August Preview: The Phoenix Suns
If I’m being completely honest, I did not know the Suns were one of the teams invited back to play under the 22-team format. That being said, I do plan on catching some Suns games in August. I unfortunately did not get the chance to watch many of their games this season, but I have to imagine a core of Devin Booker, DeAndre Ayton, and their other pieces has to be fun to watch.
However, just because a team is fun to watch doesn’t mean they’ll do well in August. In fact, I feel like the Suns might be the worst performing team when the NBA returns. Now this isn’t a knock to Suns fans, and I want to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but the odds are just really stacked against them. They’ll only be able to face good teams for the rest of the season, they have a rookie head coach, and a team that has very little playoff experience for their stars.
I mean, I know the 8 games before the actual playoffs start are technically still the regular season, but I feel like every game is going to feel like a playoff game as soon as everyone hits Orlando
I’m not exactly sure what Phoenix’s schedule looks like for the 8 games, but I know it can’t be too easy. I mean, best case scenario they face the Kings and Spurs at least once a piece, and even those teams I would consider to be better than the Suns. The Spurs have one of the greatest coaches of all time, and the Kings, in my opinion, have a more complete roster. I do think Devin Booker would be the best player on the court in either of those matchups, though, so who knows really?
I’m assuming a Suns lineup that would finish out games for them would look like Ricky Rubio, Devin Booker, Kelly Oubre Jr, Dario Saric, and DeAndre Ayton. Maybe I’m wrong, but I think inserting Aron Baynes for Saric would work better. If the Suns have already been doing that this year, great, but like I said I just haven’t been watching many Suns games this season. I know Booker finally made his first All-Star team after getting snubbed originally, Ayton had that suspension at the beginning of the season, and Oubre has turned out to be a really solid piece for Phoenix. Other than that, the Suns are pretty much a mystery to me. Outside of the pieces on the team, I’m not too familiar with the style of play or anything like that.
All that being said, I do know that Phoenix has been one of the worst teams in the league for years, and these past couple years were supposed to finally be the years where they made a push for the playoffs. Now’s their chance.
Personally, I think there is little to no chance the Suns end up making the playoffs, especially when you consider how far back they are from the 8 seed at the moment. Devin Booker has never had the chance to show what he can do in a playoff-like environment. Is he clutch like Damian Lillard? Or will we see another James Harden type performer? I think the Suns’ chance of getting into the actual playoffs rests on the shoulders of that question alone. Let’s see if Devin Booker can pull off a miracle.
