THE NBA / MARK HEISLER : It’s Tough for Bulls to Reach Point of No Return

Our annual predictions, starting with the most important of all:

He’s coming back.

My bet--oops--hunch is Michael Jordan will be back in a year. Having sent his letter of retirement to the league office, which he had to do if he didn’t want to go back on Oprah and take it all back, he can’t come back this season without unanimous consent of the other 26 teams. Since the Knicks have a vote, color him gone.

But next season?

It will depend on how he adjusts to doing nothing, which has never been his forte.

Last week, he dropped by his second Bull practice. Unlike the first, when he stayed only 30 minutes, this time he put on basketball stuff, worked out casually and even played one-on-one with some of his former teammates.

He said he did it at the suggestion of B.J. Armstrong, whom he had met for breakfast, that he didn’t mean to distract the team but to help the fellows remember that old Bull spirit, etc. His first season away hadn’t even started and a subtle change had already taken place. “My supporting cast” is now “the fellows.”

Said Jordan: “It brought back a lot of memories--but I didn’t miss it.”

And now to the races:

ATLANTIC DIVISION

1. NEW YORK--What race? Charles Barkley says the East is now the Knicks and “the Little Sisters of the Poor.”

2. MIAMI--Someone has to finish second. Miami was 26-22 with Steve Smith last season, 10-24 without him.

3. NEW JERSEY--On one hand, they have Derrick Coleman and Kenny Anderson. On the other, Benoit Benjamin.

4. ORLANDO--Remember Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs? This is Shaquille O’Neal and the Four Munchkins.

5. BOSTON--Robert Parish, 40, makes his swan song. The Celtics are already history.

6. WASHINGTON--The heat’s on owner Abe Pollin’s favorite, Wes Unseld, after last season’s 22-60, but he has enough now to win 30. Then what?

7. PHILADELPHIA--Geek is chic as Shawn Bradley learns the NBA game the hard way. The 76ers, loaded with no-name free agents, could win 15 if everything goes right.

CENTRAL DIVISION

1. CLEVELAND--New Coach Mike Fratello arrives with a wake-up call for Sleeping Beauty.

2. CHARLOTTE--If talent, youth and attitude were everything, the Hornets would already be NBA champions. Unfortunately, it isn’t.

3. INDIANA--Larry Brown’s honeymoon season, always a thing of beauty before the storm to come, even without Detlef Schrempf.

4. CHICAGO--As Reggie Miller said, “Take Michael Jordan away and what do they have?” The last playoff slot.

5. ATLANTA--They molder on under Lenny Wilkens, who goes from letter-perfect Mark Price and Brad Daugherty to the wild bunch, Dominique Wilkins and Kevin Willis.

6. DETROIT--Lindsey Hunter is the future, but Isiah Thomas (32) and Joe Dumars (30) are still there because owner Bill Davidson dotes on Thomas and can’t bear the thought of an empty Palace.

7. MILWAUKEE--Mike Dunleavy took what looked like the worst team in the league to the sixth-worst record, but what does he do for an encore? Try a lower finish and a higher draft pick.

MIDWEST DIVISION

1. HOUSTON--A new contract and a new owner and Hakeem Olajuwon is a new man. Billion-dollar frontcourt, 10-cent backcourt.

2. SAN ANTONIO--What did a nice guy like David Robinson do to deserve this? Sleepy Floyd, failed point guard, meets Dennis Rodman, the Extra-Terrestrial, meets Terry Cummings and Willie Anderson, trying to make it back from surgery, meets born-again gunner Lloyd Daniels. John Lucas is biting off more than he can chew.

3. UTAH--Now they’re old.

4. DENVER--Young and frisky. Rodney Rogers joins Dikembe Mutombo and LaPhonso Ellis, but Nuggets’ time isn’t quite yet.

5. MINNESOTA--With Christian Laettner and Isaiah (nee J.R.) Rider, the Timberwolves are on their way. Of course, it took them four years to get this far.

6. DALLAS--With Jim Jackson and Jamal Mashburn, better times are coming, but not until after another visit to the lottery.

PACIFIC DIVISION

1. PHOENIX--The Suns made a believer out of this scribe. A.C. Green assimilates faster than Schrempf in Seattle.

2. SEATTLE--SuperSonics are volatile and short on outside shooting, but they have enough talent to win an NBA title.

3. PORTLAND--Chris Dudley, Harvey Grant and a healthy Clyde Drexler make Trail Blazers the game’s deepest team again and one of the top four in the West.

4. GOLDEN STATE--The Curse of Don Nelson lifts at midseason. Chris Webber is a budding monster.

5. CLIPPERS--This is their last stand to win Danny Manning’s heart. For one more season at least, they have big-time talent and depth. Easy-going Coach Bob Weiss is a better fit with the free-spirited roster than the meticulous Del Harris or the tyrannical Hubie Brown would have been. Wilkens, who jilted the Clippers, has to show he can win 43 games in Atlanta as Weiss did last season.

6. LAKERS--Jerry Buss saw his team lose 43 last season and called the prospect of a 50-loss season “pure torture.” Then he asked the beat writers how many they think his team will lose. The consensus was 47. I say 50.

7. SACRAMENTO--Year in, year out, some things you can depend on.

Playoffs: Hornets make East semifinals, announce their time has come, point out their superiority to the Cavaliers and then fall in six games.

Pat Riley and Fratello are close friends, but Riley won’t talk to Fratello or let any of his assistants talk to Fratello’s during the Knicks’ seven-game victory in the East finals.

In the West, it comes down to the Suns and SuperSonics again. They go seven again. This time, Seattle wins.

The SuperSonics upset the Knicks in the NBA finals, ending the East’s five-year run. Riley is forced to delay publication of his latest book, “The Dynasty Within.”

Jordan, burning at this insult to his conference, finds a cause worth returning for and returns to lead the Bulls to another three-peat.

FACES AND FIGURES

This looks like a job for Superman and he just retired: Scottie Pippen, joining the Bulls a week ago: “Far as I can remember, we’re still the champs last year, so we’re still a 10.” . . . Pippen, two exhibitions later: “It’s going to be a long season for us unless a miracle happens overnight.” . . . Love/hate relationship: Larry Brown on rookie center Scott Haskin at the start of camp: “If the draft were today, we’d take him, and we’d probably take him if it was the sixth pick (rather than the 14th). He’s more athletic than we anticipated and he’s a real tough kid. People are going to be surprised.” . . . Brown on Haskin two weeks later: “He doesn’t have a clue.” . . . Marked down: Detlef Schrempf was a season away from free agency, wanted to go home to Seattle and didn’t hit it off with Brown, forcing Pacer General Manager Donnie Walsh to accept a modest package of Derrick McKey and Gerald Paddio. “The league is changing,” said Walsh, alluding to the one-year termination clauses that have breached the salary cap. “Teams are going to lose more free agents.”

Harold Miner, No. 4 guard in his rookie season, beat out Brian Shaw and will start this season. “I see a totally different player,” said Heat Coach Kevin Loughery, booed last season in the Forum and Sports Arena for not playing Miner more. “I see someone who is focused, someone in much better shape, someone who knows what it takes to do what he needs to.”

Net Coach Chuck Daly on his new center, Benoit Benjamin: “He’s got to become more aggressive for us to have any success.” . . . Comment: good luck. . . . Behind Derrick Coleman’s disdain for the Nets’ $69-million offer: The team suspects, with reason, that Coleman, who can’t become an unrestricted free agent until July 1, 1995, is trying to force a trade. “He can’t say we didn’t try to make him the game’s highest-paid player,” General Manager Willis Reed said. “We made the commitment to him. Now he has to make the commitment to us.” . . . 76er assistant Jeff Ruland, on Shawn Bradley’s progress: “We were wondering if he’d ever be able to go through a two-a-day practice. We’re talking about a guy, that when he ran up and down the court three times, he’d have to stop and throw up. If you told me in July he’d score 15 points a game, take nine rebounds and block four shots, I’d have told you you were nuts.”

Sign of things to come: The Celtics, who used to sell out throughout New England, drew 7,240 in a 13,500-seat arena in Worcester, Mass., and may not return. They have already given up on Providence, R.I. . . . It’s getting deep in here: Clyde Drexler, assured his request for a one-year, $17-million extension will be taken care of after this season, was introduced before a Trail Blazer exhibition and ran over to owner Paul Allen’s seat on the baseline to slap hands. . . . Proof Alvin’s back is better: Piston officials suspected Alvin Robertson was faking a back injury, miffed that the team had drafted two guards. Alvin proved them correct by jumping on top of Player Personnel Director Billy McKinney and pummeling him during a practice, for which he was suspended. The Pistons are still on the hook for Alvin’s three-year, $6.9-million contract.

It’s probably nothing, but: Charlotte’s $84-million man, Larry Johnson, is limping due to a weakened right leg, the result of a disk problem. . . . And he thought it was tough winning 55 games a season: Lenny Wilkens, whose precise Cavaliers’ offense was so admired, has to make it easy for his Hawks. “We’re using a fraction of what we did in Cleveland,” Wilkens said. “Some of the things we did in Cleveland, we won’t even try here. We don’t have the personnel.” . . . Bill Lacey, president of the Purchase campus of the State University of New York, where the Knicks spent $1 million to upgrade their practice site: “My mandate is to build a college the Knicks can be proud of.”