Fantasy Basketball In the Real World

PHOENIX

There are plenty of good teams in the NBA this season, from Boston to San Antonio to Oakland, and a batch of exciting young players from Chris Paul to Deron Williams. But it seems nothing stirs the professional basketball soul like Shaq and Kobe being on the same court, preferably playing against each other, especially when their teams are both good enough to seriously contend for the championship.

The fantasy of most hoop junkies is to have seven games worth of Shaq vs. Kobe in late May and early June in the Western Conference finals, but the immediate reality is one irresistible meeting Wednesday night that has rallied the desert like few civic happenings the last 15 years.

Suns vs. Lakers has been contentious for most of the last 40 years. Folks here in the Valley of the Sun have always disliked Kobe Bryant, and they're more than happy for Wednesday's visit to coincide with the Suns debut of Shaquille O'Neal, who from all indications will be in the starting lineup, an arrival that has energized not just the team but the entire state of Arizona. Want to see the game in person? No problem, $3,800 will get you a ticket on eBay. It feels more like a Game 5 of the playoffs than Game 54 of the regular season. "There are a whole lot of stories in this game," Grant Hill of the Suns said Tuesday night. "A lot of my friends back east have been calling me to say, 'I'm staying up late to watch this.' "

After all, Los Angeles and Phoenix are the two biggest markets where basketball is the No. 1 professional sporting obsession. They are only 375 miles apart. And the verbal back-and-forth began days ago, Lakers Coach Phil Jackson saying Shaq's primary role on a team as athletic as the Suns would be, "taking the ball out of bounds and waiting for the other team to get back." Shaq, after saying dismissively of his former coach, "He's funny, very funny," added, "I'm going to be looking to get out like Randy Moss and Terrell Owens."

The thing about Wednesday night's game is there's plenty of steak to go with the sizzle. The top nine teams in the Western Conference are separated by only five games. A three-game losing streak can drop you from first place in the West to sixth, which is why the Lakers traded for Pau Gasol and the Suns traded a four-time NBA all-star, Shawn Marion, for Shaq, and why the Dallas Mavericks joined the arms race out west Tuesday when the team traded four players and two draft picks and spent at least $9 million or more to acquire Jason Kidd.

Perhaps not since Michael Jordan retired from the Chicago Bulls in 1998 has the NBA been so well situated in the regular season. The league has had impressive championship teams over the last 10 years, most notably four-time champion San Antonio and the consistently formidable Detroit Pistons. But the Spurs don't measure on the pop culture meter and the Pistons don't have a Madison Avenue star. The NBA simply cannot run away from its dependence on huge stars playing for legit contenders. Having Shaq, Kobe and, to a lesser degree, Kidd involved in what essentially is a 30-game sprint to the playoffs is intoxicating.

Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, who is never shy about criticizing his league when it's warranted, told reporters yesterday: "The league is in the best position it has been in, in forever. Every game right now in the Western Conference has playoff implications. There's playoff intensity everywhere. It's what makes the league so special this year."

While San Antonio, New Orleans, Utah, Houston, Golden State and Denver are also formidable -- nine teams in the West are on pace to win 50 games as compared to only three in the East -- Shaq and Kobe are at the epicenter of this amped-up drama. Shaq has played only four games since Christmas and was bothered by hip issues when he was traded from Miami. We haven't seen him run at all, much less run with the Suns, whose philosophy of offense is to shoot the ball in seven seconds or less after getting it. We haven't seen it, but the Suns have privately over the last 10 days, during which time Shaq has endeared himself to the Valley in a way last seen when Charles Barkley arrived via trade in 1992.

"He's gotten better every single practice," Hill said. "He looked great today. Look, it's going to take some time to put it all together. He changes the dynamic, but it takes time. We're preparing for May and June and not just a game against the Lakers. We've got 30 games to get it right."

The protagonists both enter the game wounded: Kobe's wrecked pinkie needs surgery and Shaq's aggravated pride needs another championship run. Everything each man does here Wednesday night will be studied beyond reason. Shaq admits that 10 years ago he would have come in determined to carry the Suns on his back to a championship. Now, at 35, he wants to fit in. "I'm not looking to put up historical numbers," he said. "Whatever these guys ask me to do, that's what I'll do."

To that end, Shaq stopped the action during a recent practice when Hill and Steve Nash dumped the ball into him on offense for the umpteenth time. "He said, 'Look guys, I'm here to adjust to you. Do what you do. Let me adapt.' "

Hill and Nash said they found that impossible the first few days of practice, neither having played with a big man as dominant and as easy to find as Shaq. But by Tuesday, Hill said he was sprinting downcourt to receive a pass and after hearing thunderous footsteps turned to find Shaq was right on his heels. "I was thinking," Hill cracked, " 'Am I not running that fast?' "

Shaq has attempted to fit in on the court, but the Suns acknowledged he has changed the locker room, for the better, with his playfulness. Nash talked openly about the team's "spirit" being better. The Suns, admittedly, were looking weary before the trade, even though they had the best record in the superior Western Conference for much of the first 50 games. "Shaq loosens up our room," Hill said. "His attitude is, 'I've done this before. Let me help you get to the Promised Land.' He's taken on some of the pressure that's been on a team that has come up short the last couple of years.' "

Of course, it's still theory until the Suns actually win some games with Shaq against the elite teams in the West, something they struggled to do so far without him. They've lost to the Lakers, in fact, twice. And if Kobe is putting off surgery on his pinkie it's because he and the Lakers feel pretty good about their spirit, too. Bryant knows six weeks in sick bay would likely drop the Lakers out of the playoffs altogether, and he feels this team is too talented and too complete to let this chance slip by. Since their infamous divorce after the 2004 season, this is the first time Kobe has played on a team that's a serious threat. But there's Shaq standing directly in his path with what appears to be just as good a team, maybe better.

"Every time I've won a championship I've looked at the guys around me and looked at their work ethic and said, 'You know what? I'm going to win it this year,' " Shaq said. "I feel that way now."