Suns' 'old geezers’ ready to start new season

Not that the Suns and Spurs are ever happy to see each other on the basketball court, but both teams should be overjoyed that the NBA regular season is finally starting tonight in San Antonio.

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That means the incessant preseason projections are over. Both teams can finally play basketball instead of listening to droning commentary about things like advancing age and closing windows of opportunity.

Even a game against a distasteful opponent trumps hearing how the rest of the West’s young guns are poised to pistol-whip them into submission as their empty bandwagons careen downhill.

Of course, Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and company have plenty of memories with which to soothe their bruised egos. To paraphrase hockey legend Patrick Roy, it’s hard to hear anything negative when you have championship rings plugging your ears. The Suns have some snazzy highlight reels and two MVP trophies for Steve Nash, but the jewelry belonging to Shaquille O’Neal was obtained elsewhere.

It will be months and months before we find out if these two teams are, in fact, yesterday’s news. But O’Neal warns the Lakers and the Hornets and the Rockets and the rest of the darlings of the pundits that on the road to an NBA title, it’s usually age before beauty.

“When it comes down to getting the job done, I haven’t seen anyone youthful win it,” O’Neal said. “In the last 10 years, Tim’s (won a title) four times, I’ve won four times (three with the Lakers, one with the Miami Heat) and Mr. (Kevin) Garnett’s been there once.

“Youthful is more exciting to watch. But I never started winning titles until I started losing my (jumping) lift. When I was doing all that spectacular (stuff), I was going home early, too. Everyone wants to talk about youth because it’s new and fun. But in the end, we’re always talking about the old guys left standing.”

Despite 232 regular-season wins in four full seasons under Mike D’Antoni — only four fewer than the Spurs (236) over the same span — the Suns have never been left standing and almost exclusively have the Spurs to thank for it. San Antonio title roads in 2003, 2005 and 2007 all sent them rambling through Phoenix, and last year Duncan’s 3-point salvo at the regulation buzzer that tied Game 1 quickly ripped out the Suns’ soul.

Phoenix fans see the Spurs as bitter rivals, but heretofore outsider Terry Porter doesn’t buy it as he kicks off his stint as Suns coach tonight. “I don’t know if it’s a rivalry until you win a series from those guys,” he said.

But he will go along with O’Neal’s point that veterans are often more attractive in May than they are in October.

“Both of these teams have guys who have been in big games, big playoff situations and know how to make big plays and hit big shots,” he said. “We won’t run into situations that are new, and playing each other is a good test to start the season.”

The Spurs will have to wait awhile before they see how they stand. Manu Ginobili will miss the first 20-25 games of the season after aggravating an ankle injury in the Beijing Olympics and undergoing arthroscopic surgery to correct ligament damage. But since Ginobili has show signs of wearing down in recent seasons, cutting the regular season down by a third could work in San Antonio’s favor if they can tread water without him.

The Suns begin the season healthy – save for a hamstring injury that will keep Alando Tucker sidelined for at least the first three games. Leandro Barbosa and Amaré Stoudemire, who each missed big chunks of the preseason, are up to speed on both the defensive stress points and the half-court offensive sets the Suns will now run with much more regularity.

But Porter will carefully watch the minutes Grant Hill, Steve Nash and Shaquille O’Neal log during the season, with an eye toward keeping them fresher for the end – when experience and savvy are most coveted.

BONUS SHOTS: The 12 previous Suns coaches have combined for a 6-6 record in their debut games. The winners were Johnny Kerr, Jerry Colangelo, Cotton Fitzsimmons, John MacLeod, Paul Westphal, and Scott Skiles. Butch van Breda Kolff, Dick Van Arsdale, John Wetzel, Danny Ainge, Frank Johnson and Mike D’Antoni didn’t fare as well.

Stoudemire’s first free throw tonight will be the 3,000th of his career. Only Kevin Johnson (4,579), Van Arsdale (4,186), Alvan Adams (3,160) and Walter Davis (3,039) have shot that many free throws as a Sun, and Stoudemire will have reached the milestone in just 382 games – faster than any other player. Stoudemire has averaged 7.87 free throws a game in his career, more than any other Sun.