Jackson had the top gun.

THE best lawyers won.

The seven-figure team beat the five-figure team. That's the way it works in sports. Why should the courtroom be different? Between Michael Jackson's defense lawyer, Tom Mesereau, and Santa Barbara County District Attorney Tom Sneddon, is there any doubt whom you would pick if your life were on the line?

You don't send high school kids to play against the Sonics or the Lakers. So why do we keep sending the second string when we need superstars? When public confidence in the criminal justice system is at stake, what's the point of being penny-wise and pound-foolish?

Imagine how different this case might have been if Sneddon--realizing at the outset that he had an ax to grind against Jackson, that his judgment was impaired by his longtime pursuit, and that the resources of his office were limited--had decided to look for outside help.

What might have happened if he'd called Daniel Petrocelli, to name one obvious choice, the lawyer who successfully brought the O.J. Simpson civil case?

For one thing, you would have had an objective decision as to whether there was enough evidence to justify the prosecution in the first instance. Grand juries will indict a ham sandwich. Grand juries were intended to ensure that the power of a prosecutor to ruin someone's life is not used except in cases where there is sufficient evidence to meet the reasonable doubt standard.

Second, and more important, the prosecution's case would have been more effectively presented. As one juror pointed out, when the mother of the boy making the accusations went on tape, she was made-up and well-dressed, and her hair was combed. She came to court utterly unkempt, hair uncombed, clearly offending the very jurors whose confidence she needed to win. Maybe she was trying to look pitiful, the juror said.

You can't tell a witness what to say, but any good trial lawyer must help her to express herself effectively. That's what Michael Jackson and his people did. But clearly no one from the prosecutor's office had the time, experience or training to do the same.

Why not? In most cases against clearly guilty defendants, represented by public defenders or appointed counsel who haven't the time to meet their clients, let alone investigate the charges, hair styles are the least of anyone's problems. Ninety-nine percent of the time, the defendant is caught red-handed, the prosecution has more resources than the defendant and the last thing a prosecutor has to worry about is preparing his witness for a scalding cross-examination.

The most persuasive piece of corroborating evidence in this case, the video of the boy's interview with the police, was not shown to the jury until the end of the 14-week trial. How evidence is presented, in what order, is critically important. You can't wait 14 weeks to present your most persuasive evidence. Clearly, the defense expected a stronger case--so did everyone else.

Thinking back, the only celebrity to be convicted in recent years of a serious crime was Mike Tyson. He had a million dollar defense, as well. But the prosecution in Indiana reached out to a top-notch lawyer in private practice, Greg Garrison (now, what else, a radio talk show host, as well as a lawyer), to handle the prosecution for the state. He won the case.

Prior to the Simpson case, I suggested to Gil Garcetti, then the district attorney of Los Angeles, that he consider doing the same thing in that prosecution. Are you suggesting my team isn't up to taking on Johnny Cochran, Barry Scheck, F. Lee Bailey, Bob Shapiro and Alan Dershowitz? he asked me. I was. I am.

Susan Estrich is a syndicated columnist and USC law professor.