Shaq Ready for Pounding by Portland

It took him some time to admit it, and he might deny it today, but Shaquille O’Neal awoke Monday morning sore in his arms, shoulders and back.

He was able to perform his daily tasks without Arvydas Sabonis slamming an arm down across his forear~ms, however, which made Monday go a bit easier than Sunday. O’Neal took part in a light practice, which included 30 minutes with shooting coach Eddie Palubinskas, and then went off to a health club for a few laps in the pool. No word if Sabonis did cannonballs near O’Neal in the shallow end.

The fouls, O’Neal said, will come. He knows the Portland Trail Blazers have no choice.

So, when Portland sends Sabonis and Dale Davis after him, when Trail Blazer Coach Mike Dunleavy sends Scottie Pippen or Rasheed Wallace from the sides, or Damon Stoudamire from the top, O’Neal feels the pain. On his wrists, mostly. Sometimes on his neck.

“It’s just funny to me,” O’Neal said. “A lot of these guys have egos. Instead of saying they can’t stop me, they want to resort to other ways. Just say it. Just look in the mirror and say, ‘You can’t stop him.’ ”

When the Lakers beat the Trail Blazers, 106-93, Sunday in the first game of the best-of-five series, O’Neal took a beating beneath the basket, and gave some back. The Lakers wondered how much punishment O’Neal should have to endure, and the Trail Blazers demanded to know how it was O’Neal got away with so much.

Is the next crew of referees in town yet?

The series has started with a flurry of physical play, much of it beneath the basket, and much of it expected in a rivalry that has tightened in two seasons. Guarding O’Neal, Davis fouled out in nine minutes. Helping on O’Neal, Pippen fouled out. Less aggressive, Sabonis had five fouls.

Told the Lakers believed O’Neal had been roughed up, Pippen, with heavy-lidded nonchalance, said, “So what?”

So, Game 2 is Thursday.

“When [Pippen] was with Phil [Jackson] and they were with the Bulls, they got all the calls,” O’Neal said. “You couldn’t even touch him and Mike [Jordan]. I play good, hard, clean basketball. I go to the post. I post up deep. I get [the ball] and I try to go around you. I don’t have to go through opponents all the time. I’m very skillful. I can do a lot of things. I can dribble, I can spin, I can do a lot of things. It’s just life. There’s one big guy with a lot of size that knows what he wants to do, that wants to dominate and loves to dominate.”

After Game 1, Dunleavy said O’Neal’s spin move is illegal because of the elbows that come with it, and that O’Neal often spends more than the three seconds allowed in the lane.

The Lakers countered by saying there is a double standard, illustrated by the flagrant foul O’Neal was assessed when he shoved Sabonis in the third quarter. In the fourth quarter, Davis fouled O’Neal hard across the arms, and a flagrant was not called.

“It’s so unfair that it’s ridiculous,” Laker forward Robert Horry said. “I know one ref actually told me this one time, he said, ‘Well, he’s big enough, he can handle all of that.’ I’m like, ‘That’s beside the point. You’ve got to treat him just like you treat a small guy. The rules are the rules.’ If it was me, I’d probably be tossed out of a lot of games. I’d get somebody back.

“He’s a better man than me. I know if I get hit like that, next play I’m going to accidentally put an elbow in your nose.”

Much of the talk, particularly between games, is posturing, of course. Coaches are setting agendas.

But, in the first controversy of the series, sequences that showed Sabonis and Davis hacking O’Neal about the head and shoulders without conscience were edited out of Dunleavy’s game film.

“I think any game you play against Shaq is a physical game,” Dunleavy said. “Were we a very physical team? Not overly. Not too much.”

Told the Lakers disagreed, he said, “Wasn’t the film of it I saw.”

Jackson took issue but hasn’t immersed himself in the subject, either.

“They referee according to who Shaq is,” he said. “That’s the way the game is. That’s the NBA game. They can’t give him everything. If they gave every call to Shaq he deserves, he would score 40 points a game. That’ll be give and take all through the series.”

Besides, Jackson said, O’Neal is often trying to get out of the lane, but simply can’t elude Sabonis.

“The guy is 4 feet wide and 8 feet tall and weighs 400 pounds,” Jackson said. “It’s like running around a monument in there half the time.”

A day later, long after he’d scowled and pointed at officials during the game, O’Neal hardly seemed bothered by any of it. He shot free throws in the corner of the gym, while teammates marveled at his ability to withstand it.

“I was talking to Ron Harper on the bench [Sunday],” guard Derek Fisher said. “[Shaq] handles it better than anybody I’ve ever seen. As big as he is, he absolutely takes a beating. I don’t know how the fuse doesn’t blow sometimes. But, that shows you what type of character he has and what kind of control he has over what he’s doing.

“When you’re the man of steel, I guess you have to deal with that. I don’t envy his position at all.”

*

LAKERS vs. PORTLAND

Best of five

Lakers lead series, 1-0

GAME 2

THURSDAY

at Lakers,

7:30 p.m.

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