Webber’s Title Quest Has Been Something Less Than Fab

Why him?

Rich, famous, gifted, intelligent, personable, movie-star handsome, Chris Webber should have been the Golden Child.

The reality was a little more harsh. Instead, he became the most derided great player of his time.

Skepticism is almost universal, be it about his game, which is held to be soft (“He’s missing something,” an assistant coach said during a recent series), or his styling (“Don’t let the game get in the way of the show,” NBC’s Bill Walton noted during this series).

Then there are his facial expressions. Or as Dallas Maverick owner Mark Cuban said before unleashing a cowbell siege of the Kings in the last series:

“If you see Chris Webber with that I-look-like-I’m-going-to-cry look on his face, you’ll know it’s doing its job. Either that or Tyra is walking off with Chris Tucker or somebody.”

Oh yeah, Webber’s relationship with supermodel Tyra Banks doesn’t seem to be off limits, either.

Of course, after that, Webber proceeded to average 27 points and 10 rebounds in the next three against the Mavericks, all of which the Kings won ... and 25 points, 12 rebounds, 5.7 assists and two blocks in this series, which the Kings lead, 2-1.

This flawed, preening crybaby has started the last two All-Star games, finished No. 4 and 7 in the last two MVP races and is a regular on the all-interview team, but when things go wrong, he never has to ask for whom the hammer is poised.

His Kings, who’d been in the playoffs once in 12 years before Webber arrived in 1999 and hadn’t advanced since 1981, have made giant strides, tying their franchise record with 55 wins (set in Cincinnati with Oscar Robertson and Jerry Lucas), then breaking it with 61.

For Webber, it’s not enough. In a typical reaction after they lost Game 1 of the conference finals, he was blasted in this newspaper (“Tin Man”), the Washington Times (“Webber shows the referees his medical charts and X-rays, plus the findings of the human rights organizations monitoring the abuses being perpetrated against him. None of it matters. It is a cold world.”) and the Santa Rosa Press Democrat (“With Webber playing like pauper, Kings done”).

Webber had scored 28 points with 14 rebounds and six assists, so one shudders to think what would have awaited him if he had actually played badly.

Of course, stuff started happening to him long before he got to Sacramento.

There was the timeout at Michigan, the Don Nelson feud at Golden State and the dream-gone-wrong in Washington before the trade that exiled him far from the bright lights.

Just to name a few.

Why has all this happened to him? Even he wonders about that.

“‘Cause I was young,” he said recently. “‘Cause I live with my heart....

“This is a man’s world and when you come in as a young guy, you’ve got to learn the rules.... Because one thing I do, I make mistakes, but I know I learn from them. Because I hate to repeat the same situation. And making your mother upset, to me, is the hardest.”

Happily, Doris Webber, who taught at Detroit’s Mumford High, where students entered through metal detectors, understands there are worse problems and seems to recover quickly. In this family, you have to be able to endure a rough headline or two.

Because another thing Webber does is set himself up, time after time.

He wants out of Sacramento (no soul food places), he drops hints from there to New York (where, he notes, he keeps a place) ... oops, he’s staying.

Talk about living with your heart. There’s so much he wants to do, there’s all the attention he hasn’t gotten yet and pines for, and there always seems to be a maddening array of options.

He has a perfectly reasonable explanation for whatever he’s doing at the time, even if you’d have to be a blood relative to take him at his word all the time.

On the other hand, he’s still moving up. Anyone who doesn’t like the way he’s doing it can take a number and get in line.

The Master of Disaster

In this league, even multimillionaires get the blues. In other sports, stars aren’t necessarily regarded as tainted if they don’t win championships. Ted Williams was an icon, despite appearing in one World Series, which the Red Sox lost. Ernie Banks, Mr. Cub, never got close to a World Series.

The NBA is not only star-driven but celebrity-driven. Thus, Webber has a higher profile, more endorsements and commercials than an equivalent baseball star, say, Alex Rodriguez. However, with the exposure comes the expectations. And, in the shorthand of the sports section, “hasn’t won” becomes “can’t win,” which turns into “could never win.”

Of course, the process would mean more if it wasn’t torching players one day and knighting them the next.

Before Webber, the most sneered-at star was Shaquille O’Neal, derided as a starstruck rapper/actor wannabe. His Laker misadventures were met with particular scorn; when they would be eliminated from the playoffs, his quote about having won “at every level except college and the pros” would be cited hourly on “SportsCenter.”

Nor is it only a harsh media or disappointed fans. In 1999, after the San Antonio Spurs won the NBA title, several GMs were asked which player they’d pick to start a team around. All took Tim Duncan over O’Neal.

Two years and two titles later, Shaq is an NBA demigod, acknowledged far and wide to be without a peer.

O’Neal did little to bring the heat down on himself. He came in quiet and respectful toward his elders, until the veterans started to show they resented the hype around him, as in his second All-Star game, when the West squad jumped him en masse.

He was just Shaq, a natural lightning rod. That was enough.

Webber, on the other hand, had a genius for getting himself noticed, in trouble or both.

He was the marquee name on one of the most celebrated college teams ever, Michigan’s Fab Five, the star of the all-freshman lineup that was as brash as it was precocious.

If the Fabs didn’t herald the arrival of Generation X all by themselves, they were a watershed. When they decided to start a new fashion of black sneakers and socks, they just put them on and went out for the game, neglecting to inform Coach Steve Fisher. Kids thrilled to their exploits as they lost in the NCAA final twice, the second time when Webber called that timeout they didn’t have.

The good news was, in the context of his career, that one would soon look like a mistake anyone could make.

Acquired by Golden State in a draft-day trade in 1993, looking like the centerpiece of a rising power, he forced a trade a year later in a snit with Nelson, the Warriors’ coach. Nelson was beloved by his veterans but rough on young players and Webber didn’t like being yelled at.

Unfortunately for all involved, the deal--Webber to Washington for Tom Gugliotta--laid both franchises low, along with the reputations of both Webber and Nelson. Webber was a coach-killer. Nelson’s team fell apart and he resigned at midseason.

Washington was a four-year disappointment for Webber, and vice versa. The Bullets/Wizards underachieved, partied heartily and wound up on police blotters a lot, even for young basketball players.

Management was so exasperated, it finally traded Webber, then 25, for Mitch Richmond, a guard who was 33.

Not that Webber had any intention of playing in the middle of nowhere any longer than he had to. Two seasons later, as he approached free agency, there were few teams that didn’t dream of landing him and few scenarios he discouraged.

There was even a Web site, the World Wide Webber watch, tracking developments through the headlines:

Aug. 8, 2000, Sacramento Bee: Webber: I want to play for (insert city here).

Nov. 3, 2000, New York Post: Webber is the missing piece.

Nov. 5, 2000, New York Daily News: [Latrell] Sprewell faces league’s ire over trying to snare Webber.

Dec. 3, 2000, New York Times: Webber favors Knicks, former agent says.

Jan 14, 2001 Houston Chronicle: Webber’s Houston ties run deep.

Jan 16, 2001 Fort Worth Star-Telegram: Webber to Mavericks?

Feb. 8, 2001, Detroit News: Webber would be wise to be nice to Pistons.

Mar. 13, 2001 Orlando Sentinel: Webber to Orlando? It’s food for thought.

Mar. 15, 2001, Miami Herald: Webber confirms interest in Heat.

The Kings insisted everything was OK, even as their owners courted Webber with a billboard plea on his way home ... and Webber said he didn’t like it ... and the owners then took it down.

In retrospect, it’s not surprising they fell out of the playoffs so swiftly. It was surprising they lasted that long.

It’s Not Easy Being Purple

It’s an underdog’s life.

Three years later, Webber is a King for good, or six more years, the time remaining on his $123-million contract. (Well, let’s make that at least four more years; he has an opt-out in 2006.)

Who’d have thunk it?

Not him.

When the Kings acquired him, Webber tried to force a trade to the Lakers, who were offering Eddie Jones. King General Manager Geoff Petrie sat tight, leaving Webber, who had two years left on his old contract, no choice but to report.

The next spring, when the teams met in the first round, Webber was still acknowledging his disappointment at not being a Laker. (“I just wanted to be there for the big fella. I try not to think about it because it can’t do anything but make me depressed.”)

A year later, he went onto the market, only to find a narrow range of options and, like Dorothy, concluded there was no place like home, no matter how small.

“I wanted to [be a Laker] really bad,” Webber says. “And Geoff Petrie basically said, no, it’s not going to happen. He said, ‘I’m going to build a team here that you can win a championship with.’ I didn’t believe him, didn’t want to believe him, didn’t want to get to know him the first year I was here....

“If you look at this situation--I’ve played with a lot of great players ... from Chris Mullin to Rasheed Wallace, some great guys, and I’ve never been on a team this good. And it took God to bring me to Sacramento, to the worst team in the world that nobody wanted to play on, to be in this position.

“That’s why I really hold this situation dear to my heart. Regardless of the outcome, we’re going out fighting and we’re not afraid.... Regardless of what credit people give us or what they say, we’re just going to keep playing because we came from nothing.”

To be sure, he looks more comfortable 18 feet from the basket than underneath it, but unlike his Washington days, he can make shots from there.

Given his playmaking ability, the Kings run their offense through him up there and he goes inside too. Because they are first or second in scoring every season, and are widely praised as the NBA’s best passing team, it’s hard to say it doesn’t work.

Webber is wiser, although he hasn’t lost his gift of gaffe, as when he heatedly protested a Bee story about his relationship with Banks--on camera--blowing it into a story 100 times bigger.

Well, he’s still only 29.

“I think one reason I have been in trouble in my life is trying to fight every fight,” he says. “Even the situation with Coach Nelson, I don’t think people realize that it all started off of me standing up for [teammate] Chris Gatling....

“And now, maybe you would go in the back and say, ‘Coach, please don’t, we need him ready and every time you get on him, he’s not ready for the game.’

“I do believe there’s a responsibility with everything I’m given. You know, you’ve just got to spend your time figuring it out, growing up and making mistakes. And unfortunately for me, I made my mistakes in front of a lot of people....

“You know, everybody’s got to take responsibility for what they did, but a lot of it too was ... I was 20 years old [as a rookie]. My coach got fired. I think that was just boom, the onslaught. Along with me keeping making mistakes. They always had something to point back to. So it’s been tough.”

Nor will it stop being tough, with his constant yearning for a title, which is matched by the yearning of his new home. That means getting past the Lakers with their double-superstar configuration, which trumps the teams that only have only one.

It’s a typical spring in this no-reputation-left-standing world, with heroes dropping left and right as their teams go on vacation. Now Kevin Garnett is deemed too unselfish. Dirk Nowitzki has been exposed as a black hole on offense and so bad at the other end, the joke is his name should be “Irk,” without the D. Karl Malone is over the hill, as usual. Rasheed Wallace is still Rasheed Wallace.

They’re only warmup acts for Webber. This is his time, one way or the other.