Jazz miss injured Okur's 3-point shooting touch

ATLANTA — The Jazz doubt he'll play tonight at Atlanta and aren't sure if he'll play in some, all or none of the next three games on their pre-Christmas road trip.

But they do know this:

When starting center Mehmet Okur is not on the floor, the Jazz are a much easier team to defend.

"He definitely spreads the floor," point guard Deron Williams said of the typically strong outside-shooting Okur, who has missed Utah's last three games with a strained left shoulder and could be out for as much as another week if the shoulder does not respond to treatment sooner.

"He's really our only 3-point shooter besides me, and I really don't take many," Williams added. "So it's tough (now) because (opponents) have to respect him and guard him out there. It's harder on me and (power forward Carlos Boozer) to get the pick-and-roll, because they can help more off of other people."

Such is the case even Okur — a career 45.9 percent shooter coming into the season — is not knocking down his shots.

"People guard him out there," Sloan said of Okur, who was hitting just 40.8 percent from the field before getting hurt in last Tuesday's loss to Portland.

"Now they're not guarding our guys out there that much on the shots that they're getting," Sloan added. "But at least they guarded him. So what does that do? That throws some of the help away from Boozer, so it gives him a little bit better opportunity. ... It's like (ex-Jazz shooting guard) Derek Fisher. He's a 39 percent shooter, but what did (opponents) do? They went out and guarded him."

When Okur is hitting his trey tries, he gets even more respect — and the Jazz benefit that much more.

It's a big difference, Sloan suggested, between Utah's success last season and its late-game struggles during a six-game losing streak that came to a close with Saturday's win over Seattle.

"You've got to look at how many shots we made coming down the stretch at the end of the ballgame that Memo made to bail us out," he said. "That's the difference."

As a result, Sloan hopes someone — anyone, really — can start connecting from the outside as the Jazz visit the Hawks tonight, Charlotte on Wednesday night, Orlando on Friday night and Miami on Saturday night during their annual pre-holiday excursion.