Utah Jazz Notes

Seated in front of his locker before Monday’s game, C.J. Miles peeled off the black splint from his left hand to share how his injured thumb has been healing.

“You can see it,” Miles said, noting the small scar that followed surgery Oct. 11 to repair a ruptured ligament as well as the residual swelling. “Everything, it’s not as bad as you would think it is.”

Miles was encouraged about taking the next step in his recovery after having the cast on his hand removed Monday. However, it will be at least two more weeks before he can resume practicing and possibly a month before he makes his return in a game.

The Jazz also were encouraged about as Kyle Korver was re-examined Monday following knee surgery and cleared for more rehab activity. Korver will spend the rest of the week working out at the Peak Performance Project training center in Santa Barbara, Calif.

Without Miles and Korver, the Jazz have been deprived of two of their three top three-point shooters and have been left with at most 11 players in uniform.

“I can’t worry about them being back until they get here,” Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said, adding: “Right now we’re trying to win a game any way we can. This is who we are right now.”

For this week, Miles is restricted to squeezing a sponge or small ball in a whirlpool as he starts to regain strength and range of motion in his hand. He described the process as similiar to breaking in a new pair of shoes.

It will take at least two weeks before Miles can practice for the first time since he was injured Oct. 5 in London on the Jazz’s preseason trip.

“After the first couple workouts, I can gauge how much it hurts, then what I can do and what I can’t do to work up to being in the game,” Miles said.

Miles said doctors were optimistic he’d be in the lineup the next time the Jazz come through the area, a five-game Eastern Conference trip starting Dec. 16 at New Jersey. If things go well, though, Miles could be back sooner.

In the meantime, Miles joked about the “amazing” feeling of being able to shower without his cast as well as the dead skin that sloughed off afterward. 

He also admitted having “flashbacks” to his first three seasons on the inactive list while watching recent games with Korver. The Jazz’s loss Saturday to Sacramento was particularly painful with the Kings switching to a zone defense.

“Me and Kyle were sitting behind the bench like, ‘Nobody ever plays zone when we play,’” Miles said, “and watching them play zone for that extended amount of time, knowing that we could change the game.”

--Ross Siler

We’re all going to be interested to see how Deron Williams looks at Jazz practice Tuesday. Williams’ back locked up in the second quarter of Monday’s game against New York but he opted to come back for the second half with Ronnie Price lost to a sprained toe.

Despite his back, Williams ended up playing 41 minutes total and all but 1:27 of the second half with Price out. He spent his short time out of the game flat on his back in front of the Jazz bench and said afterward that just standing to answer questions was difficult.

Instead of staying over in New York, the Jazz opted to fly to Boston after the game. It’s easier, after all, to get out of Manhattan and to the airport late at night than during normal hours. The trip, however, couldn’t have been easy on Williams given his back issues.

Thought you might find this stat interesting: With their injury-depleted roster, the Jazz have been riding Williams hard for even the first seven games of a season.

Williams has played 282 minutes, an average of 40.3 minutes, so far this season. There’s no comparison for the 2008-09 season because Williams was injured with his sprained ankle to start and his minutes were monitored once he returned.

In the 2007-08 season, Williams played 268 minutes in the Jazz’s first seven games, an average of 38.3 a game. The season before that in 2006-07, Williams played 257 minutes in the first seven games, an average of 36.7.

The difference isn’t huge, but Williams already has played 14 more minutes comparatively through seven games than he has in previous seasons. That’s more than an additional quarter . . . and the Jazz have only played 28 total quarters.

It did appear in the second quarter Monday as if the Jazz had figured out a way to at least hold their ground while Williams was out of the game. They outscored the Knicks 12-8 with Price in the game and bought Williams some six minutes of rest.

--Ross Siler

If you’re grading losses on a degree of awfulness scale, the Jazz have had three whoppers already this season. Feel free to come up with your own numbers, but the Houston loss was probably a 8 in my book, the Dallas loss a 10 and the Sacramento loss a 10.

The Jazz were headed for their fourth crushing loss before holding on Monday to beat New York. It would have been a 12 on the scale, though, with the Jazz blowing a 21-point lead in the second half and a 14-point lead entering the fourth quarter.

Had the Knicks not buried themselves in the first half - - they scored 31 points, shot 35 percent, missed five free throws and went 0-for-10 from three-point range - - the Jazz probably wouldn’t have won Monday.

Had the Knicks come through on one of their final three possessions - - Al Harrington missed a three-pointer, Larry Hughes was blocked by Ronnie Brewer and Toney Douglas missed a runner - - the Jazz likely would have lost.

The Jazz gave up 62 points in the second half and watched the Knicks hit 8 of 19 three-pointers. Against the Knicks’ zone defense, the Jazz went 6-for-18 with seven turnovers in the fourth quarter, which New York won 29-17.

Yet somehow the Jazz escaped with a victory. Lose to Sacramento and beat the Knicks. You can look at that as picking up two pingpong balls as far as the draft lottery is concerned.

“Obviously, we needed everything we could get to be able to try to win the ballgame,” Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said.

I’m not sure how confident the Jazz can be the rest of this trip with games at Boston, Philadelphia and Cleveland. The Celtics game, coming on Wednesday, is especially concerning with Deron Williams’ back locking up in the second quarter Monday.

Not even a week after the Dirk Nowitzki show in the fourth quarter last Tuesday in Dallas, Jazz fans had to feel like they were watching the sequel to a horror movie in the second half against the Knicks.

The Jazz appeared in line for a cruise-control victory as they opened a 21-point lead in the third quarter. After missing their first dozen three-pointers, though, the Knicks not surprisingly got hot, with Chris Duhon and Wilson Chandler burying three in a two-minute span.

All of a sudden, the Jazz were looking at a 12-point game. Sloan held off calling a timeout until the Jazz had given up a dunk to David Lee and layup to Hughes, making it 58-48 with 6:19 left in the quarter.

Had Kirilenko not hit three three-pointers the rest of the quarter (Mehmet Okur added a fourth), the Jazz would have capsized in the third. The Knicks closed within eight, but the Jazz were able to build their lead back to 14.

The Knicks then made another push in the fourth quarter, scoring 10 unanswered points behind Danilo Gallinari and Al Harrington, closing within a point with 6:19 left before Sloan decided he’d seen enough and called a timeout.

The Jazz also fell apart with their pick-and-roll defense in the closing minutes. Toney Douglas drove for not one but two layups in the last 2:15, though the Knicks opted not to have Douglas come off a pick on his final drive against Williams.

“A couple times we did a poor job of coming over and giving help and Douglas got right down the middle of the lane for layups,” Sloan said, “and we stood and hugged our man out on the perimeter. It looked like we were glued to them.”

In the end, the Jazz were able to leave New York with a victory. It’s sort of like my celebrity sighting of Jon Gosselin in Times Square at 1 a.m. after his appearance on “The Insider.” It counts officially, but not really.

--Ross Siler

A few days ago, Utah Jazz coach Jerry Sloan dropped the biggest hint to date that veteran Matt Harpring will not play again.

Harpring has been rehabilitating knee and ankle injuries in Atlanta, hoping he might be able to return at some point during the season.

I was talking to Sloan about his young team and the importance of veteran leadership, which is something Harpring has provided in recent years.

"I doubt he'll be back," Sloan said. "... But you have to go on about your business. I think it's pretty obvious ,when we had Matt and Derek Fisher on the team, they gave us some toughness and know-how. Those things are hard to replace. You play younger guys and, one or two things go wrong, and they hang their head a little bit and feel bad. But that's how you learn how to be a better play."

It's called experience.

"Not everybody is Michael Jordan," Sloan said. "Not everybody comes in and blows you away. Most guys have to [put in] a lot of hard work to get to where they can play."


-- Steve Luhm

The most important thing the Jazz must do to have some success on their upcoming road trip to New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Cleveland is shoot better  from the outside.

Sacramento exposed the Jazz's inability to consistently make shots during its 104-99 win Saturday night. The Kings went to the zone, the Jazz failed to get the ball inside and Sacramento rallied from a 15-point deficit.

In one 20-minute stretch -- from early in the second quarter to late in the third quarter -- the Jazz converted only 11 of 38 possessions. They made seven baskets and were outscored by Sacramento, 57-23.

The Jazz ended up 5-for-15 from the three-point line, but that's misleading. Memo Okur and Deron Williams knocked down three-point shots in the final seconds. Up to that point, the Jazz were 3-for-13.

Since going 6-for-10 in the opener at Denver, the Jazz have gone 15-for-53 from the three-point line as a team. That's 28 percent ... and that's why the Jazz have missed Kyle Korver and C.J. Miles.

Combined, Korver and Miles shot almost 37 percent from the three-point line last season.

"... If you make shots," coach Jerry Sloan said, "then the game comes a little bit better for you. When we brought Kyle Korver here, he gave us a guy that could help spread things out a little bit more. Teams had to guard him and that makes the game a little easier for our bigger people because there is a lot more space for guys around the basket."

Sloan cites Tim Duncan and the Spurs as an example of a team where the outside shooters help their dominant low-post player score.

"... You look at San Antonio's team -- with the guys they put out there who can make three-point shots," Sloan said. "Duncan has a lot of leeway in there and you can't handle him most of the time one-on-one. So you make a decision -- and hope they aren't making threes or moving the ball well."

Closer to home, Sloan offers another example.

"Karl Malone had a lot more space to work with when we got Jeff Hornacek," he said. "I don't know why it works that way."

-- Steve Luhm