Basketball Players

First, it was Shaquille O'Neal and Penny Hardaway, then Shaq and Kobe Bryant, and Shaq and Dwyane Wade. . . . Next: Shaq and LeBron? OK, so it would be LeBron James and Shaquille O'Neal. In whatever order, imagine the circus the Cleveland Cavaliers would be now if they had made the O'Neal deal they were so close to two weeks ago, in the Big Near Miss. Phoenix looked ready to do it for the low, low, bargain price of Wally Szczerbiak and Sasha Pavlovic. However, instead of Szczerbiak, whose $13.

Daniel Hackett, his father says, was raised "to say how he feels and say how he thinks." Those playing against USC's basketball team get it. Those playing for USC accept it. Even those officiating USC games have had to turn a deaf ear to it.

On a recent day at Caltech's Brown Gymnasium, the wild cheers of victory this time were for the home team this time. But then again the basketball team had a couple of ringers -- Los Angeles Lakers Pau Gasol and Jordan Farmar -- and it was, after all, a television show. The NBA players visited the Pasadena campus -- famous for its brilliant scientific minds as well as its notorious athletic losing streaks -- to guest star in an episode of CBS' crime drama "Numb3rs," which airs at 10 tonight.

Now the smile makes sense. Now, when Josh Shipp gets that grin on his face, it means he has drained a jump shot or driven to the rim for another two points. "I'm definitely having fun," he says. The kind of fun that results from a late-season hot streak, the UCLA swingman leading his team with an average of better than 19 points during the last month. "Probably the best he's played in his career," Coach Ben Howland says.

In a salute to the NCAA tournament, here's my annual NBA perspective, trying to project who's rising, who's falling, and set it up so whatever happens, I can say I was right. For every phenom the pros don't talk about because they're not expected to come out -- such as North Carolina's Ed Davis or Florida State's Solomon Alabi -- there are stalwarts like UNC's Tyler Hansbrough, who aren't on this creme de la creme list but may make the real first round.

Here's an update on the 2010 free-agent class with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, Amare Stoudemire, et al.: There isn't going to be one. The entire league is buzzing about The Lockout of 2011, as if David Stern just rode across the sky in a flaming chariot with a scythe, spelling "Repent by 2011" with his exhaust. "I think it's going to be very, very extreme, because I think that the times are extreme," former super-agent David Falk told the New York Times.

Lakers Coach Phil Jackson has given a variety of answers as to whether he will return next season, though the latest indication is that he'll be back. And indications are that Kobe Bryant will be too. "I always go through the process of having to reassess the season in the summertime," he said. "I have a contract, and I mean to fulfill it. If I abrogated it and said no, I would be shocked at myself." Jackson, 63, has a one-year option for about $12 million next season.

When Kobe Bryant worked out for the Lakers as a high school graduate in 1996, he stunned them with his leaping ability and raw basketball talent that few 17-year-olds had ever possessed. Lakers luminary Jerry West, the team's executive vice president at the time, said it was the greatest workout he had ever witnessed.

The NCAA has opened its review of star basketball recruit Renardo Sidney, a Mississippi State athletic official said Thursday. Sidney, a 6-foot-10 power forward from Los Angeles Fairfax High, signed a letter of intent with Mississippi State last month after he was dropped as a recruit by UCLA and USC. Sidney had announced his plans to sign with USC. The family has said the split between player and school came by mutual decision.