NBA PLAYOFFS : Reticent Jordan Is Suns’ Worry Now : Game 1: Still not talking to media, he will lead Bulls in quest of third consecutive title.

Michael Jordan talks!

Of course, it was only to point out to the 100 or so reporters ringing him that Tuesday’s interview session was over, which was why he had finally appeared in the first place.

“Practice,” said Jordan, speaking his first public words in two weeks. “Gotta get off the court.”

Jordan walked away, breaking out of the encircling cameras and microphones, but the mob followed him and enfolded him again.

He moved once again and was encircled once again, pinned against a table.

An NBA vice president jumped in, declaring the session over, ordering the press off the floor.

Thus began the countdown to Game 1 of the NBA finals tonight, with the Bulls trying to become the first team in 27 years to win three titles in a row and the league trying to hide its embarrassment at its marquee player’s standoff with the media it has courted for decades.

Jordan won’t be fined, although NBA executives are trying to sweet-talk him out of his silence.

Asked if Jordan has been approached, an NBA official said: “Not officially.”

Officially, only one thing is known about silent Mike: He’s here.

Now let the Suns do the worrying.

Although they had the league’s best regular-season record and, thus, home-court advantage, the Suns are underdogs. They have played five more playoff games than the Bulls, struggling against every opponent they have met since the Lakers jumped out to a 2-0 lead.

Meanwhile, the Bulls swept the Atlanta Hawks and Cleveland Cavaliers before dispatching the New York Knicks, perhaps the league’s second-best team, in six games.

The Bulls are taller--7-0, 6-10, 6-7 across the front line, to 6-10, 6-8, 6-5--quicker and on another planet defensively. They also are more experienced.

The Bulls have been tested in the last three seasons only by physical teams and the Suns don’t qualify.

The Bulls also have good matchups: Jordan vs. any mortal (Dan Majerle in this case); Scottie Pippen vs. Richard Dumas, who was benched in the last series because he couldn’t guard Seattle’s Derrick McKey.

Being the Bulls, they didn’t mind letting the Suns know about it, too.

“This is Phoenix’s first year together as a basketball team,” said Coach Phil Jackson, back in his let’s-mess-with-their-minds mode.

“They are a team with three or four new parts to the puzzle. They are almost like the New York Knicks’ team. They are finding their way through the series and playoffs under duress. We’ve seen cracks in their armor, not only in the first series against L.A., but the one against the Spurs and the one against the Sonics, obviously.”

On the other hand, the Suns have Charles Barkley.

This may not be enough to beat the Bulls, but it got them through the interviews.

“I think that is the biggest crock I’ve ever heard,” Barkley said of the experience theory.

“Did the Bulls win it the first time they were in it? Didn’t hurt the Bulls, did it? Everybody’s a basketball genius and they ain’t ever laced up a basketball shoe their whole life.”

If he wants a witness, though, he’d better be careful which teammate he asks.

“I think experience is critical,” said Danny Ainge, a Portland Trail Blazer during last spring’s 4-2 defeat by the Bulls.

“They put it to us (in Game 1). They were more confident and more certain of what they wanted to accomplish than we were. And they set the tone of the whole series with that first half, I felt.

“Especially Michael’s performance. He said all the right things. He said ‘It’s not between me and Clyde (Drexler), it’s just a game, 12 players on each side,’ and all that. He said all the right things, gave us all the compliments we needed and went out and scored 35 on us in the first half. I think he did take it personal, that people were comparing him and Clyde.

“I think we have to take this personal. I think we have to take it that it’s 12 guys and a coaching staff--it’s us against everybody else.”

An attitude and the best team will win every time.

An attitude on an underdog? Time will tell what it’s worth.

The Suns are an anomaly. By NBA maxim, playoff time is the province of defense-oriented, half-court teams. The Suns win by outscoring opponents and struggle when the game slows down. They are entertaining, but as NBA finalists, they represent either the new basketball or a freak occurrence.

Ainge went to the finals five times with traditional teams with big front lines, the Celtics and Trail Blazers.

At his present address, he doesn’t know what to expect.

“People ask me to compare, but teams are so different,” he said. “Detroit was so unique, a team that didn’t have any inside game and did it all from their guards, but they dominated when so much of the ‘80s was inside-out basketball.

“I knew we could score, I knew we would play with a lot of heart. I wondered if we could stop teams when we had to, all the questions that all the critics have had all year long.

“I think they’re legitimate questions and we’ve answered them. We’ve won 62 games and we’re in the NBA finals and we have to answer ‘em for one more series to get the monkey completely off our back.”

A lot of people have looked for an answer to Jordan and the Bulls.

On a basketball court, at least, no one has found one lately.

NBA Notes

The teams worked out on the practice court in America West Arena while a previously booked exhibition of Japanese martial arts was held on the main floor. “We didn’t plan on it,” Phil Jackson said. “We weren’t expecting it, but it’s happened. We’ll just leave it at that. That’s why we flew down here, so we could practice on that court.” . . . The matchup that scares the Bulls: B.J. Armstrong, an indifferent defender, on Kevin Johnson, who occasionally returns to his old dominating game. Jackson has also used his all-defense first-teamers, Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, on Johnson. “It’s worked very well,” Jackson said. “We like those matchups but not for an extended period of time.” . . . Jackson, asked if the Bulls like their chances if Pippen keeps playing well: “We like our chances regardless.”