NBA CHAMPIONSHIP : Lakers vs. Celtics : IT’S SHOW TIME : Ready or Not, Boston, Here Come the Lakers

Short series?

“I don’t think we’ll win in four, no.”

On the eve of Lakers-Celtics X, back by popular demand for the National Basketball Assn. finals, that prediction was uttered by:

a) Michael Cooper.

b) Mychal Thompson.

c) Michael Jackson.

d) Larry Joe Bird.

Hint: He’s the only one of the four who has ever been called an overrated white player.

Hint No. 2: His answer was a flip response to the popular view--held just about everywhere west of the Connecticut River--that the Boston Celtics have about as much chance of beating the Lakers in this series as a broken-down Zamboni machine has in a race against Carl Lewis.

The answer, of course, is Larry Bird, who is no doubt mindful that stranger things have happened--Frank Selvy’s missed jumper in 1962, Don Nelson’s lucky bounce shot in ‘69, James Worthy’s pass in ’84. And it probably hasn’t escaped him that no matter how prohibitive a favorite the Lakers may be, the record in these series still has a decided Boston bent: Celtics 8, Lakers 1.

Game 1 of the best-of-seven championship series is tonight at 6 at the Forum.

Do you think Bird cares that, given the shape they’re in, the Celtics would probably be better cast in Hollywood as patients on “St. Elsewhere” than in Inglewood as NBA finalists?

“I’m not conceding anything,” said the only Celtic big man, apart from Greg Kite, who can stand on his own two feet without at least one foot threatening to quit on him.

“I’ll take them as far as I can take them. . . . We felt last year that nobody could beat us. This year, I’m sure the Lakers feel the same way.

“That’s a great way to feel, let me tell you.”

The Lakers have grounds to feel as if they’re in a no-win situation. If they beat the Celtics, especially if they crush the Celtics, it will be said that it wasn’t a fair test, that the Celtics’ battered bodies could take no more.

And should the Lakers lose, they’ll be accused of being even more overrated than Bird was.

“It is tough, no question,” said Magic Johnson, responding to that scenario. “They’re using injuries and the whole thing.

“But we know they’re going to be ready. There’s no way they’re not going to be ready for the world championship.”

They shoot horses, don’t they, but they obviously don’t shoot Celtics, no matter how crippled. The Milwaukee Bucks couldn’t do it. Neither could the Detroit Pistons, even though both the Bucks and Pistons extended Boston to seven games each.

Boston center Robert Parish may take a fall every time he goes up for a rebound, but he has yet to take a dive, despite a severely sprained ankle. Celtic forward Kevin McHale will spend his summer with his right foot in a cast, but the plaster will have to defer to the parquet of the Boston Garden floor.

Bill Walton’s condition has deteriorated from day-to-day to step-to-step, but as long as he keeps putting on a uniform, there’s always a chance he’ll play something other than a 7-foot red-headed cheerleader.

“They’re tough and they’re gutty and they’re winners, and they don’t make excuses,” said Mychal Thompson, who made his Laker debut against the Celtics in a win at the Forum in February, when the Lakers completed a two-game, regular-season sweep of Boston.

“Every time they talk about their injuries, it’s because the press brings it up. They don’t walk around with T-shirts that say, ‘I’m Hurt’ on their chests.”

The Lakers, however, are looking to unload that chip on their shoulders they’ve carried around since last spring, when Houston took them out in five games in the Western Conference finals.

There’s no one they’d rather do it against than Boston.

“I love to play Boston--I want ‘em,” Magic Johnson said.

“Last year when I went to do the finals (for CBS), Houston-Boston, people in Boston kept coming up to me and saying, ‘We wish you all was here. It’s not the same .’

“We were way up in a corner--they had built a booth up there--and I’ll tell you, before the game, at halftime, end of the quarters, people just kept coming.

“ ‘Magic, we wish you all was here.’ And I was saying, ‘Maaaaan. ‘ And they were right. Because the electricity wasn’t the same.”

And only Kelly green lights up the Forum the same way, he said.

“It’s buzzing,” he said. “This place is packed. We come out of warmups and there’s not a seat to be had.

“That’s what you love as a player. Every shot’s a big shot. Every play’s a big play. That’s what you want.”

What the Lakers want to do against the Celtics is rather simple, really: Run them into submission. On defense, they’ll double-team Bird and McHale and dare Boston to beat them with the outside shooting of Dennis Johnson (9 of 31) and Danny Ainge (42.3% against the Pistons).

“I know they’re going to double me every time I get the ball,” Bird said. “They’re going to try to cut down the number of times I touch the basketball.

“But if I’m playing well and hitting my shots, I don’t think it will make a difference.”

But what difference will it make if Bird hits his shot but the Celtics can’t run with the Lakers? Or whether the Boston defense will be quick enough to double on James Worthy or Magic or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, given the dizzying swiftness of the Laker ball movement?

Tom Heinsohn, the Celtic coach turned CBS commentator (some say Celtic apologist), acknowledges Boston could be in big trouble.

“The Lakers are the perfect team to attack the Celtics’ weakness, which is a lack of speed,” Heinsohn said. “The Lakers are not going to give up the pace game easily.

“The Celtics will try to slow them down, but the Lakers are even better at their style of play than ever before.

“A couple of years ago, Magic was the only guy to advance the ball. But now they’ve diversified the ‘push’ man. (Byron) Scott pushes it up, Cooper, even Worthy.

“That’s a pretty tall order for the Boston defense. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but it ain’t going to be easy.”

This may surprise those who believe Heinsohn watches these games through an Irish mist, but he’s not buying the notion that the Lakers’ superiority can be tracked only on a medical chart.

“When the Lakers came into Boston back in December, they did a number on Boston, when everybody was healthy.

“They played the pace game, there was a great fourth quarter by Kareem (Abdul-Jabbar), and the Boston offense just evaporated in the end.

“I call it the meltdown. The Lakers were the first team to make them melt down in the fourth quarter at home.”

That win ended the Celtics’ 48-game winning streak at Boston Garden.

A Laker win in this series would keep the Celtics from becoming the first team since 1969 to repeat as NBA champions.

“It’s time to play,” Laker Coach Pat Riley said. “But if we get caught up in making assumptions that they’re tired or injured, we’re going to get our butts kicked.”