by Dana Greene

As much as you might think Andrei Kirilenko is a waste of 12 million dollars, he has to get involved somehow if the Jazz are going to beat the Rockets. And in Game 3, he finally was. I have been practically begging Jerry Sloan to put AK on Tracy McGrady. But for some reason, Sloan went with the smaller Derek Fisher and Gordon Giricek in Games 1 and 2. T-Mac went off, and the Jazz went down. After scoring 13 first quarter points in Game 3, it looked like T-Mac would go for 50, but then Sloan finally put Andrei on him, and McGrady struggled.

We all know AK's psyche is a little...let's say...weak right now, but while he continues to be a liability on the offensive end, he's still the team's best defender. So why not put him on McGrady the entire game? Maybe it's because Sloan wants to use Andrei as a help-side defender, or maybe he thinks Fisher and Giriceck can do the job. Whatever the reason was, hopefully now we'll see Andrei continue to shut down T-Mac. And with Okur doing a stellar job on Yao Ming...this series can quickly turn in the Jazz favor.