Chicago Tribune (CT) - FRIDAY, February 2, 1996 Edition: NORTH SPORTS FINAL Section: SPORTS Page: 1 Word Count: 1,084
Melissa Isaacson, Tribune Staff Writer.

The present is good enough. It has to be. And so it is a different Johnson that we see today. Not just four years older and 27 pounds heavier than the last time he wore a Lakers uniform, but without any promises.

"Let's not worry about that," he pleads to still another reporter asking how long he will play basketball. "I'm having too much fun now."

When he tested positive for HIV and announced his retirement from the NBA on Nov. 7, 1991, Johnson left the game he loved under protest. After returning for a brief stint a year later, he would leave in anger.

If there is the slightest bit of an edge to him now, it is not without reason. It was that second exit that really got to him.

"I likened it to an all-out aerial assault," said his agent and close friend Lon Rosen. "He was not prepared for the negative reaction."

NBA players such as Karl Malone and executives such as Jerry Colangelo expressed public concern about the spread of the AIDS virus with Johnson's return. Even members of the media, who had always been on his side, took their shots. And when Johnson felt fear emanating from his own teammates while being treated for a cut in a preseason game that year, he said he would never come back.

Now, he says, with better education, he can only hope those fears have been allayed. If they have not, however, he has made it clear he will not bear responsibility this time around.

"It doesn't matter anymore," he said. "If they have a problem with it, they have a problem with it. That's their own hangup. I don't care what anyone says. Nothing has happened, ever. (The spread of the virus through contact on a playing field) has never been documented, so we might as well get off this subject because it's a dead issue. I'm back, and I'm back to stay. Everybody's going to have to deal with it. That's it."

He comes back now because friends and teammates talked him into it, gave him their blessing. He did it because Lakers General Manager Jerry West, who was uneasy with his indecision, gently told him that it was "now or never.""If not now," said Rosen, "then he would probably be flirting with it until he was 50 years old."

He did it because there was no substitute for the NBA arena, not coaching a team, which he tried for 16 games in 1994, in the latter part of the Lakers' season. And not owning a team, which he did when he purchased 5 percent of the franchise a year ago until last week, when he transferred it back to owner Jerry Buss to be in accordance with NBA rules.

Neither venture could fill the void. "Remember that first game against the Milwaukee Bucks?" asked Rosen, referring to Johnson's first game as coach. "He was jumping up and down like it was the NBA Finals. After they won, I went up to Jerry Buss' office and we all clinked glasses and drank champagne. Then Magic took off his tie and said--and I'm going to change the language here--'I don't care what you have to do, I'm not going to coach another game.' "

It was no more in Johnson's nature than leaving in the first place. And touring the world with a team made up of former pros did not cut it either.Michael Cooper knew. Johnson's former teammate from the great Lakers' teams of the '80s could read his friend's discontent.

"If it was me who owned a team, I'd get myself 30 rows (of seats) way up there," he said pointing to the Forum rafters. "But Magic, he sat right down here under the basket where he could smell the rubber and feel the action. I could tell then that he still wanted to be part of it."

After Tuesday's "debut," in which he came off the bench and helped lead the Lakers to their highest point total of the season as well as a victory with 19 points, 10 assists and eight rebounds, Johnson was breathless. "Man, this was just so much fun," he said. "I can't even begin to tell you how this feels."

By the next morning, he was talking about his desire to play on the Olympic team, if deserving, and his determination to improve. "I haven't really accomplished anything yet," he said.

Even by coming so amazingly close to a triple-double in his first game in 55 months?

"Yeah," he responded, "but I missed it."

To Lakers coach Del Harris, that was all he needed to hear. "He exceeded all reasonable expectations, even of an all-time great player. The beauty if it is that there is room for improvement as he learns our players and they learn him."

He says he likes his role as "point forward" and sixth man. "Even if Del said, 'Earvin, I want you to start (Friday), I'd say, 'I'd rather not.' We're going to be one of those teams that you don't know how to defend--like the Bulls. I think I can add a lot of versatility. It's going to be fun."

Atop his list of reasons for returning are his children, his infant daughter and particularly his 3-year-old son, "E.J.," who brought a newspaper photo of himself and mother Cookie at the game to school Wednesday for show-and-tell.

"One day," Johnson recalled, "I came in and I was joking with my wife and I said, 'I'm too old to be doing this again.' So my son goes to school and tells his friends, 'My daddy's too old to play basketball.'

"Well, now he knows daddy isn't too old. He can still do a little bit."

For now, that's good enough.

CAPTION: PHOTO (color): Michael Jordan pressures Magic Johnson in Game 5 of the 1991 NBA Finals, the last time they met in an NBA game. Tribune file photo by Jim Prisching. (North Sports Final edition, Sports section, page 1.) PHOTO: Magic Johnson works out Thursday with the Lakers: "I'm back, and I'm back to stay. Everybody's going to have to deal with it. That's it." AP photo.

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