This Deal Will Take Its Toll

Ding dong, ding dong, ding dong, ding dong.

Big Ben strikes again.

In a move sure to have everyone in Inglewood dancing like Dancing Barry in the aisles, the Lakers made a trade Monday. A big trade. A big, big trade for a big, big guy. They spun the wheel of fortune and landed on ol’ Double Zero, proving once again that what goes around does come around. Oh, well. Give ‘em two points for guts.

On July 9, 1968, the Lakers traded three players for Wilt Chamberlain. He was worth it.

On June 16, 1975, the Lakers gave away four players for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. A bargain.

But on Feb. 22, 1993, amazing as it seems, all they had to give up for Benoit Benjamin was one guy.

It’s like an NBA blue-light special.

What our desperation shot-taking Lakers did was shoo Sam Perkins off to the Seattle SuperSonics for someone who has never played one dribble of professional basketball, Doug Christie, and for our dear old friend who brightened up so many lives on his last stay in L.A., that large lad who lives down the lane, that 7-foot cult figure, Lenard Benoit Benjamin, the center from Heck.

Welcome back, Len Ben Ben.

The absurdity aside, I applaud the daring Jerrys, West and Buss, for doing something to liven up the Lakers. A team skeletally thin at guard now has three from the 1992 draft--Anthony Peeler, Duane Cooper and Christie, not a bad haul. And a team getting old and gray in the front line has gotten younger if not stronger while also unloading a very large salary.

So, I propose that we let bygones be bygones and welcome Benjamin with open arms, which is also pretty much the extent of the way he plays defense. There is no percentage in our holding grudges. No point in booing Big Ben. This wouldn’t help the Lakers, who need all the help they can get.

The first thing they should do is employ Magic Johnson--who is earning $13 million from the Lakers to be a superstar emeritus--to come to every practice and game and get on the cases of Vlade Divac and Benjamin until they can’t stand to listen any more. Randy Pfund will have his hands pfull trying to motivate his double-trouble centers, who personify the NBA headache-maker who looks like an All-Star one night and all-thumbs the next.

At face value, it would appear that this trade is of greater benefit to Seattle, which is breathing heavily trying to keep pace with Phoenix, San Antonio, Portland and Utah. This conference is a monster, and the SuperSonics strengthened themselves with Perkins without giving up anybody who was even playing.

They also shed themselves of Benjamin, who has a National Basketball Assn. body and a Continental Basketball Assn. head.

Some guys have the will but not the skill. Big Ben is exactly the opposite. He is an agile man who cannot get out of his own way. He is a player everybody wants who becomes a player everybody wants to be rid of. In leagues like the CBA, there are brainy, hustling, dedicated, hopeful athletes whose spirits are willing but flesh is weak. Some would sell their souls to have Benoit’s talent and chances.

His L.A. story was funnier than Steve Martin’s. Any diary of Benjamin’s exploits during his 5 1/2 seasons with the Clippers would have been yellow-highlighted in any number of places. It would have been hilarious if it wasn’t so sad, and Benoit would be happily dismissed as a harmless flake had he not signed off with an “I don’t give a . . . about the fans” that was accompanied by a series of one-finger salutes to the Sports Arena crowd.

You would see Big Ben stuffing his face in a restaurant and that same night he would sit out because of “stomach flu.” You would see him sit out because of a sprained ankle and then bump into him dancing at a discotheque. You would sympathize with his having root-canal work and then wonder if any workingman in history ever called in sick for so many days after one day at the dentist’s.

He was so out of shape, his thighs were smeared with petroleum jelly so they wouldn’t chafe. A teammate, Marques Johnson, once rammed headfirst into that tummy and never was the same, suffering NBA whiplash. Benoit Benjamin is the only player in basketball who should come equipped with an air bag.

Once he skipped practice because of a bruised buttock after bumping into a kitchen cabinet at home in the dark. Another tragic example of NBA furniture abuse.

The funniest thing Ben ever did--besides hire Don King as his agent--was to open his bag before an exhibition and discover two left shoes. Thurman Thomas has nothing on this guy. Benoit Benjamin has always played basketball without a helmet. But he is the headache of the Lakers now, so wish them luck.

I look at this trade with tremendous hope. I hope Doug Christie can play.