Purple Haze

Dennis is Dennis. We’re not about to tell Dennis how to be someone else. We’d take him the way he is.

--Laker owner Jerry Buss, Feb. 5, 1999

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Talk about your famous last words. . . .

Be careful what you wish for, because it might have tattoos, multicolored hair and turn your season into a modern version of “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” in which everyone falls in line behind Dennis Rodman, as if he knows where he’s going, and no one dares admit they’re lost.

Harmony has fled Lakerdom, along with direction. This isn’t a basketball team but a spectacle, a star-studded roster that delivers boffo ratings for NBC, which has its No. 1 crew of Bob Costas and Doug Collins in semi-permanent residence . . . while the organization spins madly out of control.

Buss, who committed them to this adventure, has headed for the hills, lateraling this grenade to Jerry West.

West hates tumult but fears crossing Buss by axing Dennis, not to mention truncating any hopes they have this season. West has resolved his dilemma by going into seclusion, working from as great a distance as he can manage, taking more days--and even games--off.

Kurt Rambis, the (interim) coach, is hung out to defend the indefensible, as the powers above let Rodman slide on everything, as long as he brings a note from his agent.

Oh, aliens stole your alarm clock?

These days, what the Lakers do best is pretend. . . .

Dennis’ teammates don’t care what he does off the floor, they expected this, they knew what they were getting into . . .

Committed for better or worse, they try to keep the issue off the table for the press, discouraging questions with perfunctory answers and pained looks, expressing wide-eyed innocence or stolid support.

Sure, and all the laws of social dynamics have just been repealed.

“I have not let that bother me,” Rambis says of Rodman’s comings and goings, “and I think the players are feeding off of me. I know that players not being at practice, whether they’re sick or injured or whatever, doesn’t lend itself to building the chemistry and unity and timing aspects of playing defense but we don’t have a whole lot of practice time anyway.

“But I have not let it bother me and I don’t think it’s bothering the team. That would just be counter-productive.”

It would also be human nature. Beneath the surface, there are suggestions that nerves are fraying, as when Shaquille O’Neal started snapping rebounds out of Rodman’s arms Sunday. Before, teammates always let Dennis have everything to pad his totals.

“I don’t know who’s upset, who’s not upset,” said Kobe Bryant, in a rare acknowledgment someone might not be happy.

“As far as veterans, Derek Harper, who’s been in this league for 15 years, obviously, he’s not going to be happy about it. You have certain personalities on the team who are not happy with it. But on the whole, I think we deal with it. . . .

“I mean, you’re not happy, you want the guy there. But at the same time, you deal with it because he does come out, he does know the game plan and he does know the strategies and he does execute. We also knew what we were getting into before we signed him. . . .

“All except for being tight [Rodman twice refused to go back into games, claiming his body had tightened up]. That was something new. I’d never heard about that one before. He never did pull that one in Chicago.

“That one kinda caught me off guard. But everything else? Nah. . . . “

Dennis is unselfish.

In Rodman’s mind, playing for $600,000 (even if he keeps complaining about it, after having told the Lakers for years he’d take the minimum to come here) and not shooting the ball (as if he wanted to) makes him unselfish.

In the real world, all he cares about is himself. It isn’t seemly to call someone as messed up as he is selfish. Let’s just say he’s at such a low ebb, all he knows are his own needs.

He may wear the Laker uniform but he’s on his own trip. Take the now-dreaded Friday night-Saturday morning turnaround. On three Fridays in five weeks, he has refused to go back into games, then blown off part or all of the next day’s practice.

The full story goes like this: After games, he heads for Barfly, a hot spot on Sunset where celebs gather on Friday nights. He stays until closing and after that, often goes to parties in the Hollywood Hills.

Of course, the next morning Hollywood’s Guest isn’t much into practicing. Breathing may be enough of a chore.

He may well be the genius his former coaches say he is on the floor but off it, forget the number. His blasts at teammates are a joke. After last week’s loss to the Jazz, when everyone was (obliquely) zinging Bryant for losing track of Shandon Anderson, Rodman blustered:

“If you’re going to commit yourself to play basketball, then play basketball. If you’re not going to play, then you should sit down and don’t play. Don’t even bother coming.”

Easy for him to say. When he doesn’t feel like playing, he doesn’t come.

It’s only one season and they can cut him and go back to being the Lakers.

This isn’t just a loony adventure, it represents a meltdown in the smooth-running Laker hierarchy.

Once, Buss furnished the money and vision and West ran the basketball end. Buss made calls--like insisting they keep pursuing O’Neal--but wouldn’t override a major objection by West.

In their biggest disagreement in the ‘80s, Buss agreed to trade James Worthy to Dallas for Roy Tarpley and Mark Aguirre, then asked Maverick owner Don Carter if he could back out, saying he was afraid he’d lose his general manager. (Carter agreed, to Buss’s ultimate relief. Tarpley soon hit the rehab circuit and Aguirre’s career went downhill.)

Where once there was a clear line of authority, there are three power centers: Buss, West . . . and the players.

It’s probably more than coincidence their young stars either signed off on, or wanted, this season’s big moves: firing Del Harris, naming Rambis to succeed him, signing Rodman.

Or as O’Neal put it in an exultant moment after a recent win at Phoenix: “I’m glad I’m the general manager of this team. I’ve got this team just the way I want it.”

Buss, once a flamboyant-playboy kind of open book who relished publicity, has become media shy--he declined to be interviewed for this article--even as strains appeared between him and old favorites like West and Magic Johnson.

Insiders say Buss, at 66, is more detached, less interested in the day-to-day--which makes him less accessible to West--but more likely to say, what the heck. . . .

Not only aren’t they your father’s Lakers anymore, right now they aren’t even last season’s Lakers, who won 61 games with O’Neal missing 22, Robert Horry at power forward and that old fuddy-duddy, Harris, coaching.

Be careful what you wish for, indeed. It’s here.

BEHIND THE NUMBERS

30-9: Record last season at this point vs. 25-14 this year

18-8: Record since acquiring Dennis Rodman on Feb. 22 (17-5 when Rodman plays)

10-8: Record since trading for Glen Rice on March 10

103.8: Points allowed since Rice Trade

24th: Ranking in points allowed (95.1)

26th: Ranking in free throw percentage (.683)

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TONIGHT

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