Phx-Suns.Net

Last Week's Games

@ Denver L120-104
@ Indiana W116-96
@ Philadelphia L120-105

This Week's Games

Mon, November 21st @ Washington 7:00PM EST
Wed, November 23rd @ Orlando 7:00PM EST
Fri, November 25th vs. Minnesota 9:00PM EST
Sun, November 27th vs. Denver 3:30PM EST

Suns Stories

Eric Bledsoe links Suns', NBA's youngest starting 5s: http://www.azcentral.com/story/sports/n ... /94182652/

Rookie Tyler Ulis stays sharp for rare chance: http://www.azcentral.com/story/sports/n ... /94152184/

Center of the Sun - One good win, two embarrassing losses: http://www.brightsideofthesun.com/2016/ ... ing-losses

I don't know why, but I thought these were pretty funny:
https://twitter.com/tt_sports/status/799389566008315905 https://twitter.com/sreekyshooter/status/799775768112820224 https://twitter.com/EastBayRaymundo/status/800163427834470400

Aldridge Q&A with Booker: http://www.nba.com/article/2016/11/21/m ... oenix-suns

It's part of the morning tip that Carey linked to, but for some reason it's now split up into multiple articles with no internal links.

Related: the new NBA.com is terrible.

Shabazz wrote: Related: the new NBA.com is terrible.

Oh, yes. It's so freakin bad. Whoever designed it needs to be fired immediately.

carey wrote:

Shabazz wrote: Related: the new NBA.com is terrible.

Oh, yes. It's so freakin bad. Whoever designed it needs to be fired immediately.

OH yes.

Giving Alan Williams minutes ahead of Dragan Bender is like hiring Earl Watson as your head coach without interviewing anyone else.

Except Williams is kicking ass.

Williams is a dilemma for me. He just seems to put up big rebounding numbers whenever he plays. But he is small for his position, so logically, his game has significant deficiencies. Its hard to look beyond the biases. Here is my problem. I cannot ignore this.

His per 36 numbers right now are 19.2 pts, 18 rebs, 3.7 blocks, 2.5 stls on 72% fg shooting. Add to that an Ortg of 130 and a Drtg of 99. The sample size is small (58 total minutes this year) but the numbers are downright amazing.

Per36 is not a definitive evaluation of a player, especially with limited minutes. It does not take into account the type of minutes played (cleanup minutes against end-of-the-bench players etc). But to me, Williams performance so far warrants further investigation.

He is PJ Tucker but at the Center position. Hard work and constant effort will get you far. I keep telling my son this. There are ways to overcome talent deficits. (He has had a few bad pitching outings lately.)

Question -

Here's our current rotation, when healthy:

Chandler/Len
Chriss/Dudley
Warren/Tucker
Booker/Barbosa
Bledsoe/Knight

spot minutes: Williams, Bender, Ulis. Out of rotation: Jenkins, Jones

Would we be any worse if this was our rotation going forward:

Len/WIlliam
Chriss/Bender
Warren/Dudley
Booker/Barbosa
Bledsoe/Ulis

Spot minutes: Jenkins, Jones?

Not only do I think that lineup would do as well, but I think it would be significantly more enjoyable to watch.

Moving Knight and Chandler will have zero effect on our win total for the season.

Btw here's another Q & A with Booker, I think this is the 3rd this week after the David Aldridge one (http://www.nba.com/article/2016/11/21/m ... oenix-suns) and the Undefeated one with Marc Spears (http://theundefeated.com/features/stunt ... o-the-nba/).

http://www.si.com/nba/2016/11/22/devin- ... n-calipari

carey wrote:He is PJ Tucker but at the Center position. Hard work and constant effort will get you far. I keep telling my son this. There are ways to overcome talent deficits. (He has had a few bad pitching outings lately.)

He's a great fit in a center tandem with Len, with Len starting.
Williams gives you energy off the bench, and has a natural instinct for rebounding/positioning.
And it's positive energy, whereas Tucker gives off the irritability of a small child who missed his afternoon nap ...

I would live with any attitude from Tucker if we got two things:

1) Limit his minutes a little more. Don't lean on him and play him 39 minutes just because you feel more comfy with him out there, Coach.

2) Don't let him take so many 3s / drive the ball ever. His shot isn't with him currently, likely due to his bad back, and he isn't built to be a slasher to the basket. He should be out there mostly for defense and the occasional opportunistic basket, at least until he is more fully healed.

carey wrote:Moving Knight and Chandler will have zero effect on our win total for the season.

Btw here's another Q & A with Booker, I think this is the 3rd this week after the David Aldridge one (http://www.nba.com/article/2016/11/21/m ... oenix-suns) and the Undefeated one with Marc Spears (http://theundefeated.com/features/stunt ... o-the-nba/).

http://www.si.com/nba/2016/11/22/devin- ... n-calipari

That Spears article is great. Thanks!

Me: How much is Earl putting the ball in your hands so far?

DB: At the end of last year, I had the ball in my hand more. But I understand why it’s not. We have [Eric] Bledsoe and we have Brandon Knight back, and those are point guards that make the game easier for me. I like having the ball in Bled’s hands. It’s less attention off of me, and it gets me easier looks. I’d much rather have it that way than getting trapped off of ball screens.

Did DB just slam AASE?

Superbone wrote:

carey wrote:Moving Knight and Chandler will have zero effect on our win total for the season.

Btw here's another Q & A with Booker, I think this is the 3rd this week after the David Aldridge one (http://www.nba.com/article/2016/11/21/m ... oenix-suns) and the Undefeated one with Marc Spears (http://theundefeated.com/features/stunt ... o-the-nba/).

http://www.si.com/nba/2016/11/22/devin- ... n-calipari

That Spears article is great. Thanks!

Agreed. Such a FANTASTIC read that gives you great insight into Booker and his life leading to his where he is currently in the NBA. You can tell he has a great family around him.

So don't thank me, thank one of the mods at RealGM, but this may be of interest to you all: http://nbahd.net/

It's replays of all games broken down into chunks of usually 4 or 5 videos. Bookmark it.

As usual, you are the first to post it on this site, so you get thanked anyway, so there.

Right. If you're not scouring RealGM, we'd never know about it!

ShelC wrote:I don't know why, but I thought these were pretty funny:
https://twitter.com/tt_sports/status/799389566008315905 https://twitter.com/sreekyshooter/status/799775768112820224 https://twitter.com/EastBayRaymundo/status/800163427834470400

ahahah
awesome

carey wrote:So don't thank me, thank one of the mods at RealGM, but this may be of interest to you all: http://nbahd.net/

It's replays of all games broken down into chunks of usually 4 or 5 videos. Bookmark it.

Wow; that is an amazing site. Thanks for posting the link.