THE NBA / MARK HEISLER : Pros Prepping for Youth Movement

It happens every Christmas: Six pro scouts attended a high school tripleheader in Madison Square Garden to see 6-foot-10 Tim Thomas of Paterson, N.J., Catholic.

At the Beach Ball Classic in Myrtle Beach, S.C., Miami Heat Vice President Dave Wohl and Orlando Magic personnel director John Gabriel were spotted, checking out 6-6 Kobe Bryant of Lower Merion, Pa., High and 6-11 Jermaine O’Neal of Columbia, S.C., Eau Claire.

Sound familiar?

It happened last winter when the pros got word a high school player named Kevin Garnett of Chicago’s Farragut Academy was considering jumping to the NBA and began scouting him. When Garnett failed to make a test score that would let him play as a college freshman, he skipped college altogether and wound up the No. 5 choice in the draft.

A year later, it’s becoming routine. Thomas, Bryant and O’Neal haven’t selected colleges yet, waiting to see if the pros are interested.

There’s one problem--no one is sure whether such early entry is OK (baseball has always drafted high school players) or it turns a phenom’s career into a longshot.

Additionally, the pros aren’t sure what they’re looking at. They have enough trouble figuring out if a 22-year-old can play on the next level; now they have to guess if an 18-year-old can skip a level.

“The tournament had some of the best players in high school basketball,” the Magic’s Gabriel said. “And though we don’t condone players coming out early from high school, college or otherwise, it’s our business to know who the best players are in the country.

“We’ve been very fortunate with our draft picks, but I don’t know if I can tell you if a high school player is a pro player. I don’t think I can. I don’t think we’ll know if Garnett is a player for two, three years.”

Pros who saw Garnett last winter, such as the Lakers’ Jerry West, the Indiana Pacers’ Donnie Walsh and the Sacramento Kings’ Jerry Reynolds, remain high on his potential. However, an NBA scout who has followed the Timberwolves says Garnett could go either way.

“He’s certainly not an impact player in any sense of the word,” the scout said. “Disregard the fact he’s 19 years old, he’s the fifth pick in the draft and he’s supposed to have an impact. Maybe he has to have an asterisk by his name because of his age.

“He’s not ready. He can hold his own in an NBA environment, but I don’t think that’s the point. The point is, is he Shawn Kemp or Bill Willoughby [a bust after going pro out of high school in 1976]? Right now he’s kind of in between, tending toward Willoughby.

“Kemp was a man. They called him the man-child. At 19 years old, he was physically mature. Garnett hasn’t matured.

“Kemp was a four/five [power forward/center]. Garnett’s a three [small forward] and his ballhandling skills, for a three, are virtually nonexistent.”

For what it’s worth, here’s a look at this season’s three prep stars:

Bryant--The son of former NBA player Joe Bryant, Kobe can play either guard position and small forward. He has been compared, however prematurely, to Grant Hill. Joe is now an assistant coach at La Salle University in Philadelphia and Kobe is said to want to stay near his father if he plays college ball.

Gabriel says Bryant was “borderline sensational” at Myrtle Beach. However, the players who have skipped college and made it in the NBA were physical prodigies such as Kemp, Moses Malone and Darryl Dawkins, not perimeter players.

O’Neal--No relation at all to Shaquille. Like Garnett, Jermaine is slender with narrow shoulders and hips and might have to struggle as a small forward until [unless?] he grows enough to play under the basket. He hasn’t yet made his test score and there’s speculation he’ll come out if he doesn’t.

Thomas--He’s NBA power forward size now. After his junior year, he was once considered the top player in his class. Howard Garfinkel, the famed “Garf,” a maven in youth basketball, has told pro scouts Thomas doesn’t work hard.

Here’s a judgment you don’t have to wait two or three years to make: If Garnett has a chance to be a star, he’d have been a lock with two years of college. However, kids are impatient, the more so because their courtiers assure them they’re the next coming.

The pros aren’t innocents: They get as excited as anyone else at the first glimpse of a rising star. Of course, they don’t know much about teaching him the game, which is what college coaches used to do, or try. The pros have to do it the way they do everything else, on the run.

Unsure whether to be intrigued or repulsed, the pros are both.

“Everybody assumed Felipe Lopez would go to St. John’s for a year and then leave and become the next Michael Jordan,” Sacramento’s Reynolds said. “That’s nice, but right now he can’t make a jump shot.

“If you look at Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, neither of them was heavily recruited out of high school. Larry Bird developed his senior year in high school. He was recruited but no one thought he was a pro at that time. David Robinson. . . .

“None of those players would have been drafted out of high school, and they’re some of the best players in our league the last 10 years. There’s probably a message there.”

Not that anyone’s getting it.

Reynolds says he’ll scout high school players if he must, “but the day they tell me I have to start scouting junior high kids, I’m done.”

He has some dignity, after all. He should be able to work five more years or so before some junior high kid comes out.

NAMES AND NUMBERS

The Clippers insist Phoenix’s Cotton Fitzsimmons called them, asking for Loy Vaught and Brent Barry for Charles Barkley, but they were never interested. Meanwhile, Barkley was announcing the latest developments daily, apparently intrigued at the thought of going to the Knicks. “Obviously, things are in disarray here,” Barkley said. “If we [Suns] get healthy, we’ll be very formidable. But that’s a big ‘if’ considering the last two years. I’m in control no matter what happens. The last time I checked, I had $20 million. And that was before the latest McDonald’s deal.” . . . Snarled Jerry Colangelo, Sun president: “With all due respect to anyone who makes a comment, the inmates will not run the asylum.” . . . Comment: If the Suns’ asking price is that reasonable, this could actually happen. The Knicks would have to be nuts not to do somersaults to do it. Of course, they have no young players anyone wants. . . . Encouraging sign: Clipper owner Donald Sterling, who reportedly was interested in Barkley, allowed himself to be talked out of it by his basketball people.

Pat Riley, whose cool is fabled, went off last week in Portland, suggesting how hard the Heat’s injury-riddled season has been on him. Riley worries referees are out to get his team because of its rough-tough rep. When they put Rod Strickland on the line for the game-winning free throw on a hand-check, then let the Trail Blazers bump Alonzo Mourning to the floor on his last shot, Riley fumed: “That was a royal [miscarriage of justice]. It has got to stop.” . . . We’re not just talking old school, we’re talking Biblical: Utah’s John Stockton, running third in All-Star balloting to Jason Kidd and Clyde Drexler: “Is that where I am? I don’t usually watch stuff like that.”

Rebuilding, it’s not as easy as it looks: 76er Coach John Lucas is reining in rookie Jerry Stackhouse, who is struggling as teams take away his pet baseline move and is now shooting 41% with a league-worst 4.3 turnovers a game. “He has to realize he can’t take the game over in this league like he could,” said Lucas. “Jerry has to realize that I leave him out there a lot of times. That [garbage time] is where he’s getting a lot of his points.” . . . Maverick Coach Dick Motta, happy that Dallas fans have barely noticed his team’s plummet: “Thank God for the Cowboys. We’re praying for them to make it to the Super Bowl. That would take us through the All-Star break. By that point we could start thinking about the lottery and people would be rooting for us to lose so we can get a good player.”

Rewrites for “The Lake Show”: Minority owner Magic Johnson ended his latest comeback plans with a blast (“I don’t know how to come back with a team like this. I’d be fighting with somebody out there.”) but, during Friday’s 101-100 victory over Houston, high-fived Eddie Jones and Vlade Divac after each went through Hakeem Olajuwon for key baskets. Nick Van Exel looks like himself again, but Cedric Ceballos is going south. Early this season, Coach Del Harris said Ceballos was improved in nearly everything, but Laker brass now worries he separates himself from the group off the floor and looks as if he’s out for himself on it. Before Friday’s game, comparing the absent Ceballos and Robert Horry, Harris noted that Ceballos was superior statistically but added that intangibles should be taken into account.

Stranger even than the NBA: The Orlando Magic, diverted from Philadelphia by the blizzard, found themselves in a hotel bar in Allentown, Pa., with a wedding party, a touring Sesame Street troupe and an alternative punk band called Marylyn Manson. “It was like the scene in ‘Star Wars’ where you have all the animals from different planets in the bar,” said the Magic’s Jon Koncak, and Horace Grant claimed one rocker, called The Grim Reaper, had 10 times as many tattoos as Dennis Rodman. “I couldn’t look him in the eye,” Koncak said. “I figured if I made eye contact three times, I’d be dead.”