Pretenders Scramble to Catch Lakers

Fifty-seven players were drafted by NBA teams last week. Six trades were announced. The free-agent market opened for business Sunday.

And yet the only news that is of concern in Lakerland came from the doctor’s office. Derek Fisher and Mark Madsen have injuries that could keep them sidelined four to six months.

By themselves, the injuries don’t portend doom. As a rookie, Madsen didn’t play a major role in the Lakers’ championship run (the biggest shock was that the injury was a torn ligament in his wrist and not a herniated disk from his dancing at the Lakers’ victory celebration). If both players heal within the short side of the estimate, they should be ready around the start of the NBA season in November.

But the injuries serve as a reminder that the greatest threat to the Lakers’ quest for a third consecutive championship comes from within. It’s in their bones and muscles and all the other parts of a human body, which simply wasn’t designed for the rigors of an 82-game NBA schedule.

Injuries denied the Lakers a fair shot at their previous try for a three-peat. In 1989, the back-to-back champion Lakers swept through the Western Conference in the playoffs before Byron Scott and Magic Johnson suffered torn hamstrings and the Lakers were swept by the Detroit Pistons.

It would take a disaster like that to keep the current Lakers from winning again. As evident from all the wheeling and dealing last week, it doesn’t look possible to put together a group that is talented enough to topple them as long as Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant aren’t hurt.

None of the players in the draft is a sure-fire impact player.

And there’s no free agent who can change the NBA landscape by changing addresses, as O’Neal did when he came to the Lakers from the Orlando Magic in 1996 in what has to rank as the most significant free-agent move in NBA history.

The closest thing to a franchise player in this year’s free-agent class is Chris Webber. There isn’t a team with the right combination of salary-cap room, talent and roster flexibility that could take on Webber and become an immediate championship contender. Indeed, it’s starting to look as if his best option would be to stay with the Sacramento Kings.

The Kings improved themselves by trading Jason Williams to the Vancouver Grizzlies for Mike Bibby. The Kings just added a much more heady and under-control point guard to what was already the best passing team in the league. But even if his presence and the expected progression of Peja Stojakovic and Hidayet Turkoglu mean the Kings win an additional three playoff games from the Lakers, they would still come up short.

Another coveted free agent is Philadelphia 76er center Dikembe Mutombo. He’s the most intimidating defensive presence in the league, but he’s probably still recovering from the abuse heaped upon him by O’Neal during the NBA Finals, when Mutombo’s only effective move was to catch an elbow in the face and draw a foul.

Michael Finley is expected to stay in Dallas, although he wouldn’t mind joining Michael Jordan in Washington. With Finley, the Mavericks are an interesting team that could be ready to make some serious playoff noise. Just not enough to startle the Lakers.

What needs to concern the Lakers is Fisher’s right foot. This is the second year in a row he has been troubled by a stress fracture in the foot. Will this be a chronic thing, as it was for Bill Walton?

The Lakers thought they had their situation at shooting guard resolved. Fisher is a hard-nosed defender, he hustles, and he became a dependable spot-up shooter last season. Plus, he has a luxury tax-friendly salary, coming in at an average of $4 million a season through 2006.

He proved to be more valuable than anyone could have imagined after returning to the lineup in the 63rd game, and his presence was a key factor in the Lakers’ late-season roll.

The uncertainty about his foot already prompted the Lakers to send Greg Foster to the Milwaukee Bucks for another guard, Lindsey Hunter.

The Lakers didn’t have much use for Foster, who basically served the same purpose as a fire extinguisher behind glass. So now there’s a bit more of a premium on retaining free agent Horace Grant. There aren’t many quality free-agent big men out there once you get past Antonio Davis, who is out of the Lakers’ price range.

There has to be some concern about Bryant’s injury status as well. He was sidelined the first month of the 1999-2000 season because of a broken bone in his right hand and sat out 1 1/2 games during the 2000 Finals against the Indiana Pacers because of a sprained ankle. Ankle and foot problems sidelined him for a stretch last season too.

Bryant will be one of the beta testers in this ongoing experiment of drafting high school players. As much as his development was accelerated by facing NBA competition during his college-age years, it remains to be seen what effect those extra games will have on his body. Will it sap some of the spring from those tireless legs?

As Bryant, who turns 23 in August, likes to say: It’s not the age, it’s the mileage.

It doesn’t help that he has already played 66 playoff games--almost the equivalent of an additional regular season. Actually, it should count as an extra season for Bryant, who has played an average of 67 games the last two seasons.

The fact that O’Neal’s knees can withstand the strain of carrying that 330-pound body up and down the court is something of a physiological marvel.

As long as he continues, as long as he and Bryant stay in the lineup, the rest of the league’s transactions are about as significant as a third-party political convention.

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J.A. Adande can be reached at: j.a.adande@latimes.com