The Downbeat - 5 October 2009 - #71 - The London Beat Edition

Good afternoon from London!  Kidding.  Here's an interview with AK from practice though.  I"ll forgive him for being a little off on the years the Jazz went to the Finals, but his hair and the airballed floater at the end I don't think I can forget.  In fact, all of the Jazz shooting in that vid looks like it could be from a bunch of random guys at a rec league.

AK Interview

Make sure you're following @utah_jazz or at least visiting http://twitter.com/Utah_Jazz for updates and pics from London.  They've got some good stuff up.

  Looks like everyone on the training camp roster, sans Harpring Paul Harris, so we won't be able to use that as an indicator as to who, if anyone, would make the team. 

Since the league is picking up the tab, I guess the cost of an extra play or five isn't a concern to the Jazz.  I guess it would have been pretty pointless regardless to leave training camp invitees home for over a week. 

It also sounds like Sloan is softening up in his advanced years,

Sloan understands and isn't exactly treating this like a business trip... "I'm not gonna get in the way," said Sloan, whose Jazz will have five more preseason games to play after this week. "This is not a regular-season game."

  We've only seen one game, and it was just the pre-season opener, but you could really tell that there was a concerted effort from the team on D.  The question will be whether or not they can maintain that focus over the course of 82+ games.

They say that it take 21 repetitions to make something a habit, so we'll see come late December whether or not it sticks.  Something tells me with this team it just might.