Updated: 12:14 PM EDT
L.A. Purple and Gold vs. New Jersey Goombahs
Easy to Picture Laker Players as Characters From 'The Sopranos'
By STEVE ASCHBURNER, AOL Exclusive

It's coming Sunday night, the event for which we've all been waiting. Months and months of down time, followed by a dozen weeks or so in which the pace picks up, the plotlines soar and weave and everything finally begins to build toward a climax.

Finally, this weekend, in prime time, we get the payoff:

'The Sopranos' wraps up its fifth season.

Or, the Los Angeles Lakers begin to wrap up their fourth NBA championship in five seasons.

Take your pick. Sometimes it's hard to tell them apart. (Except that one still is on cable TV, while the other finally is back on broadcast.)

Parallels abound, from intrigue, angst and felony charges to a long, colorful tradition and a code unto themselves. They move through their world of wads of cash, women mostly on the periphery, appalled onlookers, long periods of boredom interrupted by fits of action, sweatsuits, bling-bling and testosterone by the barrel.

The Sopranos mob bickers constantly from within, but can unite in a heartbeat when it's time to go to the mattresses. Ditto for the Lakers.

The Lakers squabble over contracts. Ditto for the Sopranos.

Both put the dis in dysfunctional families.

None of this is new -- remember how the Lakers ran roughshod over New Jersey two years ago, so very similar to Tony strong-arming a cut of the Riverfront Esplanade project? -- but now more than ever, the two seem to dance and veer and mesh in a Bizarro world of interchangeable plot points and doppelganger characters. (Doppelganger? Hmmm, sounds like something one of Dr. Melfi's psych professors might say. Or Phil Jackson.)

Really, would it be that difficult to imagine HBO's lovable creeps squaring off with a bunch of bad boys from Detroit, as the Lakers are about to do? These guys already live and scrap in a Motor City world of Escalades, Eldorados and Hummers. Besides, the Pistons have one guy (Rasheed Wallace) who "pleads the Fifth" any time he sees a microphone and a camera, another (Richard Hamilton) who plays from behind a mask like somebody headed for the witness protection program and a third (Ben Wallace) who's as famous for his hairdo as Silvio Dante.

As for the swap-ability of the lead players, consider these similarities between the fellas of the purple-and-gold and the goombahs of the black-and-blue:

Tony Soprano/Shaquille O'Neal

The big man himself, with the large appetites and the outsized ambitions, who can't always keep his house in order. (We're talking Lakerland and we're having fun here, but when a housekeeper gets murdered at a Houston home owned by O'Neal, the crime/sports continuum gets awfully blurred.)

Like Shaq, Tony, too, can make a case as the MDE (Most Dominant Ever). Without him, there is no show, or Showtime. Both guys are obsessed with money, from Tony dipping his beak into thoroughbred winnings or landscaping scams to Shaq demanding a contract extension in the most impolite fashion during a preseason game in Hawaii.

Both of them are easily distracted, from the Bada Bing, the mistresses and the house at the Jersey shore (Soprano) to the rap music, the junky movies and the endorsements (O'Neal). Both big men have glaring weaknesses as well -- with Tony it's panic attacks and fainting spells, with Shaq it's free-throw shooting. One seeks out a therapist but is afraid to admit it, the other ignores endless advice and is content to "make 'em when they count."

Kobe Bryant/Christopher Moltisanti

This goes beyond his problem with a certain woman, the one who snitched to authorities. Christopher just can't seem to get out from under Tony's vast shadow. The big man often refers to him as his nephew, even though he really isn't -- he's Carmela's cousin. Just like Bryant isn't really the little brother that Shaq once saw him as.

Both young guys always seem to be conflicted -- should they stay or should they go? -- and flirt with the notion of making it on their own (screenwriting for one, a new franchise for another). The tensions really rose at one point this season, until two weeks ago, when Christopher finally surrendered to his destiny and chose the family over a fresh start in the outside world. Laker fans have something similar in mind for their guy.

Gary Payton/Paulie Walnuts

Both these wise guys have been slipping in importance lately, around mostly to calm down the big man and patch over bruised feelings within the family. Don't forget, though, that Paulie once went off half-cocked when he felt he wasn't getting treated well (by the triangle offense?) and nearly betrayed the family.

Karl Malone/Tony Blundetto

A long-lost cousin, played by actor Steve Buscemi, shows up on the scene this year and all of a sudden, he's a favorite of big Tony. Seems the guy had been away for a long time -- in the federal penitentiary, in Salt Lake City, what's the dif? -- and now he wants his due. For one, it's running a makeshift casino. For the other, a ring.

Phil Jackson/Uncle Junior

The old guy who sits around giving orders, talking in riddles, smiling quizzically and pining for the good old days (with his dead brother Johnny or with Michael Jordan, as the case may be). The biggest difference is, Uncle Junior once put out a contract on his nephew but Jackson still is waiting for the Lakers to put a new contract on the table for him.

There are others: Neither Devean George or Silvio Dante seem that important anymore, mostly making cameo appearances. And Jeannie Buss can be viewed as Carmela in that both want to be viewed as strong independent women, yet still wind up being defined by the men in their lives.

Mitch Kupchak is a little like restaurateur Artie Bucco, always taking orders from his version of Tony. Carmine Lupertazzi, dearly departed former boss of the New York operation? Think Chick Hearn.

Both casts have had characters, too, who were too crazy and scary to last very long. Like Ralphie Cifaretto and Richie Aprile. Like Isaiah Rider and Dennis Rodman.

The hapless federal investigators, as portrayed in the TV show, have their obvious parallel in the NBA referees, who work and work and work when the Lakers play and still ain't got nothin' on them.

That leaves Johnny "Sack" Sacramoni, who at first seemed like another match for Bryant, based on his burgeoning rivalry with Tony. Then it clicked: Nah, this is David Stern. The king of New York, in NBA terms, the guy always trying to dictate terms to the Soprano family.

Except that while Stern can't live without the Lakers, especially in the TV ratings, it's not clear that Johnny Sack can live much longer with the Sopranos.

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Steve Aschburner covers the NBA and the Timberwolves for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.