The Worm takes over Jordan's mantle

For the six months the recently concluded National Basketball Association player lockout lingered, the league's officialdom privately nurtured a secondary concern - beyond the resolution of the labour dispute itself, it was plain to most that the great Michael Jordan had deferred the official announcement of his retirement only as a gesture of solidarity with his union brethren. Who, they fretted, would pick up the NBA torch and lead the league into the next Millennium?

With the truncated schedule (in the wake of the lockout the regular season was reduced from 82 to 50 games) having passed the halfway point, the answer has emerged from a most unlikely source. If you had to anoint a `poster boy' for the 1999 NBA season, the mantle would fall upon Jordan's old Chicago team-mate. No, not Scottie Pippen. Dennis Rodman.

Rodman is such a unique character that he really has no counterpart elsewhere in the world of sport. An African-American who dyes his hair blonde (or red, or green, depending on his mood), Rodman is a sometime cross-dresser who is covered with tattoos, and (when he is not on the court, which is, alas, more often than his employers would prefer) wears rings in his ears, nose, on his fingers and in his navel. He is 37 years of age and his nickname is "Worm".

He has been known (like Eric Cantona) to lash out and kick an unsuspecting victim (in Rodman's case it was a courtside photographer, to whom he delivered a boot during a 1997 Bulls game). Like Paul McGrath, he has been known to disappear for days, only to re-emerge as if nothing had happened. Like David Beckham, he is married to a new-age sex symbol (Hyperion Bay actress Carmen Electra).

The adjective "troubled" appears so often in connection with Rodman that some must think it's part of his name. Yes he likes to gamble and he doesn't mind a drink but there is no evidence to suggest he does either to excess. He has been so extensively tested for drugs that that can also be ruled out as a root of his eccentric behaviour. Several years ago he was, however, discovered sitting in his truck in a despondent state, a gun at his side on the front seat. So, if you called the Worm "depressed", you wouldn't be far wrong.

Because the Jordan-Pippen Bulls had won even before Rodman joined the team, his contribution to the success of that dynasty may have been somewhat under-appreciated. However, the difference Rodman has made to this year's version of the Los Angeles Lakers is undeniable. Simply put, the team is 11-0 with Rodman in the line-up and 7-9 without him.

When the lockout ended it was by no means clear that Rodman was going to play basketball this year at all. Like Pippen (and Jordan, had he decided to play), he had become a free agent following the Bulls' successful defence of their world championship last June and, with no club willing to tender the $9 million he earned in Chicago last year, he was contemplating retirement.

When he finally reached agreement with the Lakers a month into the season the Worm could only sign under the NBA's $1 million salary cap `exception' for veteran players, which, pro-rated to the remaining portion of the already-abbreviated season, worked out to $467,000. There was, it turned out, an ulterior motive - his $15 million, multi-year contract with sports shoe manufacturer Converse paid him an additional $3.1 million a year if he performed for a team from one of three high-visibility markets - New York, Chicago, or Los Angeles.

Rodman is one of those players whose talents are rarely reflected in game summaries. When he scores it is more or less by accident; his penchant is for the dirty work no one else likes to do. For all his eccentricities, he is a fierce defensive competitor and possibly the finest intuitive offensive re-bounder the game has ever known. He can step onto the court and immediately elevate the play of every other player on his team.

The Lakers, with stars like Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant (the NBA's Boy Wonder), had widely been expected to contend for supremacy in the post- Jordan era. When they stumbled to a 6-6 start the team's management made two nearly simultaneous moves. They fired coach Del Harris and replaced him with assistant Kurt Rambis. Two days later, on February 26th, they signed the Worm. The rejuvenation was immediate.

By the time the winning streak reached nine games the whole basketball world was wondering had Harris really been THAT bad? Was Rambis, considered a caretaker when he was handed the coaching job, that SMART? Or had Dennis Rodman really made THAT much difference?

The answer was shortly forthcoming. After practice on March 13th, the Lakers confirmed that Rodman had asked for and been granted a "leave of absence" to attend to some "personal matters". During his absence, the Los Angeles team lost three of the four games it played. Rodman's team-mates, like the rest of the basketball world, were left to wonder precisely what these pressing matters might be. It didn't help when Rodman was spotted in Las Vegas, working out his personal issues at a blackjack table.

Rambis was placed in an uncomfortable position by this. When he played for the great Laker teams of the 1980s he was cut from much the same mould as Rodman - an unselfish re-bounder-cum-defensive specialist who didn't mind mucking it up in the trenches. On the other hand, by adopting a laissez-faire attitude toward the Worm's absence, he risked losing control over his team.

Last Sunday, as abruptly and as unexpectedly as he had left, Rodman returned and helped the Lakers to a 115-104 win over the Orlando Magic. A night later he was back in the line-up as his team beat the Dallas Mavericks 96-93.

If the reception from his team-mates was somewhat chilly ("I wasn't expecting these guys to come over and shake my hand or anything like that," admitted Rodman) they were plainly relieved to be back on the winning track.

"I'll be here the rest of the season. I've used up my hall pass," said Rodman, as though nothing had happened at all.

The Lakers were relatively lenient, fining him a token $100 a day for his absence, but one prominent NBA analyst demanded on television that Rodman be dismissed. Converse, claiming that the Worm breached his shoe contract, announced it was terminating its relationship with the player.

Nearly half a season of basketball remains to be played, and Rodman still has plenty of time to find some new adventures. But when it comes time to choose a successor to Michael Jordan as the NBA's Most Valuable Player, it will be difficult to argue that anyone has been more valuable to his team than has Rodman.