Refusing to Knuckle Under, He Steps Back on Tightrope

This year, a teacup ... this year, a tightrope ... this year, if they do not win the NBA championship, it would only figure.

In April 2001, in a playoff preview column, I wrote those words about the Lakers.

They were fragile. They were fighting. They were vulnerable.

I was a knucklehead.

The Lakers rolled up the prediction, slipped a rubber band around it, slid a plastic bag over it, and beat the rest of the NBA over the head with it.

They won 11 consecutive playoff games. They lost one. Then they won four more to win another championship and complete basketball’s most impressive postseason run since shorts were short.

Teacup? They were unbreakable.

Tightrope? They were unshakeable.

Me? I figured out the statistics. I listened to the quotes. I studied the history.

But I was deaf to the magic.

I forgot the splendid spring dance of partners Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant, wandering superstars when it doesn’t count, waltzing fools when it does.

“I know sometimes Shaquille and I don’t play off each other,” Bryant said last week with a grin. “But that’s during the regular season. There are things we don’t bring out until the playoffs.”

I failed to consider the annual spring fever felt by Robert Horry, a legend so believable the Lakers have written it into their game plan.

“I don’t know who will be starting,” said Phil Jackson. “But you can bet Robert Horry will be there at the finish.”

I ignored the spring postulates that Jackson coaches harder, and Derek Fisher runs faster, and Rick Fox acts tougher than at any other time of the season.

“We all know, it’s our moment of truth,” said Bryant.

And Sacramento’s moment of distraction, and San Antonio’s moment of fear, and the Eastern Conference’s moment of capitulation.

I forgot all that, too.

“Late in the game, you can see the look in other teams’ faces,” said Brian Shaw. “It’s like, ‘Oh no, here we go again.’ They play to avoid losing. We play to win.”

In making a prognostication as lame as Chris Webber in crunch time, I forgot everything that fueled the Lakers on this journey toward history.

I’m trying to remember it all now.

Because my instincts say I should pick against them again.

I bet I’m not the only one.

Admit it. As the Minnesota Timberwolves prepare to host the Lakers in the playoff opener today, even as your team plays with new fire and O’Neal plays at another level, some of you agree.

You won’t say it. You don’t want to sound cynical. You don’t want to be cast as the anti-Randy Newman. You don’t want word of this leaking to the Maloofs.

But some of you know it as well as I know it.

This spring is different. This spring is scary different.

There is encouragement in the Lakers’ 39-13 record since Christmas.

But there is discouragement in this: The late-season games Phil Jackson pointedly wanted them to win, they couldn’t.

There was the nine-point loss in San Antonio, one of four to the Spurs this season, the Lakers strangely feeling the business end of a broom.

There was the eight-point loss in Sacramento, where it was the Lakers who strangely ran out of gas.

There was the two-point loss at Portland, when a win probably would have given them home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs.

In past years, for all their problems, the Lakers usually won those important regular-season games. Is it a sign of creeping weariness or withering depth that they couldn’t?

To reach today, they climbed out of a hole of a depth unmatched in their previous three regular seasons. Their nails are dirty and their breath is short and I’m not the only one wondering.

“We’ve had to squeeze them harder this year than we’ve wanted to,” said Jackson. “What will that take from us in the playoffs?”

Near the end of the season, there was also much excitement about the resurgence of the role players, from Devean George to Fisher to Fox. Heck, in the win at home against Sacramento, I could have sworn I even saw Horry grab an offensive rebound and snatch a loose ball.

But do O’Neal and Bryant really believe in them? Speaking louder than their words was Bryant’s last-second shot in Portland. He was double-teamed, and could have thrown it to an open Horry, which is exactly what happened in last year’s playoffs.

Then, Horry hit a jumper to beat the Trail Blazers and sweep the series.

Now, Bryant ignored Horry and took the shot and missed by a forest mile.

Bryant laughed and said it was nothing, but maybe it’s everything.

Horry played his most minutes as a Laker while equaling the worst shooting percentage of his career. Fox had his fewest rebounds and assists in the last three years. Fisher is shooting better than ever, but there are still questions about his defense.

The biggest reason the Lakers can win a championship every year they have O’Neal and Bryant is O’Neal and Bryant.

But as anyone who remembers Horry’s bomb or Ron Harper’s jumper or Brian Shaw’s prayer can attest, confirmation rests with the other guys.

There are so many reasons to cheer louder for this Laker team than any of the others, so many reasons to make like Madsen with the towels and the chest bumps and the love.

A fourth consecutive championship would turn the Celtic tradition green, snuff out Red’s cigar, and sweep up the shells on bar arguments forever.

The NBA’s best team ever? The 2000-2004 Lakers.

The NBA’s best coach ever? Phil Jackson.

So many reasons for hope. But so many reasons to fret.

Somebody needs to bite the bullet for this team, it might as well be me.

The Lakers will trample Minnesota in five games, survive San Antonio in seven games and, then, exhausted, will fall to Sacramento in six.

When you see the fire trucks creeping down Figueroa in June, remember you read it here first.

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