Ceballos Wants Charles in Charge

“I can beat you blindfolded,” Cedric Ceballos said, and so he did, opening a good many eyes by closing his own and jamming home the first no-look NBA All-Star slam dunk championship.

For a few days in February, Ceballos had the whole league buzzing.

A blindfolded dunk.

Was that really a blindfold, or did Cedric just sneak a black see-through stocking past the judges?

And if it was for real, is that something they regularly teach at Cal State Fullerton?

Too bad Ceballos had to remove the mask. Vision restored, his superstardom shriveled and his point of view returned shortly to its customary angle--the end of the Phoenix Suns bench, or, as the folding chair had been christened: “Cedric Slept Here.”

At a slender 6 feet 6, Ceballos was a big guard without Jeff Hornacek’s long-range accuracy and a small forward without Dan Majerle’s muscle, a Sun without a place to set. In 64 regular-season appearances, Ceballos started only four times. He averaged 11 minutes and 7.5 points. He was lost in the swirling Phoenix mix of young stars (Kevin Johnson), budding stars (Hornacek) and fading stars (Tom Chambers).

Just as Ceballos was beginning to edge his way off the bench--he started eight games in the playoffs--the Suns determined which type of star their collection still lacked.

Mega.

Which is where and why Charles Barkley entered the picture.

For weeks, Ceballos heard rumors. They were hard to miss. Ceballos came equipped with only a blindfold. Earplugs weren’t included.

“That trade was going on for a year,” Ceballos says. “Nobody knew who or when, but two weeks before it happened, everybody in Phoenix knew it was coming. The question wasn’t whether Charles was coming. The question was, ‘Who’s going? ‘ “

Ceballos figured the answer might be staring back in the mirror.

“Everybody was on the block,” Ceballos says, “and I knew Philly definitely wanted me.”

But Ceballos wasn’t as expendable--or, perhaps, as desirable--as he thought. When the trade came down June 17, Hornacek, third-year center Andrew Lang and third-year forward Tim Perry were the ones cleaning out their lockers.

Ceballos stayed behind to watch where the bodies landed. Barkley’s moved in at small forward, for lack of a better designation (“And now starting at Belligerent Forward . . . “). Majerle’s moved over to starting off-guard.

Ceballos’?

How did sixth or seventh man sound?

Surprisingly, not bad.

“That was a great deal for us,” Ceballos says. “We give up three good players, but Charles is one of the top players in the league. In the world.

“If we had a chance to get him, we couldn’t pass it up. And I don’t think his talent is the biggest factor. What we lack the most is leadership. Nobody on our team has the guts to stand up and be accounted for . . .

“We had the talent to take it all last year. We could’ve taken it all this year. But we don’t have heart. That’s where it comes from. In the playoffs, we don’t play to win, we play not to lose. Toward the end of the year, we always let it creep up on us, like a monkey on our backs.”

A harsh self-assessment, but one that hits nothing but net. In the 1990s, the Phoenix Suns have been the tin men to the Portland Trail Blazers’ scarecrows. If only the Blazers had a brain, if only the Suns had a heart. The best West and the best Johnson in the NBA now play for Phoenix--Jerry and Magic being retired--and even with the presence of Chambers and the quick stop-over by Xavier McDaniel, the Suns have been eliminated the past two postseasons in the first and second rounds.

“Charles works and makes a team hungry,” Ceballos says. “Even in Philadelphia--they never had that much talent but he always had them in the playoffs.

“If Charles tells you to do a better job, you listen. A coaching staff can only criticize so much. Players seem to listen to players more.”

Ceballos has seen this act before, because before there was Phoenix, there was Fullerton. He remembers his senior season, when he and three other starters were back from a 1988-89 team that went 16-13 and beat Nevada Las Vegas once.

He remembers what happened in 1989-90.

Complete reversal: 13-16.

Two years later, that missed opportunity helped spell divorce for Coach John Sneed and the Titans, sending Fullerton one way and Sneed to Saudi Arabia, where conditions will be more in line with his personality--dry and arid, with no Orange County media jackals within the hemisphere.

Looking back, Ceballos doesn’t fault Sneed as much as the players he recruited.

“Fullerton will be Fullerton,” Ceballos says. “Too many individual personalities who just weren’t satisfied being role players.

“Look at the great days at Fullerton. Leon Wood was there, dishing the ball. Greg Bunch rebounded. Ozell Jones blocked shots. Everybody didn’t try to be something they weren’t. You didn’t see Greg Bunch dribbling coast-to-coast and passing behind the back to Leon Wood for a dunk.”

No, you didn’t, because Bunch played at Fullerton from 1973-78 and Wood played from 1981-84, but, Cedric, we understand your point.

“I knew (Sneed’s firing) was coming,” Ceballos says, “because of the camaraderie. He just couldn’t get it back together again after ’89.”

Now it is ’92 and every sports program at Fullerton requires its own patron saint.

Fullerton baseball has Kevin Costner’s pat on the back.

Fullerton football has Mark Collins’ checkbook.

Fullerton basketball wants Ceballos’ blindfold. Recently, the school approached its NBA alum for that famed strip of cloth, for the purpose of auctioning it off for, potentially, hundreds of thousands of pennies.

Ceballos donated a jersey, a warm-up jacket and some shoes instead.

“To me, the price of that blindfold is too high,” he says. “It accomplished a lot of things for me. It got my name out there on a national level. I couldn’t give it up.”

Ceballos would rather be known for the blinding gleam of a championship ring, but until Barkley gets acclimated, it will have to do.