Kareem Plays One From the Heart

On the Kareem-o-Meter, which measures the effectiveness of Mr. Abdul-Jabbar as a Laker center from game to game, the readings range from “In Your Face, Young-’Un” down to “I Shoulda Stood in Bed.”

Most games this year, including playoff games, neither the needle on the meter nor Kareem himself has done much jumping.

You know how that gadfly Wilt Chamberlain is fond of saying “I could out-rebound Kareem in my sleep”?

That’s an exaggeration, of course, but there have been games when a sleeping Wilt could have tied Kareem on the rebound chart. Like the game in the Western Conference semifinals against the Seattle SuperSonics, when Kareem played 28 minutes and found no rebounds.

But Kareem was so much older then, he’s younger than that now. Sunday he put the bad times behind him, played easily his best game of the season, statistically and spiritually.

On behalf of his teammates, especially injured guards Magic Johnson and Byron Scott, Kareem scored 24 points and actually leaped for and grabbed 13 rebounds.

It wasn’t enough, as you probably already know. The Pistons won, 114-110, to take a 3-0 series lead. But if Kareem has another game or two like this one in him, there is life yet in the Lakers.

“He went back in a time machine and grabbed something out of 1970,” said Piston forward Rick Mahorn.

What Abdul-Jabbar grabbed was his heart and his legs. Big Fella was chasing rebounds Sunday, rather than vice versa. Games like this used to be routine for Kareem, but that was back when Hoover was president and gasoline was a nickel.

Opposing players still respect the Laker captain, but more from a historical perspective. There’s not much raw fear mixed in with their reverence.

“We still worry about Cap,” Piston forward John Salley said earlier in the series. Salley, like many players, looks upon Kareem as a kind of big brother, a friend. If Kareem has been aloof at times with the public and press, he has reached out to many NBA opponents, including Salley.

“You can never count him out,” Salley said, “no, Lord, and if I did, you wouldn’t never ever hear me say it.”

No, Lord, you do not want to rile the Big Fella.

Going into Sunday’s game, his playoff averages were below average--10.5 points and 3.3 rebounds in 22 minutes. He was the Lakers’ seventh-leading rebounder, barely ahead of Michael Cooper.

Piston guard Isiah Thomas, 6 feet 1, was a more effective rebounder than Kareem.

But Sunday, the game’s oldest player played 33 young minutes. His two free throws with 1:48 left brought the Lakers to within three points of the Pistons, and his scrambling defensive rebound a half minute later, snatched away from the swarming Piston board-crashers, led eventually to a James Worthy hoop, cutting the lead to one.

Kareem worked hard. On offense, to be effective, Abdul-Jabbar must establish base camp on the low post. He must fight for position, in order to set up a launching pad for the sky hook. The Piston defenders try to either beat Kareem to this spot, or to beat Kareem after he gets there, and the officials are almost always busy somewhere else.

At times Sunday it looked like the Captain was being guarded by an octopus, pinning down Kareem’s arms so it appeared he might have to take the feed-in passes in his teeth.

But Kareem battled for that low-post spot as if it was a claim in the heart of the Mother Lode.

“Kareem made the decision on his own that he wanted the ball today,” said Mitch Kupchak, Laker assistant general manager. “When he posted up, you could look in his eyes and see he wanted it. Everyone was depending on him and he came through.”

He tossed up sky hooks, spun into the lane for layups, even went up for a couple of awkward jump shots. Not Michael Jordan stuff, but Kareem was what the Lakers needed desperately in this situation--an experienced hand who was not afraid to ram the ball at the Pistons.

That’s one thing Kareem, at his best, can still give the Lakers. As even Chamberlain grudgingly admits, “I’ll say this about Kareem: He’s never been afraid to take the shot. When the game’s on the line, he wants the ball.”

Sunday he wanted it, got it, used it.

Instead of a liability, he was a beacon.

The question now is whether Kareem can do it again.

To be honest, I didn’t think he had even one of this kind of game in him. What he was until Sunday was a former great, great player demonstrating why 40-year-old (and up) men do not play in the NBA.

Sunday he was a freak of nature.

“He doesn’t have 82 of those games in him,” Kupchak said. “He couldn’t have done this all year, but today somebody had to step forward.”

If Kareem can do it at least one more time, he might not go out a winner, but he will go out Kareem.