Deron Williams’ sprained right ankle will limit his availability when training camp starts Tuesday at Duke University.
“It’s doing better,” Williams said during his meeting with reporters as part of Nets Media Day at Barclays Center Monday afternoon, referring to his ankle, which he injured while working out in Utah in early September. “[Nets athletic trainer Tim Walsh is] going to make me take it slow, though.
“[The] main thing is right now I can probably go out and do everything, but if I tweak my ankle or if I have a setback, then that won’t be good. Right now we’re going to take it slow and see how things go.”
With the team at Duke for the rest of the week, it remains to be seen how much Williams will be allowed to participate. The Nets understandably are being cautious with their star point guard after he spent the first half of last season dealing with issues with both ankles, to the point where he had three cortisone shots and also underwent plasma-rich platelet treatment.
But Williams reiterated Monday — as he did when first discussing the injury at his charity dodgeball tournament a little over a week ago — he is only focused on being fully ready to go when the Nets tip off their season in Cleveland on Oct. 30.
“I’m very confident [I’ll be ready to go Oct. 30 for the season opener],” Williams said. “I can probably get out there and do everything right now, but Timmy won’t let me, bottom line.”
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When the Nets wear their “nickname jerseys” against the Heat at some point during the regular season, Brook Lopez should get a cut of the revenues the team makes off of them.
“I put Brooklyn on the back, so Brooklyn will be on the front and back,” Lopez said, drawing plenty of laughs.
The general feeling among the players was the NBA’s decision to employ nickname jerseys was a good idea— even if all of them, didn’t quite understand the point of the whole thing.
“I thought it was pretty cool, but I still don’t understand what they’re going to do,” Joe Johnson said. “We’re going to wear it in a real game? That should be pretty cool.”
Johnson wasn’t quite ready to share what name will be on his jersey, though.
“No, not yet,” he said with a smile. “Y’all will have to wait and see.”
Then there was Reggie Evans, who has encountered a problem. His longtime nickname is “Joker,” which he has tattooed on his body. The problem with using it, however, is that it is trademarked — as was Batman, which Heat forward Shane Battier had hoped to use.
Unlike Battier, though, Evans claimed he’s negotiating to try and use Joker when the Nets wear the jerseys against the Heat in one of their four regular-season matchups this season.
“We’re negotiating, because [I] can’t really wear that because of all the trademark stuff,” Evans said. “But that’s really what my nickname is. We’re talking to the people, and my lawyer is trying to talk to them and the NBA, so hopefully I can have my nickname [in the game].”
Evans said he doesn’t have another nickname to use if Joker winds up being unavailable.
“No, I don’t have a backup option at all, because that’s my nickname. A lot of people are like, ‘That ain’t your nickname,’ because of how I play, but that’s my nickname.”