104th and Crenshaw Is His Real World : Pro basketball: Byron Scott still visits the old neighborhood, a reminder of where he was, and where he is.

This is about B ‘n the ‘hood.

At 30, Byron Scott, known to his friends as B, still goes back to the neighborhood at 104th and Crenshaw.

“I have a lot of friends. Their mothers still stay over there,” he says.

“We go over. Matter of fact, one of my best friends had a birthday party at his mother’s house for his son, so I was back in Inglewood. I saw her. I had to go up the street to see Mama Malone. They were all ‘Mama’--Mama Shores, Mama Malone. We just go see ‘em, show ‘em pictures of the kids, all that stuff. They still feel real close to us, and we still feel close to them.”

Everywhere he looks, he sees reminders: Skinny kids with basketball shoes and impossible dreams. Was it only 15 years ago that he was their age, with his idol Bob McAdoo’s No. 11 written on his sneakers?

He never really left them . . . and he went a million miles.

Married with three children, he lives 15 minutes away in Ladera Heights, a Laker star with a $1.1-million annual salary.

He was the one who beat the odds, but the neighborhood marked him, too, just as it taught him so many valuable things.

Take perspective.

A lot of people talk the talk, but Scott walks the walk.

Trade winds swirl around him again, but he barely stirs.

He was offered to the Cleveland Cavaliers for Hot Rod Williams in 1990, to the San Antonio Spurs for Rod Strickland last month and who knows to whom this summer?

“You get to the point--I told my wife about three years ago, ‘If we’re going to get traded, this is the year,’ ” he says, grinning.

“It didn’t happen. Next year, ‘This is the year. . . .’

“To be perfectly honest with you, it doesn’t bother me. It bothers my family; my wife, Anita, particularly because she’s the one who would have to pack up and move us. For me, it’s never been a problem. I accept the fact this is a business and these things can happen. I’ve never expected to be with one team my whole career.”

Except it’s nine seasons later and here he is, a Laker homeboy.

If he isn’t quite the brash youth of the ‘80s, running down the lane to dunk on the big guys, he remains a front-line veteran capable of big moments: Making the game-winning shot in the opener of last spring’s Houston series, averaging 18 points against Golden State in the second round, shooting 60% against Portland in the Western Conference finals.

The Bulls put John Paxson in his chest, shadowing him even away from the ball and Scott faded.

He didn’t drive on Paxson. It was a habit he had gotten out of.

After a career of accepting his role, he adopted it.

Then Magic Johnson retired, and all the circuitry that had been the Lakers was smashed.

Scott’s game is now more than coming off a screen, taking a perfect pass from Johnson, who has drawn the defense, and shooting an open jump shot.

Now Scott drives again, creates his shots and shoots off the dribble.

It’s the new Laker way.

It might be better for his total development, but ask him: the old way was more fulfilling.

“Now when we walk in, you hear all these people saying, ‘You’re done, you’re finished, you guys were the team of the ‘80s, but you’re not any more,’ ” he says.

“When we used to walk in, everybody was scared. You know, they knew. . . .”

“For me it’s still the same, but you put a little reality in it. Like, ‘It’s going to be a tough one.’ ”

Nine years in the NBA and who really knows him?

He is one of the most interesting Lakers--blunt, candid, the first of them to show you his heart . . . but almost indifferent to publicity.

Among the Lakers, Johnson offered policy statements, Mychal Thompson jokes and Scott the raw version.

Last season, when Vlade Divac struggled, it was Johnson who urged him on with carrot and stick, but Scott who described the problem starkly:

“Sometimes he comes to play, sometimes he doesn’t.”

There’s a theory that Scott gave up on celebrity in 1987-88, the season he averaged 22 points, shot 53% and still missed the All-Star team.

Actually, it goes a lot further back.

He says missing the All-Star team didn’t upset him as much as it upset Anita.

“I just kept telling her not to be that disappointed because I just thought a lot of it had to do with politics, and it was out of my control,” he says.

“I never let myself get put in a situation to be let down. . . .

“My wife, she tells me I’ve learned from my childhood to put barriers up, not to let certain things affect me. I had to tell her, it was because of what I’ve seen and what I’ve experienced in life. Basketball’s going to go on. It doesn’t matter whether it’s here or New York or Orlando or wherever. It shouldn’t be that big a deal. I don’t think guys should get ulcers over whether they get traded or not.

“I had so many things happen to me in my life, as a kid. I’m talking about friends of mine that I’ve seen die, that I’ve seen get killed. You just get to a point where you make yourself numb.

“A couple of my friends were in gangs, but three of them weren’t. But they were just into heavy stuff. I mean, they were into the drugs. I remember one very distinctly. My third year in the league, he came to my house for some money. I said, ‘No, I’m not going to give you any money.’ Next day, I went over to the neighborhood and went by his house. His mother told me he had just got killed that night.

“It’s much worse now. When I was a kid they fought with their hands. There were no knives, pistols, automatics. Now they don’t even talk. It’s all about shooting.

“If I didn’t let that bother me--and I’m talking about people I really cared about--I’m not going to let talk about trades really mess up my life.”

Scott’s stepfather was a college player and a guiding force in his life, but he has no relationship with his natural father. He says his brother served prison terms for robbery and for dealing drugs. They were on delicate terms, too, until the brother did his time and got clean.

When Johnson retired, Scott, his closest friend on the roster, cried. The next night in Phoenix, a tear rolled down Scott’s cheek on camera as he watched Kurt Rambis read a tribute.

Scott said it was the worst thing that had ever happened in his basketball life.

In real life, he had been there before.

You could ask Byron Scott. It’s not the easy way to go, but you learn which way is up.