Do Your Homework, Then Guesswork

Danny Ferry, Sean Elliott, Stacey King and Glen Rice--not necessarily in that order--are supposed to be four of the first five players chosen in Tuesday’s National Basketball Assn. college draft. And at least one of them is a total stiff.

Trouble is, nobody knows which one.

The Sacramento Kings wish they knew, because they are scheduled to choose first in the draft, barring an 11th-hour trade. Everybody’s All-Pros, the Clippers, wish they knew, because they are set to go second. July is the one month of every year when every basketball lover in Los Angeles is talking about the Clippers, discussing when and how the player they picked in the June draft will get injured.

Although they all seem to be sure things, one of these major cagers--Ferry, Elliott, King and Rice--will not pan out. It’s a tradition. Every NBA draft turns out the same way the one of exactly 10 years ago did, when Magic Johnson went first. Among the next four picks, David Greenwood, Bill Cartwright, Greg Kelser and Sidney Moncrief were deemed inseparable. Two became journeymen, one a flop, the fifth an All-Star.

Tuesday’s draft also contains a surprise, somewhere, someone on the order of Mitch Richmond, who shot out the lights for the Golden State Warriors as a rookie, or someone such as Joe Dumars (18th pick) or Mark Jackson (also 18th) or A.C. Green (23rd), all of whom were overlooked in the opening hour of their respective drafts.

Ken Norman, third of three first-round picks for the Clippers in 1987, turned out better than Reggie Williams and Joe Wolf did. The whole thing’s a crapshoot. You roll the bones and then cross your fingers that your number comes up, because sometimes the No. 1 pick in the draft is a Patrick Ewing or an Akeem Olajuwon, but occasionally he is a Kent Benson or even a LaRue Martin, the dud of 1972.

The Lakers, remarkably enough, considering their success, had four players last season who were the No. 1 picks of their drafts--Magic, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, James Worthy and Mychal Thompson. Should they somehow get their mitts on Ralph Sampson, they could have another one. Maybe the Warriors will part with Sampson, now that they are signing honorable-mention All-Soviets.

Since the Lakers and the NBA champion Detroit Pistons--our sympathies to Laker fans who find it hard to read those last four words--pick 26th and 27th in Tuesday’s draft, chances are, their picks will be men one step removed from the Continental Basketball Assn. The Lakers are looking for somebody with good ability, good attitude and good hamstrings. The Pistons are looking for somebody to replace Rick Mahorn and therefore will draft the first kid who nails a Piston scout with an elbow.

The rumor mill, by the way, has been grinding. Adrian Dantley and the No. 8 pick in the draft reportedly were dangled by the Dallas Mavericks in the direction of the Kings, who refused to part with their No. 1 choice. The Clippers allegedly discussed sending the No. 2 pick to Cleveland for Ron Harper and the No. 25 pick, but Cavalier sources called it gossip without foundation.

There is even one rumor that Sacramento will fool everybody and take Oklahoma’s King with the top pick, partly because he is pushing 6 feet 11 inches, and partly because they like the idea of having a King named King. Heck, if that’s how basketball people operate, any day now we can expect the Orlando Magic to make trade offers for Woolridge and Johnson.

Were we in charge of the club with the No. 1 pick, and we wanted to choose the best athlete available, our selection would be Arizona’s Elliott. We loved what we saw of that guy. Even if we were desperate for a shooter--and man, can Michigan’s Rice shoot--we still would go with Elliott, because he can shoot and penetrate and rebound and pass, the whole package.

The scouting report on Ferry says he can do all these things as well, that he will become a Bill Laimbeer who can shoot from long range, as well as rebound. For some reason, though, we see Ferry becoming a steady, unspectacular player and not a great one, an asset who will never be a superstar. We could be badly mistaken, but a little voice tells us the best prospect out of the state of North Carolina this year is still J.R. Reid.

Reid’s stock has gone down everywhere but in that state, where the owner of the Charlotte Hornets, one George Shinn, is warning his general manager and coach not to pass up Reid with the No. 5 pick unless they are absolutely positive he will not pan out. The Hornets hardly need Reid to juice ticket sales, having sold out every game, but Shinn has a thing about not missing out on a potential local angle. This guy probably can’t wait for a player to come along named Stacey Carolina.

Our thoughts today are with the Clippers, who could use a break. We recommend that whomever they draft, they hold off plugging him for ticket sales and putting him on the cover of their season yearbook until they sign the guy to a contract, lest he pull a Danny Manning and boycott training camp. Sign him, and then advertise him.

With the right choice--and with the Lakers losing a certain center--Showtime could soon move to the poor side of town. We are pulling for the Clippers. We always do, this time of year.