NBA CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES : Pistons Turn a True Maverick Into Paragon Among Bad Boys

It has become a ritual in the 1989 National Basketball Assn. Finals.

Magic Johnson walks over to Isiah Thomas before tipoff, shakes hands and gives him a peck on the cheek. Johnson then shakes hands with Mark Aguirre and kisses him. Warm greetings for old friends.

There are those, however, who maintain that Aguirre is about as warm as a cobra and was the kiss of death for the Dallas Mavericks, who traded him to Detroit for forward Adrian Dantley Feb. 15.

An all-star forward with a penchant for pouting, Aguirre wore out his welcome after 7 1/2 troubled seasons in Dallas.

So when he was traded, some of the Mavericks openly rejoiced.

“Yesterday was Valentine’s Day,” forward Sam Perkins said. “But today will be an all-day party.”

The rap against Aguirre was that he was moody and selfish, that he loafed during practice and often pouted during games.

Yet Aguirre had moments of brilliance as one of the NBA’s extraordinary small forwards. A deadly perimeter shooter with a feathery touch, Aguirre, 6-feet-6 and 232 pounds, drove to the basket like an armored car on the way to the bank.

But he was one of the NBA’s worst defensive players. Overweight, he waddled back on defense.

The NBA’s top draft pick in 1981, Aguirre feuded for six years with Coach Dick Motta, who resigned after the Mavericks were eliminated by the Seattle SuperSonics in the first round of the 1987 playoffs.

Motta was replaced by John MacLeod, who had a one-year honeymoon with Aguirre.

Aguirre reported to training camp in the fall of 1987 in the best shape of his career after swearing off junk food.

That was a dream season for Aguirre, who was selected for the All-Star game--which was played in Chicago, where he starred at DePaul. He led the Mavericks to the Western Conference finals, where they lost to the Lakers in seven games.

Expected to challenge the Lakers again this season, the Mavericks collapsed, failing to make the playoffs. And Aguirre became the fall guy.

“He had a tremendous first year,” MacLeod said. “But he didn’t seem to have that fire last year. I just don’t think he wanted to play in Dallas. I think he wanted out of here and if a guy’s not happy, he’s not going to play well.”

Johnson, however, thinks Aguirre was misunderstood in Dallas.

“He always has been misunderstood,” Johnson said. “(The Mavericks) wanted him to do a lot of things that are not really in his makeup. They wanted him to be a leader. He wants to be led and just come out and play the game.”

Certainly, many of the Mavericks’ problems had nothing to do with Aguirre. Forward Roy Tarpley, voted the NBA’s best sixth man in 1987-88, missed much of the 1988-89 season after re-entering a drug rehabilitation clinic. And center James Donaldson was out because of a knee injury.

Aguirre, however, was an easy target.

And the Mavericks, who rejected a trade that would have sent Aguirre to the Lakers for forward James Worthy in 1986, sent him to the Pistons on Feb. 15 for Dantley and a 1991 first-round draft pick.

The fallout in Detroit was immediate.

Dantley, who helped take the Pistons to within a victory of the 1988 NBA championship, was a hero in Detroit, where the trade divided fans.

Even now, almost four months later, Dantley is still remembered in Detroit, where a fan hopes to collect 10,000 signatures on a petition asking the Pistons to give Dantley a ring if they win the NBA title.

Thomas, who grew up with Aguirre in Chicago, was accused of engineering the deal because he supposedly couldn’t coexist with Dantley.

Dantley’s mother, Virginia, who represents her son, had harsh words for Thomas, calling him “a little con artist.”

Dantley remains bitter, too, as he told the country on television Sunday.

“I feel like I got screwed in this deal,” Dantley said in an interview with CBS sportscaster Brent Musburger. “It was a very controversial deal. The deal didn’t have anything to do with basketball abilities. It had to do with a lot more than that. There’s a lot of politics to the game.

“Everybody knows who made the deal,” Dantley said with a smile. “It’s old news.”

The Pistons, however, say that Thomas didn’t orchestrate the deal.

“I would never put a player in that position,” said Jack McCloskey, Detroit’s general manager.

So why did McCloskey trade Dantley?

“I was concerned that we were not going to get out of the Eastern Conference,” McCloskey said. “Quite simply, we felt we would have a better chance with Aguirre.

“We get in a better offensive flow with Aguirre and he plays deeper in the post. He’s bigger than Dantley and he’s been a prolific scorer for years.”

Detroit is 45-8 since acquiring Aguirre, 26-1 in home games.

Although the Pistons were wary of Aguirre, he has been a good boy since he joined NBA’s Bad Boys.

“I was a bad boy but I’ve been an angel on this team,” Aguirre said. “I’m a total angel.”

The Pistons agree.

“I haven’t even seen Mark make a face at anybody but a referee,” said George Blaha, the Pistons’ longtime radio announcer.

“Mark’s been a joy. He’s totally committed to being a Piston team player. This is the team with the least amount of selfishness that I’ve ever seen on a squad. Nobody cares about anything but winning that ring. So it’s pretty difficult to come in and be concerned about your own numbers.”

Aguirre has hustled on defense and been a relentless rebounder, drawing praise for his work ethic.

Just to make sure he understood how the Pistons operate, though, Aguirre was initiated by the Bad Boys at his first practice, during which he was mugged by teammates Rick Mahorn and Bill Laimbeer.

“They hacked me up, the SOB’s,” Aguirre said. “They just beat me up. It wasn’t like we were playing ball.”

Laimbeer recalled it as a routine practice.

“We didn’t rough him up,” Laimbeer said. “For us, that was normal stuff but he thought it was a little bit rough because he had never experienced that in practice before.

“In practice, we can play a little more aggressive because there’s no referee there. So in practice we like to hit people and Mark’s head is so big that it’s a good target.”

Aguirre is scoring less with the Pistons than he did in Dallas, where he became the leading scorer in Maverick history.

After averaging 24.1 points in Dallas, Aguirre’s scoring has plunged to 15.5 with the Pistons, who rely on their guards for offense. He has been transformed from a star to a role player.

“On every championship team there are role players, and Mark has changed his game because he has become a role player on a good basketball team that he has helped to make great,” Thomas said.

“People think that just because he isn’t scoring as much, he’s not playing as well. But what people fail to realize is that Mark has been the guy who’s been most responsible for us having the type of record we do.”

Piston Coach Chuck Daly said the team doesn’t depend on Aguirre’s scoring, and Aguirre rarely plays during key situations in the fourth quarter.

“They were depending on him a great deal for scoring in Dallas,” Daly said. “He was a major guy they went to. We have a little more balanced attack. We make more desires of him defensively and he doesn’t have to play as many minutes.”

Laker Coach Pat Riley thinks Aguirre has adjusted well to his role.

“It was a whole different ball of wax for Aguirre in Dallas,” Riley said. “He was the player that had to get it done and he was always getting the credit or the blame.

“It’s a different state of mind for him here. Here, he’s just part of it and I think he’s producing very well.”

Aguirre’s playing time has decreased because the Pistons have one of the league’s best backup forwards in Dennis Rodman, voted one the NBA’s top sixth man.

In fact, Aguirre spent his first game as a Piston sitting on the bench, watching Rodman.

“The first night he came with us, he watched on the bench and I let him know that the best backup (small forward) in the league was out there,” Daly said.

But Aguirre has gladly sacrificed himself for the opportunity to make his first appearance in the NBA finals.

“I’m really happy about the way things have gone,” Aguirre said. “I’m happy to be with a bunch of guys who want to win. I’ve found a winning situation.

“When you get a bunch of guys pulling in the same direction, willing to sacrifice anything--playing time, shots, minutes--to win, you have a really unique situation.”

It sounds as if Aguirre has finally found a home, in Motown.