How the West was none: Where did all the centers go?

Shaquille O'Neal is in Cleveland and Yao Ming is in limbo, leaving the Western Conference without a returning All-Star center in the strange-but-true story of how much has changed in 2009-10.

How strange and how true? Only one true center in the West has ever been an All-Star: Mehmet Okur of the Jazz.

That's how open the position has suddenly become, and not simply for the February weekend in Dallas. This is an opportunity for someone -- Emeka Okafor, Nene, Okur, Al Jefferson, Andrew Bynum, Andris Biedrins, Chris Kaman -- to establish himself at a sparkly new level. Or for the less-experienced Marc Gasol, Greg Oden and Spencer Hawes to develop more quickly, without having to get worked over by a superstar the way that Shaq of the Lakers days would have done and David Robinson and Hakeem Olajuwon before that.

Now, all the peers are merely credible or kids grabbing at the future. Fee-fi-ho-hum.

Not that it's any gauntlet in the other conference during the downsizing of the NBA, but the East at least has Dwight Howard as the star of stars at the position, O'Neal coming off a good season in Phoenix and still a worry to opponents, Chris Bosh as a 20-10 guy and Brook Lopez as the best center of the rookie class.

There are asterisks. Tim Duncan has played at center a lot, but the Spurs list Matt Bonner as the starting center and a few years ago made a specific request that Duncan be on the All-Star ballot at power forward. Pau Gasol inherited extensive center duty with Bynum sidelined last season, but, again, the Lakers' lineup of choice is Gasol at power forward.

For actual starting centers, though, this is the conference where the Rockets are winning with Chuck Hayes, the Suns with Channing Frye, the Mavericks with Erick Dampier, the Thunder with Nenad Krstic, and where the Kings began the season with Sean May before going back to Hawes. It's a respectable list -- bigs that who have produced and have the potential to step into the void.

It's just that there is no star power at the ready.

• Okur, Jazz, 2007 All-Star. "Shaq, he's gone," Okur said. "He's in Cleveland right now. Yao, he's probably going to be out this year. So this is going to be a great opportunity for me."

• Okafor, Hornets. He averaged a double-double in each of his first six seasons, all with the Bobcats before he was traded to New Orleans in a summer swap for Tyson Chandler.

• Nene, Nuggets. Never a force on the boards, he blossomed to 14.6 points a game last season and is still just 27, meaning he could become a factor for years. And now there is the added encouragement of nine boards a game early in 2009-10.

• Jefferson, Timberwolves. Could end up as a power forward if Minnesota lands a true center, but the first two seasons after arriving as the headliner of the package for Kevin Garnett were good; 21 points and 11.1 rebounds followed by 23.1 points and 11 rebounds in 50 games before a knee injury ruined his 2008-09.

• Bynum. On the rise each of the last two seasons, only to be sidetracked by a serious injury. Ascending again, he's now at 20 points and 10.6 rebounds to generate the possibility that the defending champions could be better this time around. Bynum could be that good.

• Biedrins, Warriors. He averaged a double-double last season following a near-miss (10.5 points, 9.8 rebounds) in 2007-08. Off to a slow start in 2009-10, though, with bad numbers and games missed due to a strained lower back.

• Kaman, Clippers. Back on track as the guy with real possibilities, he's at 23 points and 9.9 rebounds through 7 games after a foot injury kept him to 31 appearances in 2008-09. The season before, he was 15.7 and 12.7, respectively. "If I struggle during the season, I'm just grateful that I'm healthy," Kaman said. "At this point, I just want to be able to play. Hopefully, the rest of it comes with it."

It gets especially cloudy because some of the best candidates for All-Star spots are on teams having bad starts, or worse -- Kaman, Jefferson, Biedrins and maybe, surprisingly, Okafor in New Orleans. That matters in the perception game. It's a new world for West centers, with all the big names somewhere else and the line of successors forming. This one will have to do.

Scott Howard-Cooper has covered the NBA since 1988. You can e-mail him here.

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