The Nets agreed to terms with Eduardo Najera and Jarvis Hayes on the same day, held a press conference for them on the same day and maybe the two will play their first games for their new team on the same day…
But it won’t be Thursday.
Najera and Hayes – both of whom went to the doctor on Tuesday - are out for Thursday’s home preseason opener against the Celtics.
The Nets don't seem concerned about their injuries – wrist and hamstring, respectively. They just want them to get better and in the meantime they'll take a closer look at their young guys.
“I think that right now we’re being very cautious with them,” GM Kiki Vandeweghe said earlier today. “There’s a good side to that because you know what those guys can do. You definitely want to get your young guys as much time and experience as possible.”
Najera re-aggravated his sprained wrist in Europe and is out another 7-10 days. No word yet on Hayes, but no one wants to push it, wisely.
As long as they both are ready for opening night on Oct. 29 at Washington – you know Hayes the former Wizard won’t want to miss that game – that’s all the Nets care about.
It’s likely Keyon Dooling will play Thursday.
As for who starts, maybe we'll know tomorrow, but coach Lawrence Frank said he will look at different combinations.
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The Nets didn’t practice today. Frank gave them a day off after returning from their 2-0 European trip yesterday. They’ll return to the court tomorrow with plenty to accomplish.
Frank admitted it was a good week, but they’re not nearly done or ready to play real games. They have two weeks to get there and much to do.
“On the defensive end we have to significantly improve in many areas, virtually every facet,” Frank said. “We still have things to add that we haven’t done. Offensively, we have to become much sharper. We have to improve our pace. We have to improve our attack and getting everyone understanding in terms of reading the defense and we got to add. So we’ve got a lot of things we need to do.”
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The bigs question isn’t going away, but the Nets say having potentially seven serviceable-to-good power forward/centers is a good problem. In case they can’t lighten the logjam with a trade, their message is keep working and show you deserve playing time and everything will work itself out.
“It’ll be interesting because all of them had moments where they played well and moments they didn’t play as well,” president Rod Thorn said. “The competition is fierce along our frontline for playing time. I think that bodes well for us. You’re going to have to play at the highest level you can if you’re going to make minutes.”
“On any team, you’re going to have guys who aren’t going to play as much,” Vandeweghe said. “You want to have the problem where you have guys who deserve to play maybe aren’t getting as many minutes as they deserve. That’s a much better to problem to have.”
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After all the trains, planes and buses the Nets took in their trip to Paris and England, the rest of their preseason travel is very local – just two flights until the regular-season opener.
They’re home Thursday (Celtics), at Boston Sunday, home Monday (Knicks) and Wednesday (76ers) and at New York next Friday.
Thursday’s game against Boston and Monday vs. the Knicks will air on YES. Next Friday’s game at the Garden can been seen on MSGII.
too many bigs on the roster, and too many good players to have several be practice players only. Need to dump a couple, in exchange for draft choices. Team moral is important, and players who deserve to play, who don't play, get pissed off.
Posted by: Paul Erstein | October 14, 2008 at 06:46 PM