Wizards' Jamison Hardly Hurting for Experience

Antawn Jamison emerged from the Washington Wizards' locker room on Wednesday afternoon with an ice pack wrapped around his sore right shoulder and two others wrapped around his knees.

As he half-walked, half-shuffled through the hallway, Jamison looked more like a football player after a game than an NBA player just getting ready for the start of an 82-game regular season. When it was pointed out to Jamison that his game appears to be in midseason form, he chuckled.

"Man, it feels like we are in midseason already," said the forward, who averaged 12.7 points while shooting 46.2 percent in seven preseason contests. "Sometimes I'll look at the calendar and wonder when the all-star break is coming up. I've already played a lot of basketball."

Jamison is fighting through more than usual fatigue because he spent the summer playing with the U.S. men's national team. Team USA held a training camp in Las Vegas and played 15 exhibition and world championship tournament games in South Korea, China and Japan en route to capturing the bronze medal.

For Jamison -- who averaged 3.6 points and 1.7 rebounds in 9.0 minutes during the world championships -- the extra travel, the intense practice sessions and the games made him feel as though the NBA season never really ended.

He changed his normal offseason routine to accommodate the Team USA experience and tried to catch up on rest by staying off the basketball court once he returned to his home in North Carolina in early September.

"I didn't touch a basketball basically from when I got back from Asia until I came up here to start getting ready for training camp," Jamison said. "I worked out and stuff like that but I tried to get a break from basketball as much as I could."

Jamison's main physical issue during the preseason was an achy right shoulder. The shoulder has occasionally gone numb on him as it did early in the first quarter of Tuesday's preseason finale at Detroit when Jamison took a seat on the bench after playing only five minutes.

"It's not really painful, it just kind of gets this tingly feeling and I have to try to shake it around," Jamison said, as he wiggled his arm to demonstrate. "I don't see it being a long-term problem though. We'll get it taken care of in time for the season."

And what about those ice packs on the knees?

"Nothing serious, that's just something I've always done," Jamison said. "I saw the older guys do it when I was a rook and thought it would be a good idea to do the same thing."

Jamison has limited himself to shooting drills this week but said he plans to go all out starting Wednesday night at Cleveland. He isn't the only member of Team USA who has altered his approach to the upcoming season. Cleveland's LeBron James was given several practices and preseason games off and Miami's Dwyane Wade recently told reporters that he "has no legs."

Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas, who trained with Team USA before returning to Washington before the start of the world championships, said he has experienced no extra fatigue but he did get Wednesday and yesterday off so he could heal some "little bumps and bruises."

"I feel fine," said Arenas, who averaged 22.1 minutes in seven preseason games. "You know me baby. I'm playing all summer anyway. Once that ball goes up in Cleveland, I'll be ready to go."

Jamison is also eager to get the season rolling. Perhaps more than any other Wizard, he has stressed the importance of getting off to a good start while sending a message to the rest of the league that the Wizards should be taken seriously.

"It's that time when it's not about talking anymore, it's about actions," Jamison. "We know what kind of team we have and we're all anxious to get out there and play."

Wizards Note: Coach Eddie Jordan said that he still hasn't made a decision on whether Brendan Haywood or Etan Thomas will start at center Wednesday night. Haywood and Thomas rotated starts during the preseason and Jordan appeared to be leaning toward selecting Thomas following Tuesday's preseason finale.