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Thu, Oct 29th 2009, 18:37
O'Neal thinks best days are still ahead of him
Jermaine O’Neal needed all of 17 seconds to look like his old self, instead of simply looking old.
He got the ball on the first possession of the Miami Heat season. Hard dribble. Spin toward the baseline. Shot.
Swish.
It was the first of many blows O’Neal landed in a 22-point, 12-rebound opening effort offered Wednesday in Miami’s 115-93 romp over the New York Knicks. Feeling strong and healthy for the first time in almost three years, O’Neal has been saying for weeks he wants to regain the form that made him a six-time All-Star selection.
Hey, there’s a long way to go, but so far, so good.
“I expect to do it every night,” O’Neal said. “When you go through some of the issues that I went through with my knee over the 2 1/2 years, you look forward to these nights. This is the first time in 2 1/2, three years where I feel real good, the body is responding great, my movements are great, no knee braces. I’ve really looked forward to this.”
So have the Heat, which goes without saying.
They traded for O’Neal last February, desperate for another low-post presence to help Dwyane Wade. What they got, though, was a player whose knees ached more than he ever acknowledged publicly, who could barely jump or run, impaired so badly that he failed to get more than five rebounds in 14 of the 27 regular-season games he logged with Miami last season.
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