Curtain Down on Showtime

In the locker room after Game 5, the night the bubble burst, the interviewer was blunt. “Is,” he asked Laker Coach Pat Riley, “the dynasty over?”

Riley’s tie matched the striped shirt. The cuff links glittered in the TV lights. Pat Riley looked like a center spread in GQ. But it was not a question he wanted to hear.

“No,” he said carefully, “it needs a little upgrading like any dynasty. But it’s definitely not over. There’s too much talent left.”

Over in another area, The Dynasty itself was sitting, toweling off in front of a row of perspiring print and electronic reporters. Magic Johnson was almost whispering. His famous smile was present, his answers were polite, G-rated. But he sounded like a man rehearsing his farewell tour.

Johnson has always been the last man out of a locker room. So long as there’s a question to be answered, air time to fill, Magic is patiently available. He turns out the lights, leaves with the janitor.

But on this night, he appeared not to want the moment to end. In another corner of the dressing room, Arsenio Hall, no less, waited for his friend to get through, get dressed and go into the night. He finally gave up the vigil. Magic was going over his answers for each new set of people as soon as they arrived.

Is the dance over? Is Showtime as long gone as vaudeville? Does Magic want to spend his twilight years feeding the ball to a succession of players more suspect than prospect, a generation of hope-to-be’s but never-will’s, a team of fading stars and confused rookies?

Magic has been on the Yankees. Magic has lived on the top of the hill. Does he want to go back down into the pits? He has never known the agony of mediocrity. Where Magic goes, the lights shine, the cameras wink, the crowds cheer. Does he want to wind down his career now with the, so to speak, Atlanta Braves?

It takes two men to run a basketball team--one to bring the ball upcourt and the other to score with it or rebound it.

When those two men were Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the surrounding cast didn’t matter. A guy to suck up the fouls here. A guy to get the loose ball there. Magic and Kareem made them all look like all-stars.

It wasn’t a league, it was a parade. The Lakers either won or were in the NBA’s championship series every year--except for two fluke years when Houston got lucky in a prelim.

But this year, the Lakers were well beaten. They squandered leads, they threw the ball away, their tongues were out and they were gasping for breath, sneaking peeks at the clock. The Phoenix basketball expert, Joe Gilmartin, put it best. “The Lakers,” he said sadly, “remind me of an old fighter who has gone to the ring once too often. His eyes are cut, his nose is bleeding, his legs are shot, his ears are ringing and he’s fighting on pure instincts. It’s painful to watch.”

Were the Lakers of 1989-90 just two guys in a lion suit scaring the league out of its game? Did they win a league-topping 63 games on reputation?

Couldn’t the league see this team had a hole in it? Kareem couldn’t last forever, but when he left, was the team ready? When Babe Ruth left, the Yankees had Lou Gehrig and Joe DiMaggio. When Abdul-Jabbar left, the Lakers had Mychal Thompson and Vlade Divac.

Any team that has Magic Johnson still has cards to play. Unfortunately, there are not enough aces. Not even Magic can hold off the league when the playoffs come and the blue chips are on the table.

The old Boston Celtics used to fall slowly and majestically like a great redwood tree. But they grew back. The Bill Russell-Bob Cousy-K.C. Jones Celtics toppled, but in a while, here came the Dave Cowens-John Havlicek Celtics and forced the league into a turnover. They faded, and along came the Robert Parrish-Larry Bird combine.

The Lakers used to have this reproductive capacity. The Elgin Baylor-Jerry West mini-dynasty ebbed, and along came Wilt Chamberlain. When Wilt retired, owner Jack Kent Cooke went out and finagled Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

This time, there are only banners in the dust. When the cry rings out, “The King is dead!” there’s no answering echo, “Long live the King!” There isn’t any.

There’s nothing wrong with the Lakers that a Patrick Ewing, Akeem Olajuwon or David Robinson couldn’t fix. But there’s nothing wrong with the Sahara that a flood couldn’t fix.

Even the coach is making noises like a man about to go over the wall. “I can’t honestly say what I’m going to do,” acknowledges Pat Riley, sounding like a guy who’s got the bags packed and the motor running.

He probably doesn’t want to coach a one-man team. Does Magic Johnson want to be a one-man team? Face a future as a king without a realm, a general without an army? Are the Lakers as dead as the Hapsburgs? Are they yesterday’s roses, not only not champions, not even contenders?

It’s always dangerous to bury a live monarch. But you can’t win basketball games on memory. You can’t lead the league on reputation. This emperor has no clothes on, and no one (but Phoenix) noticed.

They tell you the game has changed. They talk grandly of “half-court games” or “transition games” and call double-teaming “trapping.” Detroit wins by holding everybody to 86 points, they assure you. The other team never gets the ball.

The other team would get the ball if it were the 1980-87 Magic-Kareem Lakers. Detroit would be lucky to hold them under 86 for three quarters. But Magic can’t pass the ball to himself. Michael Jordan is the only one who can.

The game hasn’t changed, players have. They get old.