Here’s Hoping He Keeps His Smile

Saturday will be the 15th anniversary of the last game of basketball Earvin (Magic) Johnson played before becoming a Laker. He played it for Michigan State in the NCAA tournament championship game March 26, 1979, against Larry Bird and Indiana State. He was 20, so much of his life was ahead of him, Los Angeles was another planet and the last thing on Earth he ever expected was that one day he would be the Laker coach.

He will make a fine coach. A splendid coach. A devoted coach. Who loves the Lakers more? Who loves basketball more? Who knows more about winning? Who knows more about the NBA? Who better to restore Showtime than the star of the show himself? Mr. Pfund is out and Mr. Fun is in. Earvin Johnson, arguably healthy, definitely wealthy and hopefully wise, is the new coach of the Lakers, effective this weekend.

Magic. Excuse me. Coach Magic. Now you see him, now you don’t, now you do . . . don’t . . . do.

Why now? I have no idea why now. Randy Pfund reportedly will move on to another assignment with the organization. Magic moves in, coat and tie. Hope he kneels on the sideline so the ticket-holders can see.

I have known Earvin Johnson for more than these 15 years. I have heard him called Earvin, E, EJ, Junior, Buck, Big Fella, you name it. Everything but Coach. I never thought I would call him Coach.

He never thought anybody would. He intended to play for the Lakers until his legs wore out, not his immune system. Then he thought he might own the Lakers sometime, or else own the team they were playing. He never minded being Magic Johnson and he wouldn’t have minded being Mr. Johnson. He simply never expected to be Coach Johnson.

His first time inside the Forum, 1979, he got there ahead of everybody but Jack Curran, the trainer. He asked Jack if he could sit in the stands by himself. He sat there thinking of games he played at Everett High, back in Lansing, Mich., and about hey, look at me now. Curran called out to him several times before Earvin came out of his fog. He took the big fella downstairs into the dressing room. Magic saw golden shirts on hangers, with names on the back: ABDUL-JABBAR, NIXON, WILKES. He started crying.

“A lot of people thought I’d never get this far,” he said later. “Not because they didn’t support me, but because almost nobody back in Lansing had big dreams.”

Stu Nahan and Jim Hill took him aside after his first news conference. A couple of TV vets, giving tips to the new kid in town. Told him to think about what he said before he said it. Told him what L.A. was like. Later on, Earvin said, Hill said to him: “Magic, there will eventually come a time when you won’t play anymore. What do you see yourself doing when your playing career is over?”

Magic said: “Actually, Jim, I’d like your job.”

Lo, these many years later, he has had other jobs. Been a Magic of many trades. Sat behind a mike. Peddled Pepsi. Endorsed all sorts of stuff. Ran camps for kids. Made a bid to buy an NBA franchise for Toronto. Barnstormed through Europe. Produced AIDS-education tapes and literature. Began his own one-on-one TV chat show, out to become the 6-foot-9 Barbara Walters. Guess maybe that one goes on the backburner for a while.

I don’t know everything about Magic, but I know how much he misses basketball. How he needs to be around it. How whatever energy he has, whatever knowledge he has, compel him to bring it back to basketball. His world is as round as that ball.

But the timing. Oh, the timing. Magicians are supposed to have timing. So why now? Why 64 games into the season? If someone has to strip the fun from Randy Pfund, must it be today? It couldn’t wait? Are the Lakers going somewhere we don’t know about? Do they think they can still make the playoffs? Do they think Magic will bring them luck when the lottery Ping-Pong balls come popping out? No, the question isn’t: “Why Magic?” The question is: “Why now?”

My enduring memory of Randy Pfund will be of him walking off that court after Monday night’s Miami game, a winner. What a prince of a guy this is. What a way this is for him to go out. To find out after a victory that he was history. When I called his home phone number Tuesday night, the answer-machine recording ended with: “Leave me a good message.” Wish I could have.

Earvin Johnson has not one whit more experience coaching than Randy Pfund had when the Lakers put him in charge. Randy struggled. Some of it was his fault, some of it was that he had a club full of rookies as raw as the coach, Doug Christie, George Lynch, Anthony Peeler, Nick Van Exel, a veritable no-star team. They traded Sam Perkins, discarded Byron Scott, were abandoned by A.C. Green. Every move was understandable. But the poor coach was stuck with what was left.

Coaching is a tough racket. That championship season at Michigan State, the team lost--and I mean lost big--to last-place Northwestern one night. The coaches were on the players’ cases. The players were uptight. They held a team meeting, after which Magic said, “We told the coaches to stay off our backs and we would play harder. We said we’d start diving for loose balls and everything.” They did.

Maybe this means Magic Johnson will be a John Lucas type of coach, turning the talent loose. Of course he is older now, has ideas. And he has no David Robinson, no Dennis Rodman out there. Of course, Magic wouldn’t want one of his younger players to do what he did that one night, which was to protest Paul Westhead’s strategy sufficiently to get the coach canned. “Shut up and pay attention!” Westhead once yelled in the huddle. “I am paying attention!” Johnson yelled back. “Either you start listening or you don’t have to play!” Westhead said. Let us hope Coach Johnson never has this discussion with a player.

Did I really say Coach Johnson?

Guess I did.

Magic Johnson’s a coach, Michael Jordan’s a baseball player and Charles Barkley wants to be governor of Alabama. It isn’t 1979 anymore, is it?