Bulls’ Fans Should Brace for Repeat of Miami Vice

Here they come, the Chicago Bulls. The team that Jerry Krause ate.

Michael Jordan, gone. Scottie Pippen, gone. Dennis Rodman, Luc Longley, Steve Kerr, gone, gone, gone.

Hey, when the Bulls play the Clippers tonight, it will be the Clippers with the most famous and interesting player in No. 1 draft pick Michael Olowokandi.

Which got us to thinking about what to say to the Bulls’ fans, to their broadcasters, to their owners and marketing people. Do you offer condolences? Do you offer advice? Do you offer paper bags for their heads?

This has happened before, you know. A championship team ripped to pieces before its time. The Florida Marlins were ravaged, as if the world championship baseball team was a stolen car to be stripped and had its parts sold as spares.

Certainly the situations aren’t exactly comparable. The Marlins sold players in order to make the team an attractive buy. The Bulls were left to drift apart, piece by unhappy piece, because the egos of the Jerrys--owner Reinsdorf, General Manager Krause--have seemed for two years to want to get on with the job of proving Jordan wasn’t the cause of six NBA titles in the 1990s. What was? Why the shining brilliance of the two Jerrys, of course.

The Marlins won only one title, the Bulls six. In other words, the Marlins enjoyed a singular moment in time. The Bulls had a dynasty.

But what happened to the Marlins after their title--the loss of all the favorite players, the losing of more games than anyone could have imagined--that’s probably going to happen to the Bulls this year.

As Marlin radio announcer Dave O’Brien said: “It gets old going from city to city and reading over and over again about how bad you are and how embarrassing your team is. Good luck to the Bulls. They’re gonna need it.”

OK, but first the bright side.

Hardly any of the Bulls will be hassled for autographs any more. Won’t need much security. Won’t be bothered by requests for tickets. Won’t have to stand around looking humble for another ring ceremony.

Oops, that already has happened. The Bulls who were on the 1998 championship team and who are members of the 1999 team--and you know who you are, don’t you?--received their rings after practice the other day at the Berto Center, the Bulls’ practice facility. How touching.

Jordan got his at his retirement news conference. The other Bulls, the guys like Pippen, Rodman, Kerr, Longley, they’ll get theirs delivered some day soon. Except maybe Rodman. No one seems to have his address.

Even the sad-sack Marlins had a ring ceremony last year.

“We had it on the first Sunday of the season,” said Jim Ross, the Marlins’ vice president of sales and marketing. “It turned out very nice, actually. We still had a bunch of the guys then. It was before the big trade with the Dodgers. What was a little tough, though, was on opening day when we raised the championship banner. That was a little uncomfortable.”

The Bulls are going to raise their sixth championship banner at their home opener. Who will raise that banner? To be determined. It will be uncomfortable in any case. Unless the Jerrys come out wearing suits that say “Kick me,” and season ticket holders get to line up wearing steel-toed boots.

Ross, an extremely chipper man considering what the Marlins went through, said his motto since the demise of the championship team has been, “Honesty is the best policy.”

There was, Ross said, no way to hide the fact that the Marlin team which had captured the imagination of South Florida was gone so fast that it might have been a mirage. “We could only tell people to be patient,” Ross said.

Take that as advice, Steve Schanwald. Schanwald is vice president of marketing and broadcasting for the Bulls. It has been reported, or maybe this is just one of those urban myths, that someone in the Bulls’ marketing department was eager for Jordan to leave in order to give the department the chance to exhibit all its marketing genius.

Dave Dombrowski, the Marlins’ general manager, did offer some good news to Bull executives. “The hard part was not, per se, losing the games,” he said. “By the time last season started, the expectations, quite honestly, weren’t that high. The hard part were the months and months of breaking up that team. Once you make those moves, it’s best just to look ahead. Because if you reflect on what you had, that comparison can be quite sad.”

So there you have it, Clipper fans. When you show up at the Sports Arena tonight, spend some extra time asking for the autographs of Rusty LaRue (who used to be a pretty fair quarterback at Wake Forest) and Kornel David (who might be the only Hungarian in the NBA). Feel sorry for them and make them feel wanted. If you see Jerry Krause, go ahead, tell him what a great job he’s doing. Because if he keeps doing it, your team, the Clippers, won’t be the most pathetic in the NBA any more. And if you see someone wearing a Bulls’ shirt, offer them one of your paper bags and your sympathies.

And realize how lucky you are. It’s so much easier to have never been the best than to have been the best. Now to be the worst.

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Diane Pucin can be reached at her e-mail address: diane.pucin@latimes.com