Suns News: 2019 Off-Season

[Split T]

I listened to the Game Theory podcast with Sam Vecenie and Cole Zwicker...they rank the top 25 players under the age of 23. 3 suns get mentioned. Booker at 4, Ayton at 8, bridges as honorable mention. Ayton was a little higher than I expected. Vecenie is pretty high on him and thinks he could go 23/12 this year.

Podcast is a good listen(and very long listen) it’s split into 3 podcasts, so just listen to the most recent one(top 8) if you just want the booker/Ayton stuff.

Rankings went:

1. Zion
2. Luka
3. Simmons
4. Booker
5. Mitchell
6. Fox
7. Trae
8. Ayton
9. Tatum
10. JJJ
11. Bagley
12. Turner
13. Russell
14. Collins
15. Murray
16. Markkanen
17. Morant
18. Barrett
19. SGA
20. Lonzo
21. Ingram
22. Brown
23. Carter
24. Huerter
25. Adebayo

[In2ition]

Danny Leroux and Nate Duncan just gave the Suns off-season an F+ and F- on their latest Dunc'd On podcast. Once again, a lovely grade.

[Split T]

Danny Leroux and Nate Duncan just gave the Suns off-season an F+ and F- on their latest Dunc'd On podcast. Once again, a lovely grade.

Haha, I don’t know that I’ve seen any other media guys that are so anti-suns...ive never seen them say anything remotely positive about us. It is what it is I guess.

[Flagrant Fowl]

Rankings went:

1. Zion
2. Luka

IMO, everything after this is wacky. How can a guy who wants to be a PG but refuses to shoot outside of 10 feet be #3? Mitchell is too high and Fox is too low. JJJ and Ayton are essentially tied to me. The end of this list looks like they're just throwing at names on a dart board.

[ShelC]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

Simmons is a walking triple double so his offense is kind of irrelevant imo. I'd prob put Markaanen ahead of Murray. Bridges I'd put on the list ahead of Adebayo, Huerter.

[Split T]

Rankings went:

1. Zion
2. Luka

IMO, everything after this is wacky. How can a guy who wants to be a PG but refuses to shoot outside of 10 feet be #3? Mitchell is too high and Fox is too low. JJJ and Ayton are essentially tied to me. The end of this list looks like they're just throwing at names on a dart board.

They both agreed that the 17-25 range has quite a drop off. Also, they make it clear that this is a list about future potential. Not where they are at currently. It’s also Vecenie’s list. Zwicker had a top 4 of Zion/Luka/JJJ/Trae.

Simmons definitely has some questions, but if he figures out how to shoot or be effective without the ball, he’s a special talent. I’m fine with him being 3rd on this list.

The booker/Mitchell/fox/Trae debate is interesting to me. Fox and Mitchell are more balanced as they don’t have big defensive issues like booker and Trae. Booker and Trae are better offensively though. I’d put fox ahead of Mitchell as fox is an actual pg. mitchell is a combo guard who scores more, but he’s also been asked to score a lot more than he probably should be. I think this season will help us see if Mitchell can be an efficient scorer.

I’d put booker ahead of Trae because I think there is at least a chance booker becomes competent defensively. I don’t think Trae is ever anything but bad. I’d say booker over fox, but I’m clearly biased. I wouldn’t have issue if someone argued for Fox.

So I’d rank them Booker, Fox, Mitchell, Trae. Ayton at 8 is pretty fair, I was definitely expecting to see JJJ and maybe Turner ahead of him.

I don’t think I would have included Lonzo, Barrett, or Huerter on the list. Not entirely sure who I’d replace them with, I just don’t have strong beliefs in them as players. Huerter I just haven’t watched. Maybe he belongs here.

[Mori Chu]

The one thing that is certain about that list is that most of it will be totally different after this season gets going. We just don't know how Ayton or Luka or Zion or Morant etc. will play next year yet. Maybe DeAndre will have a huge season, partly due to natural growth for a stud young player in his second year, partly due to Rubio giving him better passes, partly due to how he's being coached and utilized in the offense.

[Split T]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

I was a little surprised to not see Luka at 1, but if I had the number 1 pick this year and Dallas offered me Luka, I would have said no and drafted Zion.

They do make it clear that this list is about future potential. They are ranking them on how good they see them in their primes.

[Superbone]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

Exactly what I was thinking.

[Indy]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

Exactly what I was thinking.

Because anyone would take Zion over anyone else on that list.

[Indy]

Danny Leroux and Nate Duncan just gave the Suns off-season an F+ and F- on their latest Dunc'd On podcast. Once again, a lovely grade.

Haha, I don’t know that I’ve seen any other media guys that are so anti-suns...ive never seen them say anything remotely positive about us. It is what it is I guess.

Those guys are really good at following trends. They look at the what is in front of them and copy it. So teams that sucked since they have been out of college will always suck, until they don't. They won't predict anything the rest of NBA twitter/podcasts hasn't already predicted, and they will play it safe every time.

[Superbone]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

Exactly what I was thinking.

Because anyone would take Zion over anyone else on that list.

I'm not sure how you can make that proclamation before he's played his first NBA game.

[Superbone]

Bill Simmons blames Booker for Team USA's near loss to Turkey:

https://arizonasports.com/story/2065757 ... vs-turkey/

Yep. Blasts Booker for not playing for Team USA and then 17 minutes after blasting Booker on Twitter, Tatum gets injured and he freaks out on Twitter. OMG! Tatum hurt! Lol. The irony.

That’s pretty damn hilarious.

Man, the comments on Book's tweet go on forever!

[In2ition]

Now Nick Friedell calls out Devin for not saving Team USA.

[Split T]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

Exactly what I was thinking.

Because anyone would take Zion over anyone else on that list.

I'm not sure how you can make that proclamation before he's played his first NBA game.

Let’s say you had the first pick this year, who on that list would you have traded it for?

[Superbone]

How can a guy who hasn't played a minute of NBA ball be #1? I get projections and all but still.

Exactly what I was thinking.

Because anyone would take Zion over anyone else on that list.

I'm not sure how you can make that proclamation before he's played his first NBA game.

Let’s say you had the first pick this year, who on that list would you have traded it for?

Doncic.

[Split T]

Exactly what I was thinking.

Because anyone would take Zion over anyone else on that list.

I'm not sure how you can make that proclamation before he's played his first NBA game.

Let’s say you had the first pick this year, who on that list would you have traded it for?

Doncic.

Is there anyone else? There’s an argument for Doncic, but NO would have said no to any other player on this list without question. That means at worst he’s 2nd on this list. He hasn’t played yet, but there’s a very real possibility that next year at this time it would be laughable to think we ever questioned his position on the list.

[Superbone]

Because anyone would take Zion over anyone else on that list.

I'm not sure how you can make that proclamation before he's played his first NBA game.

Let’s say you had the first pick this year, who on that list would you have traded it for?

Doncic.

Is there anyone else? There’s an argument for Doncic, but NO would have said no to any other player on this list without question. That means at worst he’s 2nd on this list. He hasn’t played yet, but there’s a very real possibility that next year at this time it would be laughable to think we ever questioned his position on the list.

Sure but there is also a very real possibility that at this time next year 5 or 6 players on that list could be valued higher too. You can easily argue that Ayton was more valued before he played his first NBA game than he is at the moment.

[SDC]

Now Nick Friedell calls out Devin for not saving Team USA.

he couldnt even save his own team, much less team USA.

[Flagrant Fowl]

I'm here for the objective Devin Booker opinions, but give me a break with comparing Team USA to the Suns for the last 4 seasons. That's taking it way too far.