Roberts Holds Key to Trade : NBA: Clippers trying to package Smith, Rivers and Kimble in three-team deal for Orlando’s center and Knicks’ Jackson.

The Clippers are ready. The New York Knicks are ready. The Orlando Magic is ready.

But Stanley Roberts is not.

So three teams and four other players, not to mention the destination of three draft choices, await the decision of a 22-year-old with one year of NBA experience to see if a major trade will be completed. As an executive from one of the clubs involved said: “The kid holds all the cards.”

The deal on the table calls for the Clippers to get Roberts from the Magic and Mark Jackson from the Knicks, New York to get Charles Smith, Doc Rivers and Bo Kimble from Los Angeles, and Orlando to get two or three first-round draft choices, one from the Clippers. But Roberts, exercising an option in the five-year, $14.4-million contract he signed last month, has blocked the deal.

Orlando Coach Matt Goukas was expected to talk Tuesday with Roberts and ask him to agree to the deal, but that meeting did not come off. The Magic--or Clippers--cannot offer any monetary incentives, only stress to Roberts that he will get more playing time elsewhere and remind him of another clause in his new contract that calls for a 15% salary increase beginning with 1993-94 in the event of a trade.

Why are the Clippers willing to trade Smith? He signed a one-year contract last month, saying he will leave the team when it expires, and the Clippers are concerned about losing him without getting compensation. Thus, their four-year starter is the headliner in any potential deals.

They had hoped to use him to lure Minnesota back into talks about Pooh Richardson and Felton Spencer, but the Timberwolves kept asking for Danny Manning, thereby putting a quick end to those talks.

“You’ve got to understand, I initiated the trade,” Smith said. “I signed the qualifying offer stating for various reasons that it was time to move on.”

Smith could still play a role in his immediate destination by giving interested teams an indication whether he would stay beyond this season. He told Minnesota, for example, he wasn’t interested. But he gave the Knicks reason to believe an investment now could pay off beyond 1992-93.

The Clippers, prepared to send one of next year’s two first-round picks to Orlando, will be $312,500 under the salary cap if the trade is completed, and that would be a start in negotiating with rookie Elmore Spencer. Don MacLean, another No. 1, will cost more. One option being discussed is waiving William Bedford, acquired in a draft-day trade with Detroit, to free another $462,000.