Guessing the order of the June 27 NBA Draft was already difficult, but became even tougher this week with a record 28 players sitting out the league's pre-draft camp in Chicago.
"You're talking about the whole first round," the Jazz's Scott Layden said from Chicago.Layden and other player-personnel directors know which players will go in the first round, but anything resembling the exact order will be a mystery. Oklahoma guard Mookie Blaylock was the only definite first-rounder who participated this week; everybody else becomes harder to project.
"This might be a draft similar to the (1985) Karl Malone draft in that a lot of guys were sliding - a a lot of guards went late in the first round, like Joe Dumars and Terry Porter," Layden said.
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GETTING DEFENSIVE: Detroit's Dennis Rodman credits Adrian Dantley for helping him develop as as NBA defender, after they joined the Pistons the same year. Here's how:
"He'd do things (in practice) I couldn't comprehend, make moves I couldn't make a move to," Rodman told the Detroit Free Press. "He'd psyche me out . . . I knew I had to use my head and I had to move my feet, and gradually it came to me."
Added Rodman, "I just had to ask myself: `Do you want to work hard to stop that guy?' And I knew if I could stop him, I could stop anybody in the league."
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SUITE DEAL: The Jazz's new arena will probably look more like Milwaukee's Bradley Center than Detroit's Palace, but Jazz officials will follow the Palace's lead in building and marketing arena suites.
"That's a big issue to us, the suites," said marketing vice-president Jay Francis. "They've started a new trend in indoor arenas. How much we can afford to build, we're still kicking around."
By renting suites for as much as $120,000 a year, the Pistons are servicing the debt on the $80 million arena and making a league-high $8 million profit this season. The Jazz arena will be less expensive - and less luxurious - but renting the 50-plus suites will determine much of the building's success.
The Palace, meanwhile, nightly performs the NBA's best hoax. A video picture of a sound meter shown on the scoreboard screen convinces 21,000 fans that they're actually moving the needle.
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GROWING UP: The Mavericks Magazine TV show in Dallas solicited one of the season's best quotes from Karl Malone, asking the Mailman when he first thought he could be a great NBA player.
"It was after my rookie season," the Mailman said. "Until then, I had never taken basketball seriously . . . I was overweight and had never taken real good care of my body. I had enough success my rookie season that I realized if I really got my body into shape and worked at this game I could be special."
AT RANDOM: Malone and teammate Mike Brown will attend the Hearns-Leonard fight in Las Vegas Monday . . . Jazz owner Larry Miller completed his individual meetings with the team's five vice presidents and the basketball people this week, telling them to just keep working. "We're just kind of talking among ourselves and going forward," said Francis. Scott Layden said, "He told us to just move along. He's going to take some time to evaluate the organization." . . . Underclassman Jay Edwards of Indiana is one player who helped himself some in Chicago this weekend . . . Scott Layden has trade authority and is talking to the lottery teams, among all the others. While the Jazz are thought to be contending for even Sacramento's No. 1 pick, Layden said that high draft picks would cost the Jazz more than they're worth right now . . .
Will 10,000 people still show up at the Salt Palace on draft night if the Jazz still have the No. 21 pick? Probably. But the No. 21 picks of the '80s are Monte Davis, Alton Lister, Eddie Phillips, Greg Kite, Kenny Fields, Terry Catledge, Anthony Jones, Dallas Comegys and Mark Bryant . . . Philadelphia's Charles Barkley, on his talkative nature: "I just say what I feel and don't worry about who likes it or not. Those guys on those teams are not my friends anyway. I've always been that kind of person. I have a few select friends who know who they are and I don't worry about anyone else. Hence, I don't have to worry about what I say offending anyone. If it does, that's their problem."