LAKERS: NBA'S GREATEST FRANCHISE.

Byline: KEVIN MODESTI

Stretch a Lakers fan out on a psychiatrist's couch, probe deep beneath this month's bravado in search of long-held insecurities, and you'll find an inferiority complex rooted in a painful 1960s childhood.

Wake a Lakers fan from a nightmare, mop the cold sweat from her forehead, and listen to burbling descriptions of monsters named Frank Selvy, Don Nelson and Bill Russell, and something about the black magic in an old man's cigar.

Watch the Staples Center sign-wavers show off fresh and amusing ways of saying ``We're No. 1,'' and understand that down in their souls a nagging doubt boils, that for many adult-age fans with healthy long-term memories, the Lakers are forever No. 2 behind the Boston Celtics.

In the '60s, the Celtics and Lakers met in six NBA Finals, and the Celtics won every series, the first in '62 because Los Angeles' Selvy missed a 15-footer at the buzzer in Game 7 at the Garden, the last in '69 because Boston's Nelson got the lucky high bounce on a follow shot late in Game 7 at the Forum. The lesson, imprinted on the unconscious minds of both cities, was that the Celtics are the league's sainted franchise and there's nothing the Lakers can do about it, despite their tradition-upsetting victories in '85 and '87 and their present-day success.

``That's pretty hard to argue with, when you see the 16 (championship) banners (in Boston),'' said Rick Fox, the one-time Celtic who tries to look at it from the other side now that he's a valuable member of the Lakers team going for its 13th.

Hard to argue with, but no longer impossible. And so, today, we deliver good news for all of those tortured Lakers fans who have gone through life spooked by parquet flooring and sweat-darkened green.

I'm OK. You're OK. The Lakers, not the Celtics, are the greatest franchise in pro basketball history.

How are we so sure? Because we've looked at what the Lakers have achieved from their early days in Minneapolis to their present day in downtown L.A., before the '60s and since.

The NBA was created in 1946 as the Basketball Association of America. The Celtics were born that year, because Boston Garden owner Walter Brown wanted an attraction to fill the seats in non-hockey months, and were something less than instant wonders. The failing Detroit Gems became the Minneapolis Lakers in 1948, signed George Mikan and won the title in their first try.

Now here's one for the believe-it-or-not file: The Boston franchise has won 2,563 regular-season games, as of the end of its wobbly 36-46 run in 2000-01. The Minneapolis-L.A. franchise has won 2,563 games, exactly the same.

Because the Celtics have played 110 more regular-season games, the Lakers can boast of having pulled ahead in the winning-percentage column, .617-.601.

That's the regular season, you say. Nobody cares about the regular season in the NBA. So let's compare Minneapolis-L.A. and Boston in the playoffs. Lakers: 341-230, .597. Celtics: 272-189, .590. The Lakers pulled ahead, percentage-wise, with their second victory over the Portland Trail Blazers last month, and the Celtics were beginning their sixth consecutive idle postseason.

That's just wins and losses, you say. It's championships that count. So let's compare championships. Yes, the Celtics have won more NBA titles than any other team. The Lakers are second, and can't catch up until 2004 at the earliest.

But ... the Celtics won half of their titles in the '60s, and all of their titles in the four-decade span of the '50s to the '80s. The Lakers earned titles in the '40s, '50s, '70s, '80s and '90s and are closing in on one in the '00s - that's six decades, or every decade except the '60s.

Even if you believe a decade begins with the ``0'' year, and assign 2000 to the new decade instead of the last, then the Lakers lay claim to five championship decades.

Titles in six (or five) of their seven decades - that puts the Lakers in the class of hockey's Montreal Canadiens (eight of 10), football's Washington Redskins (six of eight) and baseball's New York Yankees (seven of 11).

They've won titles in two cities, in at least three home arenas, under three owners, under five head coaches (John Kundla, Bill Sharman, Paul Westhead, Pat Riley, Phil Jackson), and with four great centers (Mikan, Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Shaquille O'Neal).

They've been down and bounced back, haven't suffered a sub-.500 stretch longer than two seasons in 40 years and have never finished 10 games under .500 in back-to-back seasons.

The Celtics, meanwhile, are down and ... and ... As we speak, they're working on eight consecutive years at 10 games or further below .500.

Boston fans can point out that we'll never know what might have developed if the Celtics' Len Bias and Reggie Lewis hadn't died. To which L.A. fans can reply that Showtime might have gone on into the '90s if illness hadn't forced Magic Johnson to retire early. Speculation matches conjecture basket for basket.

On the court, in the record books, through the decades, the answer to Lakers fans' self-doubt is reassuring: The Lakers are not only the franchise of the moment, they're the franchise of all time.

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There need be no crisis of confidence, Lakers fans. Shaquille O'Neal and Co. have helped subdue the ghost of Boston.

Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press