THE NBA /MARK HEISLER : Balance of Power Remains Tilted Toward the West

Here’s something that can almost always be said at this time of year:

It wasn’t supposed to happen quite this way.

The pendulum was supposed to have swung to the East. The Chicago Bulls and New York Knicks were supposed to be co-titans. So how come five of the six best records at weekend’s start were in the West?

Here’s how the league looks as midseason nears:

PACIFIC DIVISION

Consensus preseason pick: Portland Trail Blazers.

1. Phoenix Suns--Nobody knew what to expect of them, or does yet. They have been the best team in the league, mostly without Kevin Johnson. Skeptics say they are a smallish, regular-season phenomenon slated for extinction against bigger teams in the playoffs.

2. Seattle SuperSonics--The dark horse contender. They are deep, physical, No. 4 in defense, No. 5 in offense and lead the league in average winning margin, 7.8 points. Problem: Key players Shawn Kemp and Gary Payton are very young.

3. Trail Blazers--Everyone is getting off them, perhaps too soon. Rod Strickland and Mario Elie make them more flexible. If Clyde Drexler comes all the way back, anything is possible.

4. Golden State Warriors--Never, ever, sell Don Nelson short, but his Smurfs are running faster and faster to stay in the same spot.

5. Lakers--Betwixt and between, neither good nor bad.

6. Clippers--Front-office politics dominate again. Short golden era, wasn’t it?

7. Sacramento Kings--Upbeat Garry St. Jean was a good choice. Luckily for him, another lottery is only six months off.

MIDWEST DIVISION

Preseason consensus pick: Utah Jazz.

1. Jazz--Mild disappointment. Jay Humphries and Larry Krystkowiak help, but John Stockton’s playing time, scoring and shooting are down and Mark Eaton is struggling after arthroscopic knee surgery.

2. San Antonio Spurs--Who has the best record in the NBA? John Lucas, 13-2.

3. Houston Rockets--They are up, they are down, as always.

4. Denver Nuggets--First stage of rebuilding: young, talented, clueless.

5. Minnesota Timberwolves--OK, they fired their coach, when is the honeymoon?

6. Dallas Mavericks--Still in the running to be the loser of the ages.

ATLANTIC DIVISION

Preseason consensus favorite: New York Knicks.

1. Knicks--Callers to WFAN are flipping out about their scoring woes; they are last at 97 points a game. With seven new players, it had to take Pat Riley time, but they are still a good bet to be there when the playoffs start and the games get rough.

2. New Jersey Nets--In three months, Chuck Daly has seen fire and he has seen rain but has quieted the storm. Derrick Coleman has zipped it up, Chris Morris hasn’t refused to go into one game and Kenny Anderson’s coming fast.

3. Boston Celtics--See Lakers.

4. Orlando Magic--Shaquille O’Neal and the 11 dwarfs. Needed: a power forward alongside him. Free-agent-to-be A.C. Green?

5. Philadelphia 76ers--Doug Moe’s motion offense whirls again. They are not going anywhere important, but will entertain themselves ambushing big guys.

6. Washington Bullets--See Nuggets.

7. Miami Heat--A funny thing happened on the way to respectability. Glen Rice, player of the month last April when he averaged 25 points, is clumping along at 19.

CENTRAL DIVISION

Preseason consensus pick: Chicago Bulls.

1. Bulls--What a short, strange trip it’s been. Even for a team with weird chemistry, the level of finger-pointing has been remarkable. Time will tell if it’s terminal or merely entertaining.

2. Cleveland Cavaliers--When Brad Daugherty, Mark Price and John (Hot Rod) Williams are all there, they are pretty tough. Of course, that has been for only a handful of games. Good enough to be taken seriously at the top of their game, perhaps.

3. Indiana Pacers--They were .500, they are .500, they will always be .500.

4. Charlotte Hornets--Alonzo Mourning needs this season to chill to merely intense. In three years, we won’t be talking Bulls-Knicks, but Hornets-Magic.

5. Detroit Pistons--See Lakers and Celtics. Dennis Rodman is even more amazing this season than last, and they are 0-10 without him. They are completely dependent on his rebounding and defense, which is too bad because he’s 31. They should trade him and rebuild, but it’s hard. Like the Lakers and Celtics, the Pistons draw well in an expensively scaled house, make big bucks and are respectable enough to hold their heads up.

6. Atlanta Hawks--This is what happens after the wrecking ball hits. They should finish the demolition by trading Dominique Wilkins, 33 but still kicking.

7. Milwaukee Bucks--When Coach Mike Dunleavy leaves to scout college players, you know what he expects.

CHARLES, CHARLES, CHARLES, CHARLES (CONT.)

It’s hard to say a player leading the NBA with 12 technical fouls has mellowed. But before Charles Barkley jumped over the Madison Square Garden press table and chased the officials down the hall, you would have had to give him a B in deportment.

Remember, this is a guy who had not been higher than D-plus in the 1990s.

Barkley, shown on instant replay to have been fouled on a three-pointer at the end of the Suns’ defeat by the Knicks, didn’t get the call. When he complained, he says referee Jimmy Clark replied, “That’s going to cost you money.”

Perhaps tired of tithing to NBA headquarters, Barkley went off, bounding down the hall after Clark, yelling, “You can’t control me with money!”--and was immediately fined $10,000 by NBA Vice President Rod Thorn, who tossed in a one-game suspension worth $29,512.

Moral: If you have to jump over a press table, don’t do it in New York, where Thorn will see it 12 times on TV by midnight.

Said Barkley, only slightly mollified: “I don’t think it warranted a suspension, but I know what they’ve got to do. They’ve got to keep people coming so they’ve got to control the image of the league.”

To which he added:

“It was a bad call. They’re bad referees.”

Any shadow this casts on his season is unfortunate. Barkley is a lock for the MVP unless he actually catches and devours an official.

One is tempted to plead with him: Everyone else gets bad calls, everyone else has to live with disappointing losses, why do you do these things to yourself?

On the other hand, speaking for those of us who write NBA columns, welcome back, big guy.

HOWDY, NEIGHBORS

Trail Blazer guard Terry Porter, bristling at glowing reports about the SuperSonics:

“Now they think they’re the new kids on the block. I heard George Karl say their game in Utah the other night was a preview of the Western Conference finals. Well, they ain’t shown nothing yet. They’ve been in second place for 40-something games and they’re pretending they’re the new kids on the block.

“It’s not like they went 40-2 or something. I think Phoenix is the new kid on the block. People keep acting like we’re awful and we’ve disappeared. Shoot, we’ve been without a healthy Clyde (Drexler) and Jerome (Kersey) almost the whole year and we’re still right with both of them. I wouldn’t advise anybody to forget about us.”

FACES AND FIGURES

Have gun, will travel: Ordered by the league to activate Bernard King or let him go, the Bullets released him, choosing peace in the family over extra salary cap-room next season.

Let’s look in on the two-time defending NBA champions: Michael Jordan’s 64 points in that overtime loss to the Magic might have looked impressive on the evening news, but his teammates didn’t think much of the performance. Jordan had 49 shots and one assist in 47 minutes. Horace Grant and Scottie Pippen wouldn’t talk afterward, but Pippen pointed to Jordan’s assist total on a stat sheet. Said Jordan, unimpressed in his own right: “If a guy is going to have a good night, that doesn’t mean the supporting cast has to take the night off.”

Reserve center Stacey King said the Bulls had a meeting to discuss it. Grant said, “We had a few things to say to each other. We found out a few things about each other.” But the rest of the Bulls said there was no meeting. It turns out that King merely got up and started talking at the end of a film session while many of his teammates were filing out of the room, paying as much attention as usual to Stacey.

Rent-a-role-player: Grant can become an unrestricted free agent at the end of the 1993-94 season and vows to leave. Says Horace, “I’m not going to stay and be this rebounder and play defense and let my offensive skills diminish right in front of me.” . . . It’s still not nice to fool with Mother Nature or Mike: The Nets, winners of five in a row, were pointing to their game against the Bulls to see how good they had become. Before 20,000 in the Meadowlands, the Bulls brushed them aside, Jordan scoring 30 points and holding Drazen Petrovic to five for 17 from the floor.

Kevin McHale, telling it like it is as the sands run out on his career and the Celtics’ heyday: “Average teams play a lot of average games. We could look at it and say we easily could have won another four or five games, but everybody else could do that, too.” . . . Wealth and fame, it’s tougher than it looks: Miami’s John Salley, renting a house on exclusive Star Island in Biscayne Bay near Gloria Estefan and Vanilla Ice, moved out after a burglar stole an estimated $10,000 in jewelry, including his Piston championship rings. Said Salley: “I’m from Brooklyn, N.Y., and I’ve never been robbed before, ever.”

Like, what have they got to lose? The Mavericks have given Quinn Buckner the rest of the season to decide on their coaching offer. Said Personnel Director Rick Sund: “Gar (Heard, interim coach) would finish out the season. We’re very comfortable doing that.” . . . Follow the fumbled ball: The Mavericks are still on the pace of the 76ers (9-73) of 1972-73. The Mavericks fell to 3-31 by losing at home to the Nuggets, who had not won on the road since Nov. 27. The 76ers got to 3-38 before winning their fourth game.