L.A. = Last Act?

After the good times, the bad times and especially the zany times, now it’s L.A. as in Last Act?

The problem with golden eras, you never realize you’re in one until it’s over, but it has been 12 wild years around here.

The Shaquille O’Neal-Kobe Bryant Lakers won three titles. UCLA won one under Jim Harrick and made the last two Final Fours under Ben Howland.

Even the underdogs had their day. The Clippers moved into Staples Center and came within one win of the 2006 West finals under Mike Dunleavy. USC put up the Galen Center and shocked everyone in last spring’s Sweet 16 under Tim Floyd, leading North Carolina by 16 points in the second half before falling.

Now, it all comes down to this . . .

Think of a group shot of Bryant, Phil Jackson, Elton Brand, Corey Maggette, O.J. Mayo, Kevin Love and Darren Collison with the caption, “See us while we’re here.”

It will take a major turnaround for the Lakers to keep Bryant, and Jackson is unlikely to stay without him. Maggette will be a free agent and Brand can opt out.

Mayo, the Trojans’ ballyhooed freshman, is already ranked No. 3 in next spring’s draft by NBADraft.net.

UCLA is a preseason top-five pick, but with Collison ranked No. 11 in the same list and Love No. 17, the Bruins won’t have to invent a sense of urgency.

For better and/or worse, here goes.

Last tango in Lakerdom?

It’s not good when your fan base is split between those who sympathize with the franchise player and those who sympathize with the owner.

Given Jerry Buss’ focus on business, his remarks about trading Bryant could have just been preparing Lakers fans for the possibility of losing Kobe.

Bryant, of course, said some things of his own and is assuredly sensitive these days.

No matter what Buss was thinking, it was a giant miscalculation. Bryant seemed to endure the rest of the preseason in a noticeably uncharacteristic style.

Now they’re supposed to create the chemistry that makes them more than they are, with 10 of their 15 games in November against last season’s playoff teams?

This will even be a trick for Jackson, who survived O’Neal, Bryant, Dennis Rodman and one season -- in which he won a title in Chicago-- with Rodman and the late Bison Dele.

“I would probably say that every coach has some kind of drama going on at some level,” Jackson mused last week.

This level?

“Maybe not this level,” he conceded, “but I’m sure there’s a level of drama going on.”

It’s just rare to see this much outside the WWE. Now to see how much longer this show has left.

Clippers will be Clippers

A new day seemed at hand in the spring of 2006 when they led Phoenix, 3-1, in the second round before the Suns rallied, Shaun Livingston was hurt, Chris Kaman disappeared, and as if to answer the question, “What else could happen?” Brand was lost.

Maggette, whom owner Donald T. Sterling decreed couldn’t be traded, has turned down an extension and is expected to test the market.

Brand can opt out but would have to find a team with $15.3 million in cap space, which is what he would make from the Clippers in 2008-2009.

For now, the Clippers will settle for getting everyone back on the floor some time this season.

“We’ve got some things up in the air, no question,” Dunleavy said. “We’ll see how the season plays out, but if we can get our guys back from their injuries, we have players like Livingston, [Cuttino] Mobley, Maggette, [Al] Thornton, Kaman, Brand, Tim Thomas, Brevin Knight. . . .

“As far as the future, next year or whatever, I like that team.”

Clippers coaches never dared to think about the future, so this had better be a new day, after all.

Indeterminate Love affair

Love, the big man UCLA has longed for, announced on media day he’s not thinking about the NBA.

“I’m focused on UCLA right now,” he said. “We want to try to win the national championship, and we’ve got a core group of guys. I think it would be selfish of myself if I was talking about the NBA through the course of the year.”

Of course, at last spring’s McDonald’s Classic amid speculation about his friend, Kevin Durant, Love told ESPN’s Pat Forde he had advised him, “The only thing you can do is go down or get hurt, so you might as well go.”

Love’s rare skill level assures him of success at the college level. From an NBA perspective, he’s intriguing although his listed height, 6-10, usually means 6-8 1/2 in bare feet, which isn’t big for a power forward.

At present, that’s in the future.

“It’s always going to be on your mind,” Love said. “You just have to step back and put it in the back of your mind.”

Please pass the Mayo

What do you know about O.J. Mayo?

What have you been told? Nothing good.

Lots of stories with one side, told by

people who’ve never met him. That

doesn’t necessarily mean they’re

wrong.

-- Slam Magazine,

November 2007

Even if he talked trash to Michael Jordan (“Well, he started it”), attended three schools, was suspended three times for fighting and just broke teammate Daniel Hackett’s jaw -- although all concerned insist it was an inadvertent elbow, not a punch -- Mayo doesn’t come off like Tony Montana.

Off the floor, he’s soft-spoken, accommodating and calls news people “sir.”

Gabe Pruitt, now a Celtics rookie, recently told the Boston Globe, “I was expecting him to come in kind of arrogant. He’s actually real down to earth and humble.”

Here’s the problem in a nutshell: After LeBron James came Mayo.

James was a wonder, unfazed by the monstrous hype that descended upon him at 16.

Mayo was even younger when fame came knocking -- he was in seventh grade when Sports Illustrated wrote a story about him -- and handled it more like a normal kid.

He was like the turf in a years-long turf war, fought over and protected, lest he be stolen away.

James, at least, had a stable support system that kept him in one place. Competing factions moved Mayo to three schools in three states.

In Mayo’s junior year at North Hill College High in Cincinnati, ESPN’s Forde tried in vain to arrange an interview, showed up in person but was turned away by Mayo’s uncle.

Forde reported the same uncle started the website, ojmayo.org, when O.J. was in seventh grade.

Mayo broke with the relatives who took him to Cincinnati -- and reportedly had him ticketed to join Bob Huggins at Kansas State -- and went home to Huntington, W.Va., for his senior year.

The same summer, a Los Angeles promoter named Rodney Guillory, who’d met Mayo at a summer camp and was now the man he looked to for guidance, walked off the street and asked Floyd if he wanted Mayo.

It sounded good or too good to be true to Floyd. That was when he asked to call Mayo and Guillory replied, “O.J. doesn’t give out his cell. He’ll call you.”

Mayo is an eye-popping package, an athletic 6-4, 205-pound point guard, competitive to a fault and the last Trojan to leave the floor after practice.

“I’ve had a lot of first-year players, guys who were coming [to the NBA] from high school,” says Floyd, the former Bulls coach. “Tyson [Chandler], Eddy [Curry], Jamal Crawford. I believe he’s more prepared to play than all of those guys were.”

For the record, Mayo says he doesn’t know if he’ll be one-and-done. Floyd is happy to have the one.

Now to see if Mayo has emerged from his rough-and-tumble childhood with enough maturity to be a special player, as opposed to a wild, talented one.

On the other hand, he got this far.

“I grew up with a single-parent mom,” Mayo says. “I have three brothers and sisters and a girl cousin of mine who stays with us. . . .

“It’s a lot of little things a lot of people don’t see. They just see the basketball player, the publicity, maybe a magazine here and there. The thing about that, growing up and getting here, I’m the first person in my family to get a scholarship into college. . . .

“I really want to represent my family’s last name. My brother and I are the last two male Mayos, so we just want to keep the name going and represent it to the fullest.”

Today, the Trojans. The world, whenever.

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mark.heisler@latimes.com