Pat Riley could have picked Alex English. He could have gone with Mark Aguirre.

Instead, the Los Angeles Lakers coach walked over to forward Tom Chambers the day before the 1987 NBA All-Star Game and told him he would start the next day.

Chambers hadn't even originally been selected to the team. He was an injury replacement, tabbed by commissioner David Stern because starting Western Conference forward Ralph Sampson had gotten hurt.

But Chambers had one thing on his side. He played for Seattle, and the game was being played at the cavernous Kingdome.

"It was shocking to me when he told me I was starting," recalled Chambers, a graduate of Fairview High School in Boulder. "I was the hometown boy, and I think he wanted to get 50,000 on his side right away. I first was worried about what the guys who had made the team for a few years would think about a replacement player starting, but not too many people questioned Pat Riley."

Tales grow through the years (there were 34,275 on hand), but there's no need to exaggerate what Chambers did on the court Feb. 8, 1987.

Chambers was named Most Valuable Player in his first All- Star Game. He scored a game- high 34 points in 29 minutes and hit a number of clutch shots down the stretch as the West beat the East 154-149 in overtime.

"It was a Cinderella story," said Chambers, who appeared in three other All-Star games. "No question about it; it was the top moment of my career. I'm asked about that All-Star Game all the time."

Twenty years later, Nuggets forward Carmelo Anthony can draw inspiration from Chambers. Anthony, hampered by a 15-game suspension for fighting, was passed over for the All- Star Game in fan voting for starters and as a reserve by coaches.

But Stern threw Anthony a life preserver. He named him an injury replacement, one of five in the game Sunday.

"I hope so," Anthony said of whether he could follow in Chambers' footsteps and be hoisting a trophy at the end. "Anything can happen."

Anthony doesn't think there should be an asterisk by his name for being tabbed a replacement, saying, "In 10 years, won't nobody really know how I got on there."

Since getting the good news Feb. 9, Anthony has been hearing the names of top players whose first All-Star Game appearance came as an injury replacement.

Two almost certain Hall of Famers are guard Gary Payton, picked in 1994 for his first of nine games with Seattle, and Minnesota forward Kevin Garnett, who was only 20 when selected in 1997. Garnett, making his 10th All-Star appearance, will be Anthony's teammate.

"You take the ego out of it, you're an All Star," Garnett said. "To this day, if they need (an injury) reserve, I'll be a reserve. I never cared about that.

"If (Anthony is) bugged out about being a replacement player, he's going to have more than his share of All-Star games. He just has to be consistent with his play every year. This is the least of his worries."

No injury replacement has had a day like Chambers did. Since the NBA in 1990 began keeping complete records of replacements, not one of 21 such players has scored more than 15 points.

Mutombo was gripping

The best replacement showing since Chambers' belongs to center Dikembe Mutombo, who ripped down 22 rebounds in 2001, tied for the best showing since 1963. Mutombo's reward was being traded 11 days later from Atlanta to Philadelphia.

Mutombo is the only player who, since 1990, twice has been an injury replacement. His first such selection - it came in 1995 when he became the only other Denver player to have been named by the commissioner - was not without controversy.

After being passed over as a reserve, Mutombo told the NBA to "go to hell." Then, in a game against the Lakers, Mutombo inadvertently struck Cedric Ceballos, tearing a ligament in Ceballos' right thumb.

In an interesting scenario, Stern named Mutombo to replace the man he hurt. A Rocky Mountain News columnist jokingly likened the move to the Tonya Harding situation of the previous year.

Stern got in some jokes of his own at Mutombo's expense.

"First, he sends me to Africa, then he sends me to hell," Stern said during 1995 All-Star Weekend about having accompanied Mutombo and other NBA players on a 1994 journey to South Africa.

Mutombo, now with Houston, ended up having a long conversation with Stern about his comments when snubbed. He regretted them.

"When I didn't make (the All- Star team), I got mad," said Mutombo, who totaled 12 points and eight rebounds in 1995, his second of eight All-Star appearances. "I remember I said something that was not good for the league. Next thing I know, I was picked up to play on the team. When I got to the game, at the press conference, I didn't know how to respond to all the questions. . . . Sometimes, when you don't make the team, you have to be very reserved in what you say about the league."

Precedence for Anthony

Stern showed forgiveness in naming Mutombo. He did the same with Anthony, who punched New York's Mardy Collins during a Dec. 16 brawl, and he did it with the Knicks' Latrell Sprewell in 2001.

After Sprewell, then with Golden State, choked Warriors coach P.J. Carlesimo in December 1997, Stern suspended him for a year, although an arbitrator shortened the penalty to the rest of the season. When Spre- well was picked as an injury replacement by Stern, it marked his first and only All-Star appearance since the episode.

When then-Knicks coach Jeff Van Gundy heard several hours after a practice that Sprewell had been named, he was so excited he wanted to deliver the news in person. Van Gundy drove to Sprewell's spacious home and knocked on the door.

With his coach standing on his welcome mat, Sprewell's first thought was he had done something wrong. But Sprewell was thrilled when told he was heading for his fourth All-Star Game but first since 1997.

The consensus is Stern, commissioner since 1984, always has been fair in naming injury replacements. In picking Anthony, Dallas' Josh Howard, Seattle's Ray Allen, Utah's Memhet Okur and Atlanta's Joe Johnson this month, that ties the 1997 mark for most overall in a game, and the West having four is a record for one team.

"We look at the votes, both fan and coaches'," Stern said about how he picks replacements. "We put in a little salt and pepper, and then I get out my Ouija board and then we make a decision."

Stern has picked Hall of Famer Joe Dumars as a replacement and, in addition to Garnett, and Payton, players such as Elton Brand and Baron Davis. He also has named Chris Gatling, Antonio Davis and Hersey Hawkins, who have gone down as some of the more obscure All-Stars.

"You and I both know (Gatling) wasn't an All- Star," said Warriors coach Don Nelson, who had taken over as Dallas general manager two days before the Mavericks forward appeared in the 1997 All-Star Game. The Mavericks traded Gatling to New Jersey eight days after the game.

Of the 20 different players named injury replacements since 1990, Gatling is one of seven, all retired, to have played in only one All-Star Game. But it didn't bother guard Michael Adams, a 1992 replacement from Washington, that it turned out to be his only appearance.

"I thought I should have made it the year before when I averaged (26.5 points and 10.5 assists for the Nuggets), but we weren't winning," said Adams, now a University of Maryland men's basketball assistant. "I had some personal feelings when passed over (as a reserve in 1992), but I didn't dwell on it. I felt that I belonged that year and the bottom line is, I'm just happy that I got an All-Star Game ring."

Adams said it also shouldn't bother Anthony how he was selected. It doesn't.

"An All-Star Game is an All-Star Game, regardless of how you got in," Anthony said. "You're still an All- Star."

Anthony won't start Sunday but figures to get plenty of minutes on a depleted West team that has lost Yao Ming, Carlos Boozer, Steve Nash and Anthony's teammate, Allen Iverson, to injury. It wouldn't be out of the question to see Anthony, the NBA's leading scorer, with a 30.7 average, have a scoring game similar to the one Chambers had in 1987.

"With the style he plays, I would expect a show," said Chambers, who does television work for the Phoenix Suns.

Chambers isn't the only injury replacement to start an All-Star Game. In 1978, the legendary John Havlicek, playing his final season, was named to replace Pete Maravich, and Doug Collins stepped aside so Havlicek could start.

Randy Smith, the 1978 All- Star Game MVP, recalls Havlicek taking the floor to a raucous greeting in Atlanta. That's what happened when Chambers stepped on the court nine years later and when he was holding up the MVP trophy at the end.

"The fans were going crazy," Chambers said.

Sounds as if Riley knew what he was doing.

The Replacements

How All-Star Game injury replacements since 1990 have fared:

Year Injured player Team Replacement Team How he fared

2006 Jermaine O'Neal Indiana Gilbert Arenas Washington 1 point in 10 minutes

2003 Chris Webber Sacramento Peja Stojakovic Sacramento 5 points in 13 minutes

2002 Shaquille O'Neal L.A. Lakers Elton Brand L.A. Clippers 6 points, 10 rebounds in 19 minutes

2002 Vince Carter Toronto Baron Davis Charlotte 2 points, 5 assists in 13 minutes

2001 Grant Hill Orlando Latrell Sprewell New York 7 points, 4 assists in 15 minutes

2001 Alonzo Mourning Miami Dikembe Mutombo Atlanta 6 points, 22 rebounds in 28 minutes

2001 Theo Ratliff Philadelphia Antonio Davis Toronto 8 points, 9 rebounds in 20 minutes

2001 Shaquille O'Neal L.A. Lakers Vlade Divac Sacramento 8 points in 9 minutes

1997 Alonzo Mourning Miami Joe Dumars Detroit 3 points in 10 minutes

1997 Charles Barkley Houston Detlef Schrempf Seattle 11 points in 20 minutes

1997 Patrick Ewing New York Chris Webber Washington 2 points in 14 minutes

1997 Clyde Drexler Houston Chris Gatling Dallas 2 points in 12 minutes

1997 Shaquille O'Neal L.A. Lakers Kevin Garnett Minnesota 6 points, 9 rebounds in 18 minutes

1995 Cedric Ceballos L.A. Lakers Dikembe Mutombo Denver 12 points, 8 rebounds in 20 minutes

1994 Alonzo Mourning Charlotte Horace Grant Chicago 4 points, 8 rebounds in 17 minutes

1994 Charles Barkley Phoenix Gary Payton Seattle 6 points, 9 assists in 17 minutes

1993 Mitch Richmond Sacramento Terry Porter Portland 7 points in 19 minutes

1992 Larry Bird Boston Michael Adams Washington 9 points in 14 minutes

1992 Dominique Wilkins Atlanta Kevin Willis Atlanta 8 points in 14 minutes

1991 Larry Bird Boston Hersey Hawkins Philadelphia 6 points in 14 minutes

1990 Karl Malone Utah Rolando Blackman Dallas 15 points in 21 minutes

tomassonc@RockyMountainNews.com

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