DENVER ? The luck of forward Calbert Cheaney, who played only nine games all last season for the Denver Nuggets, obviously hasn't taken a turn for the better with the coming of a new season.

The ninth-year NBA veteran is expected to miss four to six weeks of action after spraining his left knee in Monday's preseason game in Milwaukee. A magnetic resonance imaging test revealed no major structural damage to the knee, so no surgery is planned.