2018 Suns Offseason News

[Wormwood]

I'm calling 32 wins. Ayton and Booker play no defense. Jackson can't space the floor. Ariza is a 34% 3 point shooter, who will be playing out of position. Knight is... well... awful. SO are all our real PFs. We just have too many holes in our roster full of bad players, and the few really good ones we have on offense are defensive liabilities.

We have to pay Booker, but I think we may end up regretting it if his defense doesn't improve.

So you are essentially expecting no improvement from any of our young players.

I think Chriss and Bender haven't shown enough improvement to warrant more optimism.

I don't think Ariza helps us at all, anywhere really.

I wonder where the hell Bridges or Jackson will find minutes with the other 3 SFs we have that we're paying 35 million for.

Jackson will get better, but he's unlikely to become a great 3 point shooter, which is what we desperately need. (His FT% says it's unlikely, they're highly correlated)

I don't think Booker will suddenly be an ace on defense.

I think Ayton's awful defense will be exacerbated by being a rookie. He's going to have a hard time helping us on the court as a rookies (seriously, Kevin Durant was a net -8.8 points per 48 in his first year)

I don't believe that Knight is a big improvement over the flotsam and jetsam we had at PG last year.

So, Jackson will be a little better, but he's not going to help on offense. Ayton will need a year before he's a net positive. Bridges will have little impact with 4 other SFs on the team. Bender and Chriss have both been awful in their first two seasons. Bender shows negligible improvement, and Chriss regressed if anything this year.

[AmareIsGod]

People are really questioning paying Booker the max? Wow. Only on .net.

[Aztec Sunsfan]

I'm calling 32 wins. Ayton and Booker play no defense. Jackson can't space the floor. Ariza is a 34% 3 point shooter, who will be playing out of position. Knight is... well... awful. SO are all our real PFs. We just have too many holes in our roster full of bad players, and the few really good ones we have on offense are defensive liabilities.

We have to pay Booker, but I think we may end up regretting it if his defense doesn't improve.

Do you think Portland regrets paying Damian Lillard? I don't. Booker is this teams Lillard.

Lillard had already been Rookie of the Year, played in 2 All-Star Games, been All-NBA and taken his team to the playoffs twice before he signed his extension. Booker hasn't done any of those things yet.

And yet, here we are, board freaking out because the kid was upset about his buddy getting cut.

[AmareIsGod]

I'm calling 32 wins. Ayton and Booker play no defense. Jackson can't space the floor. Ariza is a 34% 3 point shooter, who will be playing out of position. Knight is... well... awful. SO are all our real PFs. We just have too many holes in our roster full of bad players, and the few really good ones we have on offense are defensive liabilities.

We have to pay Booker, but I think we may end up regretting it if his defense doesn't improve.

Do you think Portland regrets paying Damian Lillard? I don't. Booker is this teams Lillard.

Lillard had already been Rookie of the Year, played in 2 All-Star Games, been All-NBA and taken his team to the playoffs twice before he signed his extension. Booker hasn't done any of those things yet.

And yet, here we are, board freaking out because the kid was upset about his buddy getting cut.

Negative-Nancy.net

[Split T]

I'm calling 32 wins. Ayton and Booker play no defense. Jackson can't space the floor. Ariza is a 34% 3 point shooter, who will be playing out of position. Knight is... well... awful. SO are all our real PFs. We just have too many holes in our roster full of bad players, and the few really good ones we have on offense are defensive liabilities.

We have to pay Booker, but I think we may end up regretting it if his defense doesn't improve.

So you are essentially expecting no improvement from any of our young players.

I think Chriss and Bender haven't shown enough improvement to warrant more optimism.

I don't think Ariza helps us at all, anywhere really.

I wonder where the hell Bridges or Jackson will find minutes with the other 3 SFs we have that we're paying 35 million for.

Jackson will get better, but he's unlikely to become a great 3 point shooter, which is what we desperately need. (His FT% says it's unlikely, they're highly correlated)

I don't think Booker will suddenly be an ace on defense.

I think Ayton's awful defense will be exacerbated by being a rookie. He's going to have a hard time helping us on the court as a rookies (seriously, Kevin Durant was a net -8.8 points per 48 in his first year)

I don't believe that Knight is a big improvement over the flotsam and jetsam we had at PG last year.

So, Jackson will be a little better, but he's not going to help on offense. Ayton will need a year before he's a net positive. Bridges will have little impact with 4 other SFs on the team. Bender and Chriss have both been awful in their first two seasons. Bender shows negligible improvement, and Chriss regressed if anything this year.

Everything you mentioned is possible, but I find it unlikely that it all does. Surely there will be some good things that happen.

Also I know many on here don't think Ariza is a PF, but we plan to play him there, so we should probably start considering him a PF. He'll take minutes away from Jackson and Bridges, but minutes they would have spent at the 4

[sunshoopjunky]

I am super thankful that Bookers agent is not Rich Paul. I didn’t know that Ulis and Booker had the same agent. That kind of puts the whole Booker wasn’t contacted about Ulis thing in a different light for me. When I heard Book was upset about not knowing, I said to myself the whole world knew it was happening just not when. Book needs an invite to here we have known for months.

[Aztec Sunsfan]

I'm calling 32 wins. Ayton and Booker play no defense. Jackson can't space the floor. Ariza is a 34% 3 point shooter, who will be playing out of position. Knight is... well... awful. SO are all our real PFs. We just have too many holes in our roster full of bad players, and the few really good ones we have on offense are defensive liabilities.

We have to pay Booker, but I think we may end up regretting it if his defense doesn't improve.

Do you think Portland regrets paying Damian Lillard? I don't. Booker is this teams Lillard.

Lillard had already been Rookie of the Year, played in 2 All-Star Games, been All-NBA and taken his team to the playoffs twice before he signed his extension. Booker hasn't done any of those things yet.

And yet, here we are, board freaking out because the kid was upset about his buddy getting cut.

Negative-Nancy.net

Don’t get me wrong, I like Booker a lot, and he is the only thing running as planned or above around here. Max the guy, give him input and put his face on every Suns’ billboard, but let’s not spoil the kid, handing him the keys Lebron style, like he had already arrived, AND DELIVERED. We did it with the Morrii (of course in a different scale) and hopefully the lesson was learned.

[In2ition]

Do you think Portland regrets paying Damian Lillard? I don't. Booker is this teams Lillard.

Lillard had already been Rookie of the Year, played in 2 All-Star Games, been All-NBA and taken his team to the playoffs twice before he signed his extension. Booker hasn't done any of those things yet.

And yet, here we are, board freaking out because the kid was upset about his buddy getting cut.

Negative-Nancy.net

Don’t get me wrong, I like Booker a lot, and he is the only thing running as planned or above around here. Max the guy, give him input and put his face on every Suns’ billboard, but let’s not spoil the kid, handing him the keys Lebron style, like he had already arrived, AND DELIVERED. We did it with the Morrii (of course in a different scale) and hopefully the lesson was learned.

I think Booker will be the first to tell you that he needs to improve. I'm not going to stick up for his defense so much, but it did show improvement. As far as him carrying us to the playoffs in the past, I think the organization was actively undermining his ability by tanking. I think/hope that all changes this season. Maybe the Suns make a trade yet, but I'll be curious as to how this turns out. At least I'm looking forward to the summer league. Last year I was expecting a good showing at summer league too, but Chriss came into the off-season entitled and thinking he arrived. It didn't turn out so good.

[carey]

So who all is still on Bender Island with me?

[O_Gardino]

I'm with you. He's going to be a solid player for a long time.

[The Bobster]

Bender has a lot of talent and is still very young, but he's going to have to want it a lot more to be successful.

We'll see if having a new coaching staff makes a difference for him. Let's hope it does.

[carey]

Who's ready for Isaiah Thomas on the Room Exception? Lol. (Not reporting anything but he just followed the Suns and Magic on twitter.)

[EDC]

I think there is an argument to be made that Bender was our best player throwing the ball into the post last year. That combined with shooting the three pretty well will probably make him a very nice compliment to Ayton.

[specialsauce]

IT is exactly what we DONT need at the PG spot. Shoot first second and third, no defense and questionable health and leadership

[Split T]

We don't have money, don't worry about IT coming

[Big Jake Little Jake]

So who all is still on Bender Island with me?

I'm mostly with you. I don't think he needs to turn into some dude who's breaking guys down and dunking on them, but he really, really needs to be able to get in the paint with the big boys and grab rebounds. I think that's his biggest weakpoint for me right now.

[TOO]

So who all is still on Bender Island with me?

I'm actually on it more now than I was when he was drafted. He's a potential perfect complement to Ayton/Booker/Jackson.

[TOO]

So who all is still on Bender Island with me?

I'm mostly with you. I don't think he needs to turn into some dude who's breaking guys down and dunking on them, but he really, really needs to be able to get in the paint with the big boys and grab rebounds. I think that's his biggest weakpoint for me right now.

I just want him to defend and hit 3's with regularity.

[Big Jake Little Jake]

I'm mostly with you. I don't think he needs to turn into some dude who's breaking guys down and dunking on them, but he really, really needs to be able to get in the paint with the big boys and grab rebounds. I think that's his biggest weakpoint for me right now.

I just want him to defend and hit 3's with regularity.

Yeah I'm assuming (hoping) he'll get there with that. He'll be a rotation player if he can nail that down. If he wants to start on a good team though, he'll need to be able to fight for rebounds. Not talking about 10 a game, but good box outs and getting the occasional ones that go his way.

[Hermen]

So who all is still on Bender Island with me?

I'm here. As someone else noted, we need defense, passing and shooting to complement the main pieces. That sounds like Bender.