Shaq-Lakers Squabble Cries Out for a Solution

At one time or another we’ve probably all said to our kids, or certainly the wife, “You big baby!” but it takes on a whole new meaning when you say the same thing to Shaquille O’Neal.

You talk about your BIG baby, they don’t get any bigger than Shaq, who wants to be loved and get his way in L.A., by golly, or he’s going to take his game and go elsewhere.

Based on experience, when the kids started crying, I immediately stuck a bottle in their mouths -- or in the case of the wife, gave her the credit card -- so they’d all shut up and let me get back to watching the ballgame.

Well, you can see how the kids turned out. And as for Mrs. Nordstrom, so much for any thought of early retirement. The thing is, I just never thought it was right to let a baby just cry and cry, or leave the wife behind just stomping her huge feet, but I think Shaq is showing me the error of my ways.

You see, I don’t believe Shaq is going anywhere, and for three good reasons:

* Common sense: The Lakers aren’t going to deal Shaq to a Western Conference team and then try to beat him in the playoffs unless they believe his game has dropped off more than we think.

And how many teams in the East have the talented players necessary to complete a deal with the Lakers? How many teams are going to give up a number of good players, then give Shaq $27.7 million while he has the chance to opt out of his contract after next season?

How many teams are going to be willing to give the Big Baby a contract extension, which he’ll surely demand before reporting to a new team, on top of the $60 million he has coming the next two years?

* Gary Payton’s decision Tuesday to stay with the Lakers: Payton wouldn’t stay unless he had talked to Shaq and received assurances Shaq would be here, since it’s Shaq who persuaded Payton to come here for less money. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the twosome has already agreed to open their own Babies ‘R’ Us franchise in L.A. next year.

* The binky the Lakers will shove in Shaq’s mouth: The Big Baby will need a reason to stop crying, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that comes later this summer, when the Lakers all of a sudden let it be known they’ll be willing to talk contract extension with Shaq.

Now if that’s not enough to stop the Big Baby from carrying on, I’d suggest a good spanking. Any volunteers?

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I’D BE more interested in the bat used by F.P. Santangelo, of course, to record his last hit with the Dodgers, but David Kohler, president of SportsCards Plus in Laguna Nigel, seems to think there might be more than $3 million worth of interest in bidding for the bat Babe Ruth used to hit the first home run hit in Yankee Stadium on April 18, 1923.

I thought I’d ask sports editor Bill Dwyre if he remembered that historic day, but I didn’t want to interrupt his late-morning nap.

Ruth hit a three-run homer, and then later autographed the bat and dedicated it, “To the Boy Home Run King of Los Angeles, ‘Babe’ Ruth, N.Y. May 7th, 1923.”

The bat then was presented to Victor Orsatti for his high school heroics by the mayor of L.A., on behalf of Ruth and the Los Angeles Herald in June 1923. Orsatti, who went on to play football for USC and work as a Hollywood talent agent before his death in 1984, willed the bat to his caretaker, who kept it under her bed for 20 years.

(We have things that have been under the bed for 20 years, too, but I don’t see the wife getting to them any time soon.)

Kohler obtained the bat from the caretaker, and will put it up for auction, along with other Ruth and baseball memorabilia, Oct. 4 in New York.

The ball hit by Mark McGwire for his 70th home run drew $3 million, and Kohler said he would be surprised if Ruth’s bat -- which he calls “the Holy Grail” and “the single greatest piece of sports memorabilia ever discovered” because he’ll be raking in all the profits -- doesn’t top the price paid for the McGwire ball.

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THE DAUGHTER invited me to spend $175 so I could join her for a day of golf Monday in the Notre Dame Club of Orange County Tournament at Strawberry Farms Golf Club and buy all her refreshments. The club conducted a silent auction to benefit charity, one of them a football autographed by Coach Tyrone Willingham, which was listed as “priceless.” That might explain why it sat there for a long time, failing to attract a bid. Had I known they wanted to raise a lot of money for charity, I’d have gotten them a signed Pete Carroll football.

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JOE NEWMAN, co-founder of the American Basketball Assn., said there would be ABA franchises in Orange County, Los Angeles, Ontario and Long Beach this season, beginning Nov. 15, which made Tuesday’s announcement that former UCLA coach Jim Harrick would be coaching the Vancouver franchise a little odd. The Vancouver franchise will have a predominately Chinese team, leaving open the possibility, I guess, that if the players don’t speak English, Jim Harrick Jr. might finally stump someone with his 20-question exam in Coaching Principles and Strategies of Basketball.

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BRIAN CLARK e-mailed: “I keep hearing the Dodgers saying how the recent Yankee series had a ‘playoff atmosphere.’ How the heck would they know?”

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TODAY’S LAST word comes in e-mail from Bill Eberly:

“I really get a kick out of the way you demean your family; they must be really good sports. If I spoke publicly that way about my no-sense-of-humor wife, she would shoot me while I slept.”

You might want to keep one eye open tonight.

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T.J. Simers can be reached at t.j.simers@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Simers, go to latimes.com/simers.