Chances are George Karl won't be consulted for input on picking his successor as Milwaukee Bucks head coach.

But Karl left no doubt where his feelings on the matter rested.

"I'd probably hire me," said Karl, explaining that the current Bucks remind him of the Seattle SuperSonics team he rebuilt from the bottom up.

When reminded that he was not a viable option, Karl said he favored two of his former assistants, Terry Stotts, who is the interim head coach of the Atlanta Hawks, and Bucks assistant Don Newman.

While Stotts remains a frontrunner for the job, Newman eliminated himself from consideration on Wednesday.

"I hope Terry or Donnie gets it," Karl said. "Those would be my personal choices of the people they are interviewing.

"They both have an advantage to coaching this team because they know it and have a comfort zone with it."

Newman still may remain with the Bucks as an assistant under the new coach, but he is rumored to be interested in an assistant position with the New Jersey Nets.

San Antonio Spurs free-agent swingman Stephen Jackson is scheduled to visit the Nuggets today in Denver.

Jackson averaged 11.8 points and 3.6 rebounds in 28.2 minutes last season for the NBA champions. The 6-foot-8, 220-pounder ranked 18th in the NBA in steals (125) and started in 58 of 80 games.

Jackson averaged 11.8 points and 3.6 rebounds in 28.2 minutes last season for the NBA champions. The 6-foot-8, 220-pounder ranked 18th in the NBA in steals (125) and started in 58 of 80 games.
 
Agent Dan Fegan said Jackson also would visit the Utah Jazz on Friday and the Atlanta Hawks early next week. The Nuggets' roster includes shooting guards Rodney White, Vincent Yar- brough and Jeff Trepagnier.

"It's a great fit for (the Nuggets)," Fegan said. "Stephen has proven he can knock down big shots. If the Nuggets get (point guard) Andre (Miller), he becomes a great fit."

The Utah Jazz are still looking for someone to pay the $20 million they have available under the salary cap. The team made a slight dent Wednesday by re-signing point guard Carlos Arroyo, but hadn't given up on Atlanta restricted free agent Jason Terry.

"We're still talking," Jazz vice president for basketball operations Kevin O'Connor said. "Other than that, I don't have a comment on it."

Published reports earlier this week that the Jazz were on the verge of signing Terry, who averaged 17.2 points and 7.4 assists for the Hawks last season, to an offer sheet were not true, O'Connor said.

Jason Terry didn't sign an offer sheet with the Utah Jazz Tuesday.

Why not?

Jazz vice president of basketball operations Kevin O'Connor said the Hawks restricted free agent point guard hasn't received one.

"There is no offer sheet involved," O'Connor said. "We're nowhere near that point. There's a lot of different things involved. Outside of that, I have no other comment."

This situation has come down to semantics. Terry's agent, Raymond Brothers, said that since his client hasn't accepted an offer from the Jazz yet, there is no need for the team to draw up an offer sheet.

"The offer is still there," Brothers said. "He has not decided to sign with Utah. He's weighing all of his options."

In a brief phone interview from his home in Seattle, Terry said he is "seriously considering" the Jazz. But Terry, Brothers and O'Connor would not comment on the terms of the offer.

The Jazz has more than $21 million to spend this summer after the Los Angeles Clippers decided Tuesday to match Utah's six-year, $42 million offer sheet to Corey Maggette.

The Jazz decided weeks ago that Corey Maggette is going places in the NBA. Because the Clippers finally realized the same thing, Maggette is going nowhere.

The Clippers exercised their right to match the Jazz's offer to the fourth-year guard on Tuesday, dealing an expected, but still painful, blow to Utah's attempts to rebuild through free agency.

"You say, 'I think the Clippers were smart and signed a terrific player,' and go on," said Kevin O'Connor, the Jazz's vice president of basketball operations. O'Connor signed Maggette to a reported six-year, $42 million contract on July 16, but because he was a restricted free agent, Los Angeles had until Thursday morning to offer the same deal and keep their starting guard.

"We're really glad he will be back for the long term," Clippers vice president Elgin Baylor said in a statement announcing the transaction with Maggette, who averaged 16.8 points in 64 games for L.A. last season. Baylor still has a day to decide whether to match Denver's long-term offer to point guard Andre Miller; the Clippers have already done so with a six-year, $82 million contract for forward Elton Brand.

The Jazz, with $21 million to spend under the salary cap and a dwindling supply of free agents to lavish it on, can only wish they had those sort of decisions to make. Instead, O'Connor is left to negotiate with Hawks point guard Jason Terry -- another restricted free agent whose team has publicly said it would match any offer he receives -- and lesser free-agent talents, or troll league rosters for trade possibilities.

Terry, a 6-2 guard who averaged 17.2 points and 7.4 assists in his fourth season with the Hawks, has received an offer from the Jazz, his agent said Tuesday, though the two sides are not ready to formalize things, and start Atlanta's 15-day clock to match, by signing an offer sheet yet.

As Dion Glover sees it, he was merely dismissed --- not dissed --- when the Hawks elected not to tender him a qualifying offer and made him an unrestricted free agent this summer.

"I'm not mad at anybody," Glover said last week at his basketball camp at Life University in Marietta. "I'm fine with that. The [Hawks] organization has been great to me. That kind of gives me the flexibility to sign with who I want to sign with.

"I'm still going to have a job in the NBA next year," he said. "Where? I don't know, but I'll have a job, and that's the bottom line."

Glover's Houston-based agent, Brian Dyke, said his client is mulling offers from a few teams and could sign somewhere "at the end of this week or next week." Neither Glover nor Dyke would mention the teams that have shown interest.

"It's definitely going to be tough," Glover said of possibly leaving the Hawks. "My family is here. But that's the sort of business that I'm in. That's a part of life. I want to be in Atlanta. If I'm here, I'm here. If I'm not, I'm not."

The agent for Jason Terry said Monday that the Hawks' restricted free agent guard has been given an offer sheet from the Utah Jazz and could sign this week. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"He might sign as early as [today]," said Terry's agent, Raymond Brothers.

Jazz vice president of basketball operations Kevin O'Connor was unavailable for comment.

"I don't know anything about it," said Billy Knight, the Hawks' director of basketball operations and interim general manager. "If they've made him an offer, we'll find out."

Two days before the clock expires on Corey Maggette, the Jazz may be about to start another one.

Jason Terry, Atlanta's high-scoring point guard, is prepared to sign an offer sheet with the Jazz, his agent told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Monday.

"He might sign as early as" today, Raymond Brothers told the newspaper. He would not reveal the terms of Utah's offer sheet, but it figures to resemble the six-year, $55 million contract the Jazz offered Andre Miller earlier this month.

Trouble is, Terry is a restricted free agent, and the Hawks have made it clear they intend to match any offer the four-year veteran receives.

But it may be worth the effort anyway for the Jazz, who have been rebuffed by every free agent they have chased except Maggette. Utah has $21 million to spend under the salary cap, and Atlanta has been conspicuous about its intention to reduce its payroll.

When Billy King, the 76ers' president and general manager, flew to Boston for the Reebok Pro Summer League two weeks ago, he had more on his mind than evaluating young players.

Finally out from under the imposing shadow of Larry Brown, King was thinking trade from the moment he set foot in the gym at the University of Massachusetts-Boston.

And 10 days later, late Wednesday night, he turned that thought - and hard work - into results.

Thanks to inside knowledge of what his fellow general managers wanted and his ability to organize complex negotiations, King engineered a four-team deal that involved the Sixers, the Atlanta Hawks, the New York Knicks and the Minnesota Timberwolves.

The Sixers got forward Glenn "Big Dog" Robinson and a 2006 second-round pick from the Hawks, plus center Marc Jackson from the Timberwolves.

King sent forward Keith Van Horn to the Knicks and a future No. 1 pick, plus forward Randy Holcomb and cash, to the Hawks.

The Timberwolves got the shooting guard they were looking for in the Knicks' Latrell Sprewell, and the Hawks received salary-cap relief by taking on the contract of Terrell Brandon, the Minnesota point guard who had not played in nearly two years and is expected to retire without playing again.

Everybody, it seemed, got what they wanted. Thanks to King.

Hawks forward Shareef Abdur-Rahim knows this can't be it. There's no way the Hawks trade Glenn "Big Dog" Robinson for a contract and do nothing else.

"I didn't understand it," Abdur-Rahim said this weekend, describing his initial reaction to the news that Robinson was dealt to the 76ers in a four-team trade that landed the $11.1 million contract of soon-to-retire point guard Terrell Brandon. "I thought, 'We give up 20 points a game for a guy who's going to retire?' Something else is coming behind."

Abdur-Rahim said he called Billy Knight, the Hawks' interim general manager, after hearing the news because "nobody wants to be a part of a team when they want to rebuild." After talking with Knight, Abdur-Rahim said he realizes the move was made for financial reasons but will withhold judgment of the trade that brought the team $2.42 million under the salary cap.

"It depends on what they do," he said, speaking of Hawks management. "If we can acquire a few different guys, I can see where [the cap room] helps. I've got confidence in the things Billy is doing, but we have to start getting on the ball. We need a small forward, a shooting guard --- and we need to re-sign Jason [Terry]."

Abdur-Rahim leads all active NBA players in games played without a postseason appearance (533), and he isn't looking forward to the prospect of missing out again. He's had enough losing seasons in his first seven years in Vancouver and Atlanta.

"I hate to see Dog go," said Abdur-Rahim, the Hawks' second-leading scorer after Robinson last season.