<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">TORONTO ? The Jazz began preseason play Wednesday without their leading scorer from a season ago, Carlos Boozer. Boozer sat out Utah's exhibition opener at Toronto with a strained left hamstring, and Jazz coach Jerry Sloan said the power forward will not play tonight at Indiana either. "I think those are things we have to be a little bit more cautious about at this time of the year," Sloan said of the injury. "I don't think we're gonna make or break what he does (in the regular season) by playing him (so early in the preseason)." Boozer, who initially sustained the strain in the second session of two-a-day workouts Saturday night, declared himself to be "day-to-day." "It's constricting," said Boozer, who also missed last year's preseason opener ? with soreness in his lower back. "It only gets painful when I try to do too much, go too far. But it's fine. It's gotten a lot stronger. It's healed very nice, and we'll just take it day-to-day and see how it goes." Boozer, who missed the last 31 games of last season with a foot injury, did work out with trainer Gary Briggs on Wednesday. Later, Sloan did not seem overly concerned. "We'd like to have him back, so where we can kind of see where he is, how he's able to play with our team," the Jazz coach said. "But we know he's going to be a part of it, so there will be space for him." It remains to be seen if Boozer will play in Utah's third game of the preseason, Monday night vs. Phoenix at the Delta Center.</div> <div align="center">Source</div>
A hammy injury huh, most def. not the best way to start off. Those injuries are one of the worst and most painful injuries. If the Jazz want to make the Playoffs which I honestly believe they can they need to get off to a fast start in the begging of the season. And this injury is not helping. Boozer needs to reincorporate himself with the team before the season starts to work off that rust and polish himself off. It's going to be vital for the Jazz to get off to a fast start in the beginning of the season, with potential Playoff contenders like the Clippers probably starting off a little rocky with chemistry issues, the Amare situation, Spurs & Memphis potential chemistry problems the Jazz need to take advantage of that and steal some of those games. But in order for that to happen they are going to need to be at full strength. Hopefully Boozer will be at least 85% by the time the season starts and maybe get a few preseason games in there.
