While Jermaine O?Neal is talking about how no one on the Nets can stop him, in New Jersey the belief is, and as Steve Popper of the New York Times reports it is the more believable scenario right now, that Kenyon Martin can more than handle O?Neal without any assistance.

"I always feel like that," Martin said. "I've been talking like that for a while, before I got in the league. I've always felt like that. No matter who I'm on, I can ? I'm not going to shut guys out, this is the N.B.A. ? but I feel like I can do a pretty decent job of limiting what they do."

And after holding the All-Star to only 12 points in each of the past two games ? both losses to O?Neal?s Pacers, Martin has a reason to talk.

"We're not trying to get in his head," Martin said. "We're just playing him tough. We just played him different than we did in Game 1. He got the ball anywhere he wanted to in Game 1 and he made shots. He was 5 for 17 and 3 for 11 in the other games. We knew we had to play him different, whether he was talking or not."

"We won two games, man. Everybody's talking about Jermaine, Jermaine, Jermaine. Let them keep focusing on him. We're worried about winning."