DALLAS (AP) Dallas Mavericks forward Eduardo Najera will miss Tuesday's game with Milwaukee with a sore left knee, and center Shawn Bradley is listed as doubtful.

Bradley has missed the last seven games with back spasms. Najera has missed one game.

Although a tad tainted by his criminal conduct and ridiculous rhetoric, bidding for Rasheed Weed's services has sharply escalated within the last week. Resolved to rid themselves of the rising free agent, the Blazers gave permission to agent Bill Strickland to elicit trade propositions from teams his client would consider re-signing with come summer.

So far, all three Texas teams and the Hawks - maybe even the Pistons - are involved in the auction.

Rasheed's preference is the Rockets, according to Peter Vecsey; the obvious appeal being Yao Ming and Steve Francis, which is why they refuse to include either one in trade talk. Meaning, Houston may have to wait until the offseason to pursue Rasheed.

Unlike the Mavericks, underlines a Strickland trustee, who might be inclined to give up Antawn Jamison and Eduardo Najera (but would rather include Tariq Abdul-Wahad), depending on the health of the Lakers' feared foursome and Mark Cuban's mood following a two-game skid.

Long before the Spurs' manufactured their 12-game victory march, they offered Rasho Nesterovic, Malik Rose and Ron Mercer for Rasheed, the same source maintains.

As for the Hawks, they're eager to move Theo Ratliff and Alan Henderson for Rasheed. The Blazers countered with a request for Shareef Abdur-Rahim and Stephen Jackson.

Mavericks forward Eduardo Najera, who missed Saturday's game against Memphis with left knee pain, will be out of action for up to two weeks.

"It's going to be more than a couple games," Najera said. "We're going to give it a couple of weeks and see how it responds."

Shawn Bradley believes that he might be able to play Tuesday when his Dallas Mavericks play the Milwaukee Bucks.

"It's improving," he said of his back. "Hopefully, it won't be too much longer."

Bradley has missed the past six games with back spasms.

It is not a stretch to assume Don Chaney has four games between this weekend and the new year to save his job as coach of the New York Knicks.

Isiah Thomas has been on the team's president for only a few days, but already he didn't like what he saw Tuesday night when Latrell Sprewell returned to Madison Square Garden with curses and taunts in a Minnesota Timberwolves' victory that dropped New York's record to 10-19.

``Something happened in our house (Tuesday) night that I hope won't happen again,'' Thomas told reporters on Christmas Eve before returning home to Indiana. ``I look at what went on in our house, it was something that won't ever happen again. Right now, we're down. Sometimes people kick you when you're down. We've got to stand up and we will stand up.''

Thomas, who replaced fired team president Scott Layden on Monday, planned to rejoin the Knicks on a three-game road trip that began Friday night in Memphis and included stops in Miami and Orlando. The Knicks play their final game of 2003 at home Tuesday against the Heat.

With an edict from owner James Dolan that the team ``must'' make the playoffs, Chaney will be under extra scrutiny in the first few games of the Thomas era to see if he is the right coach to lead the Knicks out of the Layden era.

Thomas, who has already called the Knicks a ``sick patient,'' made three minor personnel moves by waiving 7-foot-5 center Slavko Vranes, a second-round pick on the injured list all season; placing forward Clarence Weatherspoon on the injured list; and activating rookie first-round pick Michael Sweetney, who was taken by Layden with the ninth pick of the first round last June.

If Thomas tries to shake up the Knicks with a trade, he'll need to find a team willing to take on one of the long-term contracts given out in recent years.

Thomas would likely try to package one or more players with expiring contracts (Antonio McDyess, Charlie Ward, Michael Doleac) together with Shandon Anderson (signed through '06-07 for $23.7 million), Howard Eisley (owed $20.7 million through '06-07) Keith Van Horn ($30 million through '05-06), Weatherspoon ($12.2 through '05-06) or Allan Houston ($57 million through '06-07).

Two of the Knicks' other potentially movable players, Kurt Thomas ($5.9 million) and Othella Harrington ($3.1 million), have contracts that expire after next season.

``You always want the best players,'' Thomas said. ``There aren't a lot of those walking around. We have to find other creative ways to beat the bushes and come up with talent.''

PASSING RILEY:@ Don Nelson passed Pat Riley for second place on the career coaching victories list when the Dallas Mavericks beat the Toronto Raptors 111-94 Monday night. The 1,111th victory of Nelson's 26-year coaching career came in his 3,000th NBA game as a player or coach.

``Any time Pat wants this record back, he can have it. All he has to do is go back into coaching and coach some more,'' said the self-effacing Nelson.

``The way I look at myself, to be quite honest _ there are some great, great coaches. Pat Riley's one of them, and Red Auerbach and Lenny Wilkens, any of the guys who have gotten up in that 60-percentile of winning percentage.

``I'm passing some good ones, but I'm not in their caliber or their class,'' Nelson said.

Phil Jackson is the winningest coach in NBA history in terms of percentage, entering this season with a success rate of nearly 73 percent. Billy Cunningham is second with a .698 winning percentage, and K.C. Jones was third at .674.

Riley retired with a winning percentage of .661 in 21 seasons with the Lakers, Knicks and Heat, making the playoffs in all but his final two seasons. Wilkens, who was fired by Toronto at the end of last season after amassing 1,292 victories, had a career winning percentage of .537.

Nelson's career percentage is .570.

``I'm a good basketball coach, but there are lots of guys like me around that do a good job. I've just been fortunate to do it for a long, long time. And to be quite honest, I don't even want to pass them. I shouldn't even be up there with them,'' Nelson said.''

FREE KOBE:@ Kobe Bryant plans to be a free agent next summer after opting out of his current deal with the Lakers, although he says his preference is to remain in Los Angeles.

But will it be with his current team, or with the Clippers?

The Lakers' co-tenants at the Staples Center will be one of the few teams with enough salary cap space to offer Bryant anything close to what Lakers owner Jerry Buss can offer. And, there's a school of thought that says Bryant will want to remain in a large market if he leaves the Lakers and signs elsewhere.

With San Antonio and Utah the only other teams expected to have major cap space, what better large market than the one he's already in?

``I've never really been a free agent before, so I'd kind of like to see what's out there. Now it doesn't mean that I want to leave the Lakers, you know my preference is to stay here,'' Bryant told ABC in an interview that aired at halftime of the Lakers' loss to the Houston Rockets on Thursday.

``That's not something that I'm going to harp on during the season or dwell on during the season. It's something that when the time comes, you know, I'll think about it.''

Perhaps the best way to consider current NBA rosters is to list those players who are not about to be traded, according to some general manager, front-office lackey, published report, Internet message board or hot dog vendor in Section 228 of your local arena.

Already this season, we've seen five trades involving 18 players, from Jalen Rose and Ricky Davis to Rick Brunson and Brevin Knight. But it won't end there, for a variety of reasons. One team, the Trail Blazers, has a mandate for change that comes from the organization's brass. Another, the Hawks, is prepping for an old-fashioned fire sale.

Some teams have a general managers -- Glen Grunwald of the Raptors for instance -- who sense an opportunity to take advantage of the watered-down Eastern Conference and firm up their shaky job status by transacting their teams into the postseason.

After discussing the situation with several front-office types, Sean Deveny of the Indianapolis Star breaks down the 10 most likely members of the NBA's most likely to be traded club, which includes Shareef Abdur-Rahim, Theo Ratliff and Jason Terry of the Hawks, Kurt Thomas of the Knicks, Jamaal Tinsley of the Pacers, Zydrunas Ilgauskas of the Cavaliers, Marcus Fizer of the Bulls, Lamond Murray of the Raptors, newly acquired Antawn Jamieson of the Mavericks and Rodney White of the Nuggets.

With Isiah Thomas taking over for Scott Layden in New York, changes could be coming for the Knicks.

However, if they are looking to deal Mutombo, the Dallas Mavericks despite having Shawn Bradley injured and no bigs over 6-7, would still not be interested.

"Owner Mark Cuban and president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson both said Tuesday the Mavericks have no interest."

"Shawn Bradley is out indefinitely with back spasms, which won't help the Mavericks' efforts to improve their defense in the near future."

Head coach Don Nelson said he isn't planning on having Bradley back anytime soon.

With this said, ity seems that Bradley will be out for a while.

With Michael Finley day-to-day with a sore toe and Shawn Bradley out with a bad back, Dirk Nowitzki says he won't let his two sore ankles make him miss tonight's game against the LA Clippers.

"It's a tough stretch right now, so hopefully we'll win [tonight's] game," Nowitzki said. "We've got to start clicking. I don't think we're that far away, but we haven't really been playing well together.

DALLAS (AP) Injured Dallas Mavericks players Michael Finley and Shawn Bradley will miss the team's next two games against Boston and Minnesota.

Finley is out with a sprained right toe. Bradley has back spasms.

The Mavericks will return to Dallas following their back-to-back set in Boston on Wednesday and Minnesota the following night. They play at home against the Los Angeles Clippers on Saturday night.