Fisher's injury still keeping guard out of practice

SACRAMENTO — Injured guard Derek Fisher had hoped, even planned, to practice today or Sunday.

Won't happen.

"I think that's a little ambitious," Jazz basketball operations senior vice president Kevin O'Connor said Friday.

The Jazz had hoped, even planned, for Fisher to at least accompany them on a three-game exhibition trip that started Friday night in Sacramento and ends Tuesday night in Denver.

Not happening, either.

O'Connor said Fisher, who has been out since falling hard to the floor in last Saturday's exhibition win at Indiana, instead remained in Utah so he could continue to rehab his badly bruised pelvis.

As a result, Fisher's one and only chance for playing in another preseason game prior to its Nov. 1 regular-season opener will come when the Jazz close the preseason Thursday night vs. Indiana at the Delta Center.

So be it, Jazz coach Jerry Sloan suggests.

"We just have to go ahead and play," Sloan said Friday. "That's the same old story."

Sloan did say he'd like to get Fisher back for at least one exhibition game before the Jazz begin the 2006-07 season against the Houston Rockets: "I've got to play him some, to see where he is and let him try to get familiar with what we're trying to do."

It's possible, Sloan added, that the injury will limit Fisher's minutes early in the season — assuming, that is, he's ready for the opener.

"It all depends how he plays," the Jazz coach said. "I may have to see how somebody else is playing. I'll try to play him as much as I can, but not extend him too far, because he hasn't practiced and played that much."

ARTEST ON BELL: Fresh from the conclusion of a preseason visit to Phoenix, rough-and-tumble Ron Artest of the Kings had some biting remarks regarding ex-Jazz guard Raja Bell of the Phoenix Suns in Friday's Sacramento Bee newspaper.

"He's a good defender, a good player, but he does that dirty stuff sometimes," Artest said of Bell, who reportedly body-slammed Sacramento big man Brad Miller to the floor in the third quarter of Thursday's exhibition in Phoenix.

"When he does stuff like that," Artest added, "I want to fight him. I can't do that, of course, but it makes me want to meet him off the floor for a nice little fight."