Maybe We All Can Get Along

By BILL PLASCHKE

June 3, 2001 12 AM PT

The growing roar of the Laker postseason had been momentarily replaced by the sounds of two children in my kitchen fighting over cereal.

I can’t believe I said it, but I did.

“If Shaq and Kobe can figure it out, so can you.”

A troubled couple walked into the Beverly Hills office of Dr. Marc Shatz, poured out their problems, then stated their goal.

He can’t believe they said it, but they did.

“If we could only do with our family what the Lakers have done with theirs.”

Some of us are going crazy here, but it’s a good kind of crazy.

It’s not about burning cars, but repairing bridges. It’s not about pounding a chest, but extending a hand.

For all of their extraordinary victories, these Lakers are making their biggest impact with ordinary lessons.

A prodigy dims himself for the sake of the greater good, and now shines brighter.

A giant stoops to lift those around him, and becomes larger in the process.

A mentor is silent while his students work out their conflicts, and is praised for his wisdom.

Behavioral experts say these Lakers have become so beloved not only because they are winning, but because of how they are winning.

While their impact will be ultimately recorded in statistical tomes, it is already being felt in everyday lives.

“Instead of having one player as a role model, the entire Laker team has become a role model for group behavior,” said Dr. Reef Karim, psychiatrist at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute. “Joe on the playground can relate to this. People can use this in their workplace, in their family.”

And nowhere would it matter, of course, if the team wasn’t on the threshold of another NBAchampionship. Nobody is learning anything if the NBA finals aren’t beginning Wednesday at Staples Center against either the Philadelphia 76ers or Milwaukee Bucks.

Obviously, if the Lakers aren’t winning, we’re not having this conversation, even if Shaquille O’Neal has moved into Kobe Bryant’s guest room and Phil Jackson is coaching in robes.

The Lakers are not prophets, they’re entertainers. They work in short pants. They play with a child’s toy. They don’t heal, they distract.

But the 11-0 playoff record and two-month unbeaten streak have turned that distraction into a sort of community decree.

“The Lakers have become a teaching vehicle,” said Larry Smith, character development consultant for the Pasadena Unified School District. “The playoffs have been filled with teachable moments.”

Those moments began in the first quarter of the first game of the first series against Portland. Every starter either had a point or an assist in the first six minutes. The leading scorer at the end of the quarter was--and won’t this be a nice bit of trivia--Horace Grant.

“Back in February, I was hearing about all the fighting and thinking, ‘How sad,’ ” said Dr. Todd Boyd, a USC cinema-TV professor and author of “Basketball Jones: America Above the Rim.” “Then to see these individually great players give themselves up for the team during the most important time of the season, it had an incredible effect.”

Skip to the end of the second game against Portland, when the whining, selfish Trail Blazers self-destructed at midcourt. This awful display made Laker fans realize what could have been but was clearly not.

“It was like, you can go the route of the Trail Blazers, or you could do what the Lakers have done,” Dr. Karim said. “I think people identified with this.”

The attachment grew against Sacramento, when O’Neal dominated with 77 points in the first two games, then Bryant led with 84 points in the next two games.

Arguably the two best players in the ego-driven NBA were--gasp--sharing.

Bryant will never be Michael Jordan as long as he is playing with O’Neal, but suddenly it didn’t matter.

O’Neal will never be Wilt Chamberlain as long as he is playing with Bryant, but for once he seemed not to mind.

The lesson was as loud as the score.

“A community is very much in need of a sense of people working together, and the Lakers have given us this sense,” said Michael Josephson, president of the Marina del Rey-based Josephson Institute of Ethics.

Josephson has studied the situation from Staples Center, from his seat as a season-ticket holder, amid a crowd that has increasingly treated the games like joyful family picnics.

“I’ve never seen a situation around here where people have shown so much genuine affection for a team,” he said.

Those teachable moments began piling up in San Antonio, where O’Neal called Bryant his “idol” after the opening victory, then Jackson was ejected and left the team to fend for itself for the final quarter during a dramatic Game 2 victory.

Many thought Jackson’s exit was symbolic of his approach during the season, when he let his team fight it out, then figure it out.

“Ninety-five percent of the coaches out there care more about winning than teaching,” said Jeff Stephens, a longtime youth basketball coach in La Canada-Flintridge. “Maybe this will help the way we look at things, make us realize that the teaching comes first.”

All lessons led to last Sunday against San Antonio, to what has become this postseason’s most memorable play. And no, it wasn’t a reverse dunk, or one-on-one drive, or 30-foot jumper.

It was a pass. Actually, two passes.

O’Neal on the fastbreak, throws a no-look pass to Bryant, who throws it back to O’Neal, who . . . well, does it matter what he did next?

“For both the Lakers and the community, it’s hard to imagine a more important highlight to this epiphany,” Shatz said. “Shaq threw the ball to Kobe. And Kobe threw it back.”

Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com.

EASTERN CONFERENCE MILWAUKEE AT PHILADELPHIA

GAME 7, CH. 4, 4:30 P.M. TODAY

Suspension Leaves Them a Buck Short

Scott Williams is suspended for today’s game after committing a flagrant foul against the 76ers’ Allen Iverson in Game 6. D10