The Phoenix Suns are coming off of a miserable 2018-19 NBA campaign in which they won just 19 games, good for the worst record in the Western Conference.
To be fair, pretty much everyone knew the rebuilding Suns wouldn’t be any good, but it’s not the fact that they lost a lot of games: it’s the fact that their front office doesn’t appear to have a clue.
Once one of the premier franchises in the league, Phoenix has fallen off of a cliff over the last decade, as it has not made a playoff appearance since 2010 and has posted just one winning season during that span.
To make matters worse, the Suns have won under 30 games four years in a row.
Based on Phoenix’s recent decision-making, things don’t appear to be changing.
The Suns actually had some nice young talent on their roster this past year, and they still do. Deandre Ayton had an under-the-radar terrific rookie season, and Devin Booker has emerged as one of the NBA’s best wings.
But Phoenix also had a couple of other really interesting young pieces in T.J. Warren and Josh Jackson, both of whom they traded for peanuts.
It dealt Warren to the Indiana Pacers for cash considerations, and it traded Jackson to the Memphis Grizzlies for Jevon Carter.
Uh, what?
So now, the Suns are actually fairly limited on young talent outside of Ayton and Booker, unless you count Kelly Oubre, who is not that good, and Mikal Bridges, who had a decent rookie season.
It’s hard to comprehend just what Phoenix, which seemed to finally be building toward a legitimate future, was thinking this summer, but then you realize it’s the Suns, and everything makes sense.
Let’s face it: Phoenix is on its way to having another terrible season.
As impressive as Ayton and Booker are, there is not nearly enough talent on the rest of this roster for the club to make any sort of noise in the Western Conference.
Yes, the Suns added a couple of veterans in Ricky Rubio and Aron Baynes, but those guys are not going to move the needle much for this team.
Basically, Phoenix needs to hope that Ayton absolutely busts out and that Booker finally learns how to play some defense, and then maybe, just maybe, it will be somewhat respectable.
But even, the Suns are probably no better than a 30-win team.
Oh, and can we talk about how Phoenix, which needs all of the young talent it can get, actually traded down from No. 6 in June’s NBA Draft to acquire the 11th overall pick and Dario Saric?
No disrespect to Saric, who is a decent floor-spacing big man, but did the Suns really think trading down five spots in a top-heavy draft was worth it just to get Saric?
There is so much not to like about what Phoenix has done over the years that it’s impossible to fit all in one piece.
But generally, a team does something to give you some hope about the future (well, unless you’re the New York Knicks). When are the Suns going to start providing some comfort for their fans?
Let’s look at the Sacramento Kings, for example. This is a franchise that has not made the playoffs since 2006. They have been toiling at the bottom of the barrel for over a decade. They couldn’t make it work with DeMarcus Cousins. They’ve gone through coaches like water.
And yet, here they are in 2019, and they have a roster teeming with young talent that should make a push for the playoffs this season.
Why are the Kings in that position but not the Suns?
Phoenix is not only eons behind the top teams in the West, but it has also fallen behind in the arms race with rebuilding teams, who have done a far better job of making shrewd decisions and stockpiling talent while the Suns stay on the hamster wheel.
All of that also has an adverse effect on free agents joining your squad. It’s not like Phoenix is the most desirable destination for marquee free agents anyway, but when you throw inept leadership and poor decision-making from management on top of that, even the B-tier free agents are going to look elsewhere when July comes.
The Suns are basically hoping that Ayton and Booker can become the next Shaq and Kobe, or at least something that at least moderately resembles it. That seems to be their only hope of getting out of the mud at the current point in time.
And let me just tell you right now: Ayton and Booker are not Shaq and Kobe.