By the time the Jazz meet Houston on Saturday at the Toyota Center, the drama will already be mounting. If there is a sports equivalent to "As the World Turns," it's the NBA playoffs.

Somewhere along the line, something ultratheatrical is bound to occur. It's the natural order of things.

Remember last year in Houston? That was when Andrei Kirilenko was reduced to tears over his role. It made worldwide news. AK said he was at the end of his rope, unsure of what Jerry Sloan wanted him to do. Sloan said he wasn't equipped as a counselor. Kirilenko's wife tried to mediate by saying it was a communication problem.

There were other playoff situations, too. Like after the Jazz's final game, when Deron Williams called out teammates for mentally taking an early vacation. Derek Fisher brought the crowd to its feet by showing up in the middle of a second-round game, after attending to his seriously ill daughter.

Baron Davis dunked on Kirilenko, a meaningless late-game basket, yet it sent the Bay Area media into a frenzy.

What will be this year's melodrama?

"I'll be the sideshow this year," offered Sloan.

That's the thing about the playoffs. EVERYTHING is in high definition. An offhand remark becomes a rallying cry for the opposition. A sprained ankle becomes as important as the war in Iraq.

Heaven help the poor guy who suggests the coach isn't playing him enough, because his remarks will be on talk radio, in the papers and on TV, ad nauseam, for days.

John Stockton got in a fender bender on the way to practice one year, and you'd have thought he was in a fiery explosion.

Never mind his car was barely scratched, much less Stockton himself.

Then there was the story that broke in 1998 about Karl Malone's previously unknown twins he had fathered as a teenager.

Chicago' coach Phil Jackson called Stockton as dirty a player as Dennis Rodman, the only difference being their off-court behavior. Big story. Not to mention the years when Rodman fueled postseason interest by squiring Madonna about town.

This year's cause celebre could be anything. It might be the play of Mehmet Okur, who in Wednesday's regular season finale whacked San Antonio's Fabricio Oberto across the face, drawing a flagrant foul. If he elbows a Houston Rocket, he'll be branded the next Hillside Strangler.