Steve Nash surprisingly returned to Phoenix in the summer of 2004, so could he eventually return to Dallas?

"First of all, I'm happy in Phoenix," said Nash.  "But I'd have no problem going back and playing for a team in Texas, even the Mavericks! It's not as though there was some irreconcilable divorce with Dallas; it was just best for me to move on at that time. I was wanted more in Phoenix; that's the way it is in sports. But if Phoenix doesn't want me one day, I have nothing against considering one of the Texas teams."

Steve Francis almost joined the Clippers in the off-season. Instead, he signed a two-year deal with Houston, where he was a three-time All-Star before being traded to the Orlando Magic along with Cuttino Mobley in 2004.

"I had conversations with the Clippers, the coach; we had some deep conversations up until the last couple of days when I made a decision to come to Houston," Francis said Monday before the Rockets' 88-71 victory over the Clippers at Staples Center.

"I made an easier decision I thought was best for my family, my daughter, my wife. We have a home in Houston. We've been living there for seven, eight years."

Mobley, Francis' longtime friend, was a recruiter in the Clippers' attempt to land him.

Some in the Clippers' organization doubted they ever had a true shot at signing Francis, believing he wanted to play for a team with legitimate title aspirations and a dominant one-two punch in Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming.

At the beginning of the season, he found himself questioning it. He did not play in 11 of the team's first 13 games and was buried deep on the depth chart.

"Of course, by me not playing the first 11, 12 games, I not only possibly thought of if I should've [come] here but Miami, or Dallas, or Cleveland," Francis said.

The Clippers, mired in a 2-6 slide, will probably have the services of leading scorer Corey Maggette for tonight's game against the Houston Rockets.

Maggette, sidelined the last four games because of a strained right hamstring, was originally slated to miss two to three weeks. But he responded well to therapy, including laser treatment that penetrated the injured area.

"Last time, you heard it was supposed to be three weeks," Maggette said, speaking with reporters Sunday. "But everything is doing well, and I had the opportunity to rest it and get some good strengthening from therapists, and it's feeling good."

"Most likely, I'll be playing [against Houston]."

Bonzi Wells missed Saturday's game with a bruised bone in his right ankle that he suffered in the third quarter of Friday's game in Miami. An MRI showed no further damage, and he is listed as day-to-day.

"The thing is you have to be healthy," Coach Rick Adelman said of matching up with the high-scoring Nuggets. "You can't be a warrior, or this team is going to run right past you. If it's sore at all, we probably shouldn't play him and let it rest."

The NBA shifted Tim Duncan from center to forward on its All-Star ballot on Wednesday, boosting the San Antonio player's chances of making his ninth consecutive start.

The seven-member media panel that selected the players for the original ballot had Duncan as a center, even though he has always been listed as a forward. He was voted to start for the Western Conference each of the last eight seasons, but that streak would have been in jeopardy if he was a center.

"It's great. I have an opportunity to make the team now," Duncan said after the Spurs 128-110 win over the Orlando Magic on Wednesday. "To have an opportunity to be back on the ballot and to be at the forward, and to have a chance to start, it's an honor."

Houston center Yao Ming gets overwhelming support from China and has been elected to start every year of his career. He received the highest vote total in history in 2005, and the fourth-highest ever last season.

"It's great that they did that. ... It makes total sense, and we're thrilled that they made that change," Spurs' Coach Gregg Popovich said in San Antonio. "That's what he's been; he's been that way [a power forward] for 10 years. There's no reason to change it."

Rockets' center Yao Ming met with Coach Rick Adelman after Monday's practice and without sharing anything from their conversation, sounded frustrated with his play in the losses to the Suns and Spurs.

"Particularly, the last two games, I didn't play my game," Yao said. "In San Antonio, I didn't get the ball because of the fronting defense and against Phoenix because of their speed and my foul troubles. It took me out of the game. I was gone, like I never went to the game.

"I just (have to) work (to get) my game back."

Tracy McGrady's return to the court Wednesday against Dallas could lead to Steve Francis' return to the bench.

Rockets coach Rick Adelman said Monday that he does not plan changes to his rotation, calling Francis' first playing time of the season Saturday "a one-game situation."

"I don't think there's anything different," Adelman said. "It's not a problem with our rotation. It's just a problem with how we're playing as a team. I don't have any plans to change that right now.

"It's a one-game situation. He (Francis) played and I thought he did fine the other night. If you're going to make a change like that and incorporate somebody into the rotation that hasn't been in there, you need to have to decide who it is you're taking out because they didn't give me 20 more minutes to deal with.

"That's the bottom line. I think you have to be real fair and be sure when you make a decision like that."

Francis made three of 11 shots, scoring eight points with two assists.

Before reaching Toyota Center for Saturday night's game against the Phoenix Suns, Tracy McGrady was convinced that he would be able to play after missing a game with a sprained right elbow.

He instead watched the action unfold from the Rockets' bench.

"I wanted to play, but the doctors kept me out to get three days of rest," McGrady said. "It was very frustrating to be sitting."

He won't be forced to watch the next game.

Nearly a week after suffering his injury in an odd collision with Lakers' forward Luke Walton, McGrady is expected to return to the starting lineup Wednesday night when the Rockets host the Dallas Mavericks.

As Steve Francis fails to leave the Rockets bench night after night, he has admitted that it has crossed his mind to request a trade when he becomes eligible next month, although he has never acted on those thoughts.

"Everything crosses your mind when you're not playing," Francis said, when asked if he thought about leaving the Rockets a few months after his return. "I don't know if it was one day or one week, but everything crosses your mind when things like that happen."

There was no low point, he said.

"Every game," Francis said of when the inactivity bothered him most. "I'm not going to deny wanting to play. Every game."

Houston's Yao Ming was surprised to learn that the Spurs' Tim Duncan was on this year's All-Star ballot as a center rather than forward.

Voted to the Western Conference starting lineup each of his first four seasons, Yao said Duncan's placing on the ballot represented a new challenge.

"It is more challenge at the center position, huh?" Yao said. "However, a couple years ago, we had Shaquille O'Neal move to the East, so that made it easier."

Yao, who is from Shanghai, is tired of hearing that Internet voters in China are responsible for his having been voted to the starting lineup in his first four seasons in the league. If San Antonians are upset that he might get more votes this year than Duncan, he wants them to know he is not responsible for the voting system.

"After five years I'm already tired of talking about Internet vote," Yao said before Friday's game. "That rule was not set by me."

"First, I appreciate every fan that votes on me and if again I get a chance, I will enjoy the All-Star Game."