The Deseret Morning News (Tim Buckley) reports: Jazz starting center Mehmet Okur won’t play for his native Turkey when its national team plays France, Belgium and Ukraine in September qualifying games for the 2009 FIBA European championships. According to a Web report from the English-language Today’s Zaman Turkish newspaper, Okur was dropped from the team’s provisional roster due to injury. Okur played with an Achilles tendon injury late in the Jazz’s 2008 playoff run, and O’Connor on Wednesday suggested the 2007 NBA All-Star was more injured late in Utah’s second-round series with the Los Angeles Lakers than many people realize.
