Rodrigue Beaubois hopeful for opener
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DALLAS -- Wearing a white Team France T-shirt and a bulky, blue boot on his healing left foot,
Dallas Mavericks guard
Rodrigue Beaubois is hopeful he will be ready for the start of the regular season on Oct. 27.
"In a perfect world, I think the most important thing, because we don't want to rush anything, is [to be ready] for the beginning of the season, I hope," Beaubois said Friday after completing his daily, two-hours-plus workout at the American Airlines Center. "If we can, it is going to be better if I can come a little bit before [the season], but we'll see. The thing is I need time to heal. That is the problem. I just need to take that time and then everything will be good."
Beaubois, the second-year player from Guadeloupe, broke his foot in early August while training with the French national team for the ongoing FIBA World Championships in Turkey. He was supposed to be France's starting point guard in his first international competition, but the injury that required surgery to place a pin his left foot on Aug. 13 put an end to that.
After spending more than three weeks on crutches, Beaubois will wear the walking boot for another week or two. His activity is limited to upper-body weight training, riding the stationary bike and other non-impact conditioning work. He is examined once a week by Mavericks team physician T.O. Souryal. No timetable has been set for Beaubois' return to the practice court in any capacity.
"He's handled it very well. He's making progress," Mavs coach Rick Carlisle said. "The surgery was successful and the hope is that we can get him back before the regular season. There's no exact timetable, but he's making gradual and steady progress. There are positive signs."
The Mavs have not been shy in communicating their desire to hand Beaubois a much larger role this season. Several explosive performances last season failed to land him a permanent spot in Carlisle's rotation. Earlier in the summer, talk heated up that the Mavs would like to make Beaubois the starter at shooting guard, which would allow
Caron Butler to slide over to small forward. That potential scenario is obviously now on hold.
The Mavs open training camp at SMU on Sept. 28 and begin an eight-game preseason schedule on Oct. 5.
"My goal was to be ready and show what I can do and show that I'm ready to bring a lot of things to the team," Beaubois said. "If I had to start, yeah, I would be ready to start and play as good as I can. If I was to come from the bench, I just wanted to show that I was ready to play."