Sloan now 'Fish'-ing for defense

Michael Redd, who visits tonight with the Milwaukee Bucks, dropped a franchise-record 57 points on the Jazz last month. Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers showed it was no fluke, scoring 52 last Thursday. And Ray Allen, in a performance reminiscent of those two, scored 20 of his 33 for Seattle in the fourth quarter Saturday.

Common thread?

They're all shooting guards, of course.

"We're having a difficult time trying to guard that position," Jazz coach Jerry Sloan was grumbling just the other day.

In an effort to slow the flow, Sloan started veteran Derek Fisher at the 2 when Allen and the Sonics were in town.

The move was made not so much because Fisher is a noted defensive stopper but more so because Sloan has decided the likes of Allen and Redd would not have it as easy as when 19-year-old C.J. Miles or rookie Ronnie Brewer started at shooting guard.

The Jazz coach wants someone who "at least (can) stay close to some of the guys we have to guard that's a 50- or 60-point player" — and someone who warrants attention on the offensive end.

Miles is a shooter who has struggled with his shooting, hitting just 34.3 percent from the field in his second NBA season.

Brewer is making 52.9 percent, but he is more of a slasher than a pure outside shooter — and that's not necessarily ideal when he's playing next to another slasher with shooting issues of his own, small forward Andrei Kirilenko.

Fisher?

The longtime Los Angeles Laker's penchant for knocking down the long ball is league lore.

"People are gonna guard him," Sloan said of Fisher, who has made 38.7 percent of his trey tries this season — better than Miles' 30 percent and miles ahead of Brewer's 0-for-6 from behind the long line. "That's one thing they're gonna do, because they know he can make shots."

That, the Jazz coach added, keeps "a lot people off of our people inside." And it means the big-time scorers have to expend more energy on their own man.

"When we were playing L.A. and some of these teams," Sloan said, "they weren't guarding our guys."

Fisher, for his part, just wants his presence respected — and noticed — at both ends.