Game Day: Celtics (20-33) @ Suns (29-27), Mon 2/23/15

[djy2j]

What's to like about this team right now? We go from a potential playoff team to having less upside than the Kings. Our defEnse was bad before the trade. Its worse now. The players we brought in are bad defenders save maybe Knight. I dont expect great chemistry immediately from a trade like thst but there is very little effort until we get down a bunch.

I dont have blame for just the gm or the coaches or the players. I blame them all equally. There's now an article posted on hoopshype.com today about a disconnect in the front office.

No big name free agents will be signing here anytime soon.

Again, I love my Suns but this team is an absolute mess top to bottom.

[cbesch5]

IT with the 3 and the foul. Fuck.

IT had the same kick out the leg play about 5 times this year and was always called for an offensive foul for it, hey but now he has no suns uniform on any more so now it's a defensive foul. IT must be very happy about that, at least now he s gonna get some calls his way.

I was thinking the EXACT same thing when I watched that. I even backed it up and watched the replay several times, it did not even look like Knight touched him up high, or was even in his landing space, IT kicked his legs out and drew the contact. We saw that called offensive against Suns players several times this season. Frustrating.

[Sunsfan4life]

. Our defEnse was bad before the trade. Its worse now. The players we brought in are bad defenders save maybe Knight. I dont expect great chemistry immediately from a trade like thst but there is very little effort until we get down a bunch.

Knight is the only player we brought in. Well I guess you can count Marcus Thorton but he'll be collecting DNP's Soon enough

[Sunsfan4life]

There's now an article posted on hoopshype.com today about a disconnect in the front office.

Can you post the link to this? I can't seem to find it and would love to read.....thx.

[ShelC]

Really? Less upside than the Kings? Other than DeMarcus Cousins, what do they have exactly? At the very least we have two bright young PGs with their best basketball ahead of them, a 20 year old thoroughbred who's shown some real flashes of late, and a 20 year old 7-1 center who's looking like he could be a game changing beast.

Also, i think the disconnect within the FO had to do with the business and basketball departments sharing analytics and staff. Wasn't anything dramatic like in-fighting between Babby and McD. Unless there's a new article I'm not familiar with.

Here's the stuff from the ESPN Analytics piece:

The Suns employ an unorthodox front office in which the business and basketball sides of the organization share analytics resources, as overseen by Zaheer Benjamin, VP for business planning and basketball analytics. According to sources, that structure has led to tension and miscommunication between the two groups. But a source familiar with the Phoenix front office says the organization has begun to work through the issue, with more dedicated analysts available to basketball operations.

[Superbone]

The biggest positives lately are Len playing great and Archie showing promise when getting some regular rotation minutes.

[Mori Chu]

What's to like about this team right now? We go from a potential playoff team to having less upside than the Kings. Our defEnse was bad before the trade. Its worse now. The players we brought in are bad defenders save maybe Knight. I dont expect great chemistry immediately from a trade like thst but there is very little effort until we get down a bunch.

I dont have blame for just the gm or the coaches or the players. I blame them all equally. There's now an article posted on hoopshype.com today about a disconnect in the front office.

No big name free agents will be signing here anytime soon.

Again, I love my Suns but this team is an absolute mess top to bottom.

I do think it's unfair to judge them too much after 2 games together with not much practice time. Also, in this Celtics game we mistakenly played the horrible Marcus Thornton and didn't play Gerald Green at all. I think the team is better than its record in the last 10 games or so.

I don't think the team is in a bad state. We actually have a decent amount of talent on the roster at 4 of the 5 positions. (The gaping hole is at SF, in my opinion.) We have many young players who will likely get better in the next few years, including Bledsoe, Knight, Len, Goodwin, and Warren. We have plenty of draft picks in the upcoming years of drafts, so we have a good chance to improve our team that way. And we have some trade assets if we do need to make a trade down the line.

We've lost a lot of games recently, but I actually like a lot of what I've seen on the court for the most part. The guys are sharing the ball much more. And little things, like when Markieff Morris dove into the crowd to try to save a loose ball, two guys ran over and pulled him up and slapped him on the butt. Or when Goodwin got fouled on a drive, Len picked him up and pulled him in for a hug / chest-bump. I feel like the chemistry is pretty decent on the team and I like that. They still need to up their effort on defense a lot, but I like some of the signs lately.

If you didn't want this team to top out as an 8 seed, then the recent games are actually not so bad. I'd rather have us play the young guys and lose some games than have us play a bunch of vets and ball hogs. Yeah it's a bummer if we were expecting improvement over last season. But I like most of the guys on the roster now (notable exceptions: Thornton; Marcus Morris; sometimes Tucker).

Losing all these games is a bit of a bummer. But I don't think it's a reason to give up on the team or freak out.

[Superbone]

Yeah, people. Settle down. We shouldn't be upset about losing to an elite team like the Celtics on our home court. Especially after they lost the night before to a powerful team like the Lakers in overtime. Everything is peachy.

[Shabazz]

Regarding our defense, it's weird. We start 3 '+' defenders in Bledsoe, Tucker and Len. Markieff competes on that end (though his rebounding leaves a lot to be desired) and we've added another supposedly good defender in Knight, yet our starting lineup has been getting torched lately.

It has been a striking change for Knight coming from Milwaukee, the NBA's fourth-best defense.

"Everything was defensively drilled and, here, it's a little bit geared to our offense," Knight said.

Uh oh. Is this the start of the "Hornacek doesn't coach defense" narrative?

[Ring_Wanted]

It only takes one weak link. And rebounding is part of the defense. A huge one at that.

[INFORMER]

I think part of the reason we're committed to the 2-PG system is because Bled isn't really a PG. So we run two "half" points to get one point. And hey, haven't I heard a billion times that you can't win a championship building a team around great point guards?

You're misapplying this point. The "you don't need a great point guard" ideology is a reason for not paying Bledsoe $70 million.

Statistically, you can argue Bledsoe is great. He's a tremendous fantasy basketball player.

But the "you don't need a great point guard" ideology doesn't mean you don't need your point guard to be smart, reliable, run the offense well, and shoot the ball effectively. And those areas are where Bledsoe fails the most.

[Gladiator]

I don't think the team is in a bad state. We actually have a decent amount of talent on the roster at 4 of the 5 positions. (The gaping hole is at SF, in my opinion.) We have many young players who will likely get better in the next few years, including Bledsoe, Knight, Len, Goodwin, and Warren. We have plenty of draft picks in the upcoming years of drafts, so we have a good chance to improve our team that way. And we have some trade assets if we do need to make a trade down the line.

Losing all these games is a bit of a bummer. But I don't think it's a reason to give up on the team or freak out.

I agree with most of this. You can clearly debate the merits of Bledsoe's contract and how much upside some of those younger players have. But it's not as if the Suns' roster has maximised its potential and there's nowhere to go.

However I think we've got an issue at starting SF and PF. If you take that as a forward combination, the Suns are clearly worse than any other team in the top 8 in the west, IMO.
Even disregarding contracts (and Markieff's "bargain") which team would swap their forwards for ours straight up?

Warriors (Barnes/D.Green)
Grizzlies (Randolph/J.Green)
Rockets (Ariza/T.Jones)
Portland (Aldridge/Batum)
Dallas (Dirk/Parsons)
Clippers (Griffin/Barnes)
Spurs (Duncan/Leonard)
OKC (Durant/Ibaka)

[iLLmatic]

Agreed OE. The progression of posts in this thread is pretty funny to read. People are way too emotional and willing to jump the gun 2 games after the trade.

Ridiculous. I love when people call out McDonaugh and then in the next breath praise a guy he drafted (Len or Goodwin) or traded for (Knight)

I never said McStunna was bad at drafting. In fact, I liked the Len and Warren pick. It's the other things he's done that makes me wonder if he really knows what he's doing. For example, giving Bledsoe and the Morris twins their contracts, trading away that LA pick, drafting Tyler Ennis, trading for another small combo guard, etc.

[BearHoward]

Considering the lack of defense this year, what are everyone's thoughts on asst coach Mike Longabardi? He is basically 'the coach' when the suns are on defense... waiving his arms and screaming, then slumping into his seat when the shot goes in. I thought he was supposed to be a defensive wizard and usher in a new age of defensive accountability for the phx suns. What happened?

[TOO]

I'm not sure its Longabardi's fault the team rotates so lazily or just loses vision of who they're supposed to be defending. We have low BBIQ players, and its exposed on both ends.

[Dan H]

What's to like about this team right now? We go from a potential playoff team to having less upside than the Kings. Our defEnse was bad before the trade. Its worse now. The players we brought in are bad defenders save maybe Knight. I dont expect great chemistry immediately from a trade like thst but there is very little effort until we get down a bunch.

I dont have blame for just the gm or the coaches or the players. I blame them all equally. There's now an article posted on hoopshype.com today about a disconnect in the front office.

No big name free agents will be signing here anytime soon.

Again, I love my Suns but this team is an absolute mess top to bottom.

I do think it's unfair to judge them too much after 2 games together with not much practice time. Also, in this Celtics game we mistakenly played the horrible Marcus Thornton and didn't play Gerald Green at all. I think the team is better than its record in the last 10 games or so.

I don't think the team is in a bad state. We actually have a decent amount of talent on the roster at 4 of the 5 positions. (The gaping hole is at SF, in my opinion.) We have many young players who will likely get better in the next few years, including Bledsoe, Knight, Len, Goodwin, and Warren. We have plenty of draft picks in the upcoming years of drafts, so we have a good chance to improve our team that way. And we have some trade assets if we do need to make a trade down the line.

We've lost a lot of games recently, but I actually like a lot of what I've seen on the court for the most part. The guys are sharing the ball much more. And little things, like when Markieff Morris dove into the crowd to try to save a loose ball, two guys ran over and pulled him up and slapped him on the butt. Or when Goodwin got fouled on a drive, Len picked him up and pulled him in for a hug / chest-bump. I feel like the chemistry is pretty decent on the team and I like that. They still need to up their effort on defense a lot, but I like some of the signs lately.

If you didn't want this team to top out as an 8 seed, then the recent games are actually not so bad. I'd rather have us play the young guys and lose some games than have us play a bunch of vets and ball hogs. Yeah it's a bummer if we were expecting improvement over last season. But I like most of the guys on the roster now (notable exceptions: Thornton; Marcus Morris; sometimes Tucker).

Losing all these games is a bit of a bummer. But I don't think it's a reason to give up on the team or freak out.

I agree with that, and theoretically it should be relatively easy to pick up an above-average small forwarded.

Still would like a classic rebounding 4 but Len may develop to the point that we don't necessarily need one.

[OE32]

Still would like a classic rebounding 4 but Len may develop to the point that we don't necessarily need one.

If Len's strong in that area, we may be able to get away with having a weaker rebounder at the 4 spot. But then you need an active rebounder at the 3 IMO. One guy simply can't do it: the ball bounces more than one direction.

And IMO, even if/when Warren busts out, he won't be an elite defensive rebounder. Eventually I think we'll have to choose between the Morris twins and TJ, and I picked my horse (not horses) the night TJ was drafted.

I think the Morris twins would rotate well with, say, Paul George, Thad Young, Giannis, Aaron Gordon, Batum, Hayward. I think Warren would work well with either a traditional or stretch 4, provided they can rebound/protect the paint. I like Len a ton, but I don't think he's good enough to do it on his own.

[INFORMER]

Thomas with the dagger going past Bledsoe. Haha.

https://twitter.com/paulcoro/status/570073652433006592

Good for you, IT.

[Indy]

Thomas with the dagger going past Bledsoe. Haha.

https://twitter.com/paulcoro/status/570073652433006592

Good for you, IT.

I assume you really meant that. I would have if I were him. They signed him, then basically said he was worthless. Serves them/us right.

That said, I wasn't a fan. He was way better here than most give him credit for, though.

[Superbone]

He won us games, he cost us games, but overall, I didn't like the way the ball flowed (didn't) with him.