Nash not burned out yet

TUCSON, Ariz. – It was an innocent and friendly question, the kind you can ask a dozen people during the course of a day.

“Steve, how are you feeling?”

But when it was put to Steve Nash at a media session after his first training camp workout this week, it became a riddle.

“Hmm … why do you ask?” Nash answered with just enough left-hand English to make his quizzical tone obvious.

Since arriving back in Phoenix, Nash has gone out of his way to poke holes in such veiled references to Father Time.

Yes, he will turn 35 in February. Yes, by NBA standards, he’s getting long in the tooth. Yes, a little rest would be welcome. And, yes, a little less pressure to be the fulcrum for virtually every Suns basket would be appreciated.

Other than that, he tells people the same thing he told Mark Cuban five years ago when the Mavericks’ owner chose to let him leave Dallas under the premise that the big breakdown was right around the bend.

Go ahead and bet against me.

“If a guy is playing at an All-Star level when he’s 40, is he old?” Nash asked. “Yes and no. I’m old by basketball standards. With every year, the odds tip away from you. But if you go by last season, I feel like I played at a really high level, and I think I can play even better than that. When my level starts to drop … then I’ll be old.”

Critics will point to the second half of last season, when even Nash admits he hit an adrenaline wall just as the Suns were trying to work Shaquille O’Neal into the lineup. During the first 50 games, Phoenix had the best record in the West (34-16) and Nash was back in the discussion for a third league MVP run. He was playing more minutes and more demanding minutes than at any point in his career.

In Game 1 of the playoffs against the Spurs, Nash had 25 points and 13 assists, scoring 20 in the final 22 minutes. In Game 2, he hit 10 of 15 shots from the field and finished with 23 points and 10 assists.

Remember, this was the “worn down” Nash.

“We went to Boris a lot (after going down 0-2 in the series), which was the plan and that’s great,” Nash said. “But I was just following the plan.”

Now, there is a new plan, with general manager Steve Kerr and new coach Terry Porter handling the blueprints.

“Steve was brilliant for us, but we were asking too much,” Kerr said. “That was one of the biggest reasons we traded for Shaq. We wanted to improve our defense and rebounding, but we wanted to score in ways other than asking Steve to create it all. And I think this season we’ve gotten him more help.”

After going without a true backup for four years, the Suns hope rookie Goran Dragic, in concert with a combination of other ball-handlers (Grant Hill, Boris Diaw, Leandro Barbosa) and Porter’s more deliberate offense, will help mitigate the huge offensive divot the Suns have endured when Nash goes to the bench.

The whole idea of him sitting out games as a healthy scratch was ditched when the team failed to sign a veteran backup, but limiting his minutes and even playing him off the ball at times – Nash shot 50 percent from the field and a league-best 47 percent from 3-point range last year – would aid in attempts at preservation.

“If I could miss 10 or 12 games and go to the Bahamas, that sounds good,” Nash said. “If I have to stay here, I might as well play.

“But to shift the minutes around a little more and change our style just a little bit to preserve guys’ legs … I think that’s possible.”

Whatever the plan, Nash knows his job is to digest Porter’s philosophy and make it work on the floor. The two both rank among the NBA’s top 15 point guards all-time in assists, combining for 13,948 assists in their careers.

“As a point guard, it’s a dream come true to have a coach who was a great point guard and had a great reputation as a player,” he said. “He definitely has my respect.”

So far, Nash has been an interested observer to Porter’s defensive schemes and set plays through the motion offense. Wednesday was the first time one of the plays featured a pick-and-roll – Phoenix’s signature maneuver during the Mike D’Antoni era.

“I think (Porter) knows we’re probably still going to run it a lot,” Nash said. “But he wants to teach the stuff that we haven’t done or haven’t done well to start building.

“The pick-and-roll is the hardest thing to cover in this league, and we have the people who do it well. I don’t think we’re going to abandon it.”