NET NOTES
Kenyon Martin can live with being passed over for the All-Star team in the coaches’ voting. What is a little tough, he admits, is who made it ahead of him.
“It was who they picked. If you’re going to pick some people, pick people who are well-deserving of it. Don’t pick nobody just because of the position they play,” said Martin, whose gripes were with centers Brad Miller of Indiana and Zydrunas Ilgauskas of Cleveland.
“If they’re going to pick somebody from Cleveland (with nine wins), pick Ricky Davis. He’s been playing a lot better than Zydrunas to me. They’re the worst team in the league.”
What would he shoot if he were 7-3 like Ilgauskas? “Eighty percent because everything would be a dunk,” Martin said.
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Rodney Rogers will return to practice today and is eligible to be activated from the injury list after missing his mandatory five games (strained left calf). However, Byron Scott said, “it’s probably still about another week or so” before Rogers returns.
“Hopefully, I can go right back to playing,” said Rogers. “We’ll see once I get back to practicing and in the swing of things. I just really haven’t been doing a lot of pounding on it. It feels good, like I could just go out there and play. But sometimes that’s a trick. A lot of times when you feel good or you think you feel good, there can be a setback.”
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Dikembe Mutombo is out of his cast, wearing a hard plastic brace and elastic wrap on his right wrist. “It’s just a protection so I cannot do nothing crazy,” said Mutombo, who hopes to return by mid-March.
Kerry Kittles was unavailable last night. Kittles left the team during the road trip because of personal reasons.
Michael Jordan spoke about Patrick Ewing and how their careers paralleled – at least on a time line. “The only sad part about it is he never got the chance to win a championship … Our careers parallel. One of us had to lose and most of the time it was him.”
Jason Kidd will be one of seven recipients of the Thurman Munson Award, presented Feb. 4 by the Association for the Help of Retarded Children.
Charles Oakley was asked if he grew nostalgic over this possibly being his final trip to the Meadowlands. “No,” he said. “I’ll see it again on my way to Atlantic City.”