Jeffries out 2 weeks
The Knicks have lost nearly every time Jared Jeffries has been sidelined this month. They must try to do better this time without his interior defense. Jeffries missed his second straight game Saturday with what an MRI revealed was inflammation in his surgically repaired right knee. The Knicks said the defensively minded big man will miss approximately two weeks.
“(I’m) disappointed, but it gives other guys an opportunity to step up, like Josh (Harrellson), and we just have to take it a day at a time and welcome him back when he’s healthy,” Mike Woodson said before Saturday’s win over Detroit. “A healthy Jared Jeffries is great for our ballclub because he does a lot of things to anchor our bench defensively. The Knicks went 5-5 with Jeffries sidelined at the start of the season with a sore right calf, but entering Saturday, they had dropped all five games without him in March, including Friday night’s ugly 96-79 loss in Toronto.
“He’s had problems with it and this has kind of been an ongoing deal this season,” Woodson said. “With the games coming so fast, you just don’t have enough time to recoup. We’ll give him the two weeks and see how he feels and then hopefully he’ll be out on the court because we could use him.”
Asked if little-used center Jerome Jordan might see added time in Jeffries’ absence, Woodson answered: “Not really. That’s no knock against him. He just hasn’t had enough court time. Would I be scared to throw him in there if we got in foul trouble and needed to use him? Absolutely not. I think he’s capable of coming in and giving us some positive minutes, but not big minutes. He just hasn’t played. We’ve talked about possibly sending him down to get a couple of games under his belt in the DLeague, just to stay a little sharper for us. We have to gauge that, though.”
DETROIT ROCK CITY
Woodson, a member of Larry Brown’s coaching staff on Detroit’s 2004 championship team, interviewed for the Pistons’ head coaching job that went to former Nets coach Lawrence Frank last summer. “I struck out three times (last) summer, not just with Detroit,” Woodson joked. “I interviewed in Minnesota and Houston, as well. . . . Ownership and whoever made those decisions in those organizations decided to go in another direction. I have to respect that.
“I was just happy that I got a phone call here, giving me an opportunity to come back to New York (originally as Mike D’antoni’s assistant), and an opportunity to get back to work. Because that year off was a long year.”
MUM’S THE WORD
Baron Davis refused to discuss the apparent shouting match he had with Raptors guard Jose Calderon in a runway after Friday’s loss in Toronto. “I ain’t got nothing to say,” Davis said.