原文出自 nola.com http://www.nola.com/hornets/t-p/index.ssf?/base/sports-1/1098341102263000.xml Magloire seems eager for Western challenge Thursday, October 21, 2004 John DeShazier There hasn't been much to dislike about Jamaal Magloire on the basketball court, Hornets coach Byron Scott said. That shouldn't be a surprise, considering the player. Because every year of his NBA career, Magloire has improved by noticeable statistical leaps, and he ended up on the Eastern Conference All-Star team last season. Duplicating that achievement might be more daunting this season, New Orleans' first in the Western Conference. But if Magloire plays at a level anywhere near where he played after being selected to his first All-Star team, when he averaged 16.4 points and 11.9 rebounds in the last 34 games, the respect will keep rolling in even if the individual recognition doesn't. Each season so far has been better than the previous one. Which means for his fifth season, the expectation is for something a little more substantive than the 13.6 points and 10.3 rebounds per game he had overall last season. "He's done some real good things, he's learned the offense extremely well," Scott said. "I told him like I told (small forward) Lee (Nailon), 'I know you can score. I want to see you do other things.' I want to see him become better at passing the ball." Scott wouldn't bring that point up if there wasn't some validity to it. Lest Magloire begins drawing comparisons to a black hole, he'll need to raise his total of 86 assists last season and 88 the season before -- about one per game. But that's small stuff that won't necessarily be sweated too heavily. The important stuff is this: There are less than five legitimate NBA centers not named Shaquille O'Neal, and Magloire is one of them. There are two or three who can work the post-up game or step out, face up and consistently make 12- to 14-foot jumpers, and he's one of them. And with O'Neal moving to the East because of a trade from the Lakers to Miami, there's a lot less man-mountain for Magloire to scale en route to establishing himself as even more of a force for the Hornets. Especially if he operates as Scott believes he can in the Princeton offense. "Everything is all right, it's OK," Magloire said of his acclimation. "There's lots of movement, which is good. It's not stagnant. "(It will help) from a standpoint of just being able to have movement on the weak side when the ball does touch my hand, to open up the weak side." "It just opens up everything for him," Scott said. "The post, the mid-post . . . it enables him almost to be one-on-one with his guy at all times. I think it'll be a very big help." Too, it will help Magloire -- and the Hornets -- that the personal trainer saga that dominated the first week of training camp has subsided to little more than a whisper. The issue rightly has taken a back seat to basketball, which is fine by everyone involved. Because all that will be remembered from the upcoming season is how the Hornets play and, more pointedly, how one of the team's two All-Stars responds to Scott, his staff and the fact that his days of sneaking up on anyone are gone. Any cloaking that Magloire had disappeared last season, as he was named an Eastern Conference Player of the Week in April, conference Player of the Month for April and had the first 20-20 game (23 points and 21 rebounds against Toronto) for the Hornets in more than seven years. He countered that, likewise, the Hornets won't be surprised. "We're ready," Magloire said. "We're not intimidated by any team." Especially not if Big Cat raises his play a little more, same as he has every other year. --

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