Prior to the mysterious rash of injuries, "Your Phoenix Suns," as announcer Al McCoy always calls them, were riding high.
Before Kevin Johnson, Tom Chambers, and Dan Majerle were struck down by mysterious ailments, McCoy boasted that this was a team playing what he kept referring to as "Phoenix Suns basketball."
I don't profess to know what that term actually means. Whatever it was, however, disappeared quickly once KJ, Chambers, and Majerle decided to start spending the bulk of their time under heat lamps.
Let us look back to the night before the crash. God was still in his Heaven. It was the night the Utah Jazz came to town, and there we were with a sellout crowd packed into what used to be known as the "Madhouse on McDowell."
In a few minutes, the game against the Utah Jazz would get under way. The Gorilla would start his nightly series of ballet routines.
The well-to-do fans had tucked their German luxury cars safely into the parking lot. Only a few of them would be warned by the public-address announcer that in their haste to get into Veterans' Memorial Coliseum they had left their headlights on. They would take one last glance at their Rolex watches before the game with the Jazz began at 7:40 p.m.
It would be their last look at a potential championship team for some time to come.
Majerle, one of the fans' favorite players, walked to the center court. Majerle shook hands with two youngsters who had been chosen, as a promotional stunt, to serve as "guests for the night" on the Suns bench.
When this little tableau had played itself out, the big screens at both ends of the floor informed the fans of a charity promotion in which Tom Chambers is involved.
Everything each member of the Suns does appears to serve some promotional value. Every player either has a charity of his own or he is shipped out to visit the sick in key, geographically situated hospitals.
You look around the Coliseum. The advertising billboards assault your eyes. They are everywhere. There are even revolving billboards on the floor directly behind each basket.
Sanderson Ford. First Interstate. America West. Winston. Coke. Kelly Tires. Phelps Dodge. Greyhound Dial. Bud. Bud Light. Dillard's. Reebok. On and on it goes. The mind numbs.
Out in the concourse, there are more billboards and also a number of sports specialty stands selling tee shirts of Kevin Johnson in five different colors. If a fan fancies other Suns, tee shirts of those players can be purchased as well. If you like Magic Johnson or Larry Bird, those tee shirts are also available.
Must the Suns management really stoop to this in order to pay those remarkable salaries?
A statistician broke it down. KJ gets $1,773 per assist. On this night, he would be credited with 20 assists. Tom Chambers gets $1,000 per point. Last year he averaged 27 points a game.
It grows even more absurd. Because of the bizarre salary scale, even marginal players have become millionaires.
Ed Nealy was hired because someone thinks his bulk has some value under the boards. Nealy cannot run fast, jump high, shoot or pass with proficiency. Nealy's basketball skills are so ordinary in nature that he has been waived by three different National Basketball Association teams and played parts of two seasons in the Continental League. He signed a multiyear contract with the Suns for $2.1 million!
Mark West and Andrew Lang share the center position. Both are tall and muscular. Neither can shoot nor dribble nor make anything more than the most rudimentary pass. This lack of elementary skills is exacerbated by the fact that neither West nor Lang has the necessary attention span required to catch basketballs thrown in their direction.
On this night, the Suns were playing the Jazz, which also features some pretty high-priced players. There was Karl Malone, who has an eight-year contract calling for $27.2 million, and John Stockton, with a six-year contract for $13.2 million.
As it turned out, the Suns had little trouble beating the Jazz. When it was over, the Suns had won, 131 to 117. KJ was certain the Suns were on their way to big things.
Surrounded by an admiring press corps, KJ delivered one of the little sermonettes that have become his trademark. "We have so many weapons," KJ said, "that we should beat no matter who we play by a lot of points."
KJ had scored 37 points and been credited with 20 assists in one of his most productive performances of the season. Everything he attempted worked. He dribbled through crowds. He sailed through the air. He shot well both from outside and on driving lay-ups. He pretty well controlled the game. It was heady stuff. When KJ's tricks are working, he is as entertaining to watch as anyone in the entire NBA. However, when his tricks are not working, KJ can be pretty awful. And this was the KJ who showed up for the next home game against the Los Angeles Lakers.
Unfortunately, even when KJ's shots are off the mark, he continues to shoot as rapidly as though he possessed a hot hand. You must watch him play on one of these nights to see how he becomes just as responsible for a defeat as he can be for a victory.
KJ played at one speed all night long, attempting to drive up through the middle where no room existed and to pass off to players who weren't open. For the Lakers, James Worthy and Magic Johnson made it look as easy as if they had breezed into town to hold a clinic.
Before it was over this turned out to be a truly disastrous evening for the Suns. Majerle remained in the locker room at the half complaining of numbness in his thigh. And after the game, KJ complained of a pulled thigh muscle.
How long would they be out? No one seemed to know.
Things only got worse on Friday night when the Suns visited the Golden State Warriors, a team they have owned for the last two years.
And during this losing cause, Chambers pulled up lame with a back problem. One wonders about what has happened to Chambers' game this season.
The Suns never had a chance. They started Negele Knight, a rookie, at KJ's guard spot. Knight responded by scoring 22 points. But Knight is a rookie. There is no way the Suns can win anything this year without KJ at that spot.
Jeff Hornacek is the Suns only really consistent player. With him there are no wildly fluctuating performances. He gives you the same degree of excellence every night. You can't say this of any other member of the starting unit.
The problem with KJ is that he seems to have almost the same number of points and assists on both his good and bad nights. You can't tell how effective he was by reading the box score. He keeps driving and shooting until he gets his average, and the scorers too often award him questionable assists.
It may turn out that Kevin Johnson, as much fun as he is to watch, will not ultimately make this team a winner. And in the end, that won't be much fun.
When Xavier McDaniel was acquired earlier this season, it was thought he might provide the final piece to the puzzle. From what one can see to date, he is more puzzling than puzzle-solving.
On Sunday night, the Suns visited Jack Nicholson and the Lakers in the L.A. Forum. By now they had three players out--KJ, Majerle, and Chambers.
With the heart of the lineup missing, Al McCoy, the voice of the Suns, was reduced to describing the gallantry of the Suns' attempts against overwhelming odds.
On Thursday, Magic Johnson and James Worthy had put on a clinic for Suns fans. It was only fair that they now put on another one for their own fans. Someone once said that Magic has the power to destroy the will of the opposing team to play.
I think this is true. Watch him closely. He is impossible for most other players to guard. He is much too quick for the players his own size. His arms are much too long for the players who must guard him in the backcourt or on the fast break.
In one brief period Sunday night, he drove for the basket and did a 180-degree turn before flipping the basketball in over his head. The next time up the floor, he tossed up a three-point shot that went through the hoop, hitting only the net.
They say a great basketball team is like a jazz group playing in the early hours of the morning. The great jazz guys know when to back a man up and when to let him do his own thing.
Right now, the Lakers seem to have that going again for them. The problem with the Suns could well be that they are all making so much money that they are seeking to preserve their careers. Nobody in the NBA seems to play with pain anymore. Financial security has become more important than winning a championship ring.
During the Lakers game here April 4, I found myself sitting behind Suns president Jerry Colangelo.
I remembered the first time I saw him. It was years ago when he was working in the front office for the Chicago Bulls. Colangelo was an outstanding outside shooter as a high school player and Kansas recruited him to play with Wilt Chamberlain.
By the time Colangelo arrived on campus, Chamberlain had decided to turn pro. So Colangelo transferred back to the University of Illinois.
Colangelo knows what makes the world go 'round. He probably could have made the league as a player in those early days, but he decided to work in the Bulls front office. It was the right career move.
The co-coaches of that first Chicago Bulls team were John Kerr and Al Bianchi. They had just finished lengthy pro careers of better than ten years each. Neither of them ever made much money as pro players.
Kerr did set the league record as an iron man. He played years without ever missing a game until one night his coach, Paul Seymour, decided out of meanness to sit him down.
"When the game ended," Kerr said, "he came by when I was getting dressed and told me, `It has to end sometime, John.'"
There wasn't much ceremony in the league back in those days. The Bulls played in a chilly old barn called the Chicago Amphitheater because Jim Norris, who owned Chicago Stadium and the Chicago Blackhawks, didn't want to give pro basketball a foothold.
The Amphitheater was at the Chicago stockyards and you could smell the cattle even when inside the arena. In those days, the Bulls played to fewer than 5,000 fans on most nights. Even the Boston Celtics couldn't sell the place out.
It's strange the way it all worked out for Colangelo, Kerr, and Bianchi.
Kerr was coach of the year in his first try. Then he moved out here to Phoenix and got fired. Now he's the color man for the Bulls and owns a popular bar and restaurant.
Bianchi was here in Phoenix for a dozen years as an assistant to John MacLeod. Most recently, Bianchi reached a career peak when he got the job as general manager for the New York Knicks.
"This is the kind of job I always thought went to the guys in the suits," Bianchi said.
New York is a tough basketball town. It is the place where Bianchi grew up. But the fans blamed Bianchi when Rick Pitino, the wunderkind, quit the Knicks to take the coaching job at Kentucky. It didn't help when Bianchi brought in his old pal MacLeod to be his coach.
So Bianchi got fired. He says he doesn't mind. But he does, of course. If the fans ended up booing him in Madison Square Garden, it wasn't anything they hadn't done before to people who are now considered legends in New York basketball.
I know what makes me think about this. In those early days, the Bulls weren't good enough to win. But they had a little guy who could drive like a bullet and make spectacular passes that thrilled the fans.
He played a lot like Kevin Johnson. His name was Guy Rodgers. I wonder what ever happened to him?
The problem with KJ is that he seems to have almost the same number of points and assists on both his good and bad nights.
The problem with the Suns could well be that they are all making so much money that they are seeking to preserve their careers.
