Utah Jazz point guard Williams still frustrated with ankle

Along with Oklahoma City's Kevin Durant and Portland's Brandon Roy, Jazz point guard Deron Williams will be featured in a new Nike commercial that airs tonight on TNT.

For one of the NBA's faces of the future, it's a natural tie-in for selling shoes.

But if Williams also were asked to play pitchman for headache powder or perhaps an aspirin maker, he probably could pull that off as well.

Because as he prepares to play Roy and the Trail Blazers in a late-starting TNT-televised game this evening at EnergySolutions Arena, Williams is one flustered point guard.

"It's definitely frustrating for me," Williams said of the way things have been going eight games into his second comeback from a left ankle that was badly sprained in the preseason.

"That's why I got a technical," Williams, who along with the rest of the 14-9 Jazz had Wednesday off from practice, said after picking up his first tech of the season in a 99-96 win at Minnesota on Tuesday night. "I'm just not playing like myself. It's tough to get going. I just have to figure out a way to get going."

Williams was tagged with five turnovers Tuesday, making it a total of 30 — or more than three per game — in his last eight outings.

The 2008 Team USA Olympic guard has reached double digits in assists in five of the eight games in which he's been back since late November, a stretch in which the Jazz have gone 5-3.

But the career 46.6 percent shooter coming into the season has struggled with his shot in that same span, hitting just 35-of-85 — 41.2 percent — from the field.

That includes a 6-for-17 night in last Saturday's loss at Phoenix, and a 2-for-11 showing — including a start of 0-for-7 in the opening half — at Minnesota.

"I'm just thinking about different things when I'm shooting instead of thinking about the shot," said Williams, who did hit two key late-game baskets, including a 17-foot jumper in the final minute, to lift Utah over Sacramento early last week. "Layups, the same thing."

Some nights, it seems like his explosiveness is back.

But others it obviously is not, like Tuesday, when he had three shots blocked by the Timberwolves, all by Minnesota big man Al Jefferson.

The ankle, clearly, is weighing heavily on Williams' mind.

"He's fighting his way back," Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said. "That's all I know."

Sloan, though, also seems well-aware that the Jazz can live short-term with Williams' stroke struggles — as long as he also distributes like he did late against the Wolves.

"He was very good, again, coming down the stretch and getting the ball ... where it's supposed to go," Sloan said.