From Deseret News archives:

Kirilenko putting up some ridiculous shooting stats

Published: Thursday, Jan. 17, 2008 12:23 a.m. MST
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TRADE TALK: According to Sports Illustrated's Marty Burns, writing Wednesday on SI.com under the headline "Break up the band?/Chemistry concerns could spur the Suns into action," Phoenix has "had internal discussions about Utah's Andrei Kirilenko, the (Los Angeles) Lakers' Lamar Odom and Memphis' Pau Gasol, according to a source."

The source was not identified.

"But," Burns wrote, "the Suns might not want to help the rival Lakers, while the Jazz and Grizzlies would be reluctant to take Shawn Marion without a strong indication that he would re-sign with them."

By way of background, this is talk of the very same nature the Jazz and Suns engaged in this past offseason.

Both players were unhappy and requested trades during the summer.

At that time — it's believed, and has been previously reported with varying detail — the Jazz indeed were offered Marion for Kirilenko.

But Utah decided not to pull the trigger on a deal, at least in part because of the reason — Marion's unwillingness to commit to remaining long-term in Utah — cited now by Burns.

Kirilenko never did publicly withdraw his trade request, but since the start of training camp in October he has not publicly pushed to be dealt either.

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WELL MEANING: It may take some translation, but Kirilenko had awfully kind words Wednesday when discussing Nuggets center Marcus Camby.

"I would say he's the best dirty worker in the whole league," Kirilenko said. "You know, everything on the floor — rebounds, steals, blocks, running the floor, being a defensive stopper. He's really a guy is who is, like, joker for them."

That's dirty as in "willing to do the dirty work," not cheap. And that's joker as in wild card, not humorist.

HE SAID IT: Point guard Deron Williams, who called "crazy" the fact that despite a 1-9 road record in December the Jazz are within reach of the Western Conference's leading playoff contenders: "As badly as we've played, the team with the most wins in the West is like 26 (as of Wednesday) — and we're right there with 22. So, you've got to be at least happy with that — that we're not totally out of it, and we still have a chance to get back in there."

TV TALK: The well-chronicled story of Jazz reserve power forward Paul Millsap and his brother, forward John Millsap of the NBA Development League's Jazz-affiliated Utah Flash, will be featured Saturday on "NBA Access with Ahmad Rashad," which airs nationally on ABC affiliates.

INJURY UPDATE: Reserve guard Ronnie Price has missed four games since spraining his left ankle in practice, and the Jazz are calling the Utah Valley State product a "game-time decision" for tonight.


E-mail: tbuckley@desnews.com

Recent comments

Trade Lamar Odom for Shawn Marion

Anonymous | Jan. 31, 2008 at 9:38 a.m.

That was the dumbest comment anyone has posted on this article....

Odom for Stoudemire | Jan. 20, 2008 at 9:48 a.m.

I think the Lakers should trade Lamar Odom straight up for Amare...

Heres a thought | Jan. 19, 2008 at 2:58 p.m.

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