Utah Jazz notebook: Jerry Sloan gives Andrei Kirilenko another crack in starting 5

SALT LAKE CITY — His team doesn't play baseball, but Jerry Sloan is borrowing a common practice from America's pastime.

The Jazz manager has adopted an unofficial starting rotation.

Sloan, continuing to search for answers during the team's season-worst slump, returned to his ace small forward, Andrei Kirilenko, to start Wednesday's game against San Antonio.

AK-47's return to the first five comes a night after C.J. Miles started against the Lakers, and that came a game after rookie Gordon Hayward got the tipoff call at the 3 spot on Saturday. The Jazz lost both games.

"I put Andrei in because we still haven't been rebounding any more," Sloan said. "And I feel like we were still winning some games before we started making changes. We'll go back to that and see how it goes."

Despite the change, the Jazz suffered their sixth-straight loss — 112-105 to the Spurs at EnergySolutions Arena.

Sloan didn't say whether or not he'll return to his three-man small forward starting rotation Friday against Minnesota.

The Jazz have had the most success this season with Kirilenko beginning games. Utah fell to 24-13 with Kirilenko starting alongside Deron Williams, Raja Bell, Paul Millsap and Al Jefferson.

Hayward has a 3-4 mark as a starter, while Miles' only experience came in Tuesday's lopsided loss to the Lakers.

The Jazz have used five different starting lineups in 46 games.

INJURIES, ILLNESSES: Listed as a gametime decision, Paul Millsap started for the Jazz despite suffering a severely bruised right thumb in L.A. on Tuesday.

Millsap played with a tightly wrapped thumb after X-rays taken earlier in the day came out negative, revealing no structural damage.

"It's always something," Millsap said. "You get used to it after a while. You just got to play through it, keep a positive attitude about it."

Millsap caught his thumb against a players' elbow, fell down and then "smashed it pretty good" when he hit the court.

"The soreness went away a little bit," Millsap said before tipoff. "It's tender, but you can't do nothing about it."