New Sarver Article: AZCentral

[Mainstreet]

he should coach and play too

This would save a lot of money as well. He could then pay himself the veteran minimum if he were on the roster and not another player.

Sarver is the man.

 

[da_suns_fan]

I'll Play For Free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Irish]

I'll Play For Free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Still overpaid.

 

[CardsFan88]

Sarver thinks too short-term imo

The best decisions financially for that quarter, may not be the best decisions financially for the long term. Sometimes these shortsighted decisions can ruin a company/franchise. Of course not always. Many times it can just hurt enough to pull a surging company or franchise back to the middle of the pack. Rarely do they do much benefit in the long term...they do what they do...help with that quarter's bottom line.

If you are losing money but your principle is sound, and most everyone agrees that the right assets are in place, you take the losses. Especially when you can in the Suns case 'afford' it.

JC did just that. He took losses in many seasons, but he turned a franchise almost out the door into one that is worth about 10x more now than it was ($44.5 to $449M, pre O'Neal trade)....JC sold for 401 million, so he'd already seen the franchise's worth grow by nearly 50 million.

If he'd nickeled and dimed players, and was not progressive enough to say sign the first free agent in the modern day for the NBA, among countless other examples, this franchise wouldn't be here, and even if it was...it would probably be worth about 100 million less.

He even knew the value of resigning Danny Manning....via verbal agreement...after he got injured. He took a loss there, but when that is how you run things, and the players know that, the goodwill created is immense, and although you can't quantify it, it backed up what everyone said about, 'model franchise'. That's how you get FA's to call you first, or even be included on the list. Especially if you aren't a LA, NY, or at the time a 'great team'.

Now with $arver, he wanted to run the Suns bottom line like a Fortune 500 company on wall street that has to make a quarterly report look good so the stock doesn't decline.

Often he forced himself to make a decision, where it was good for the bottom line, bad for the team. Forced himself to make a decision, when none 'had' to be made. That's the most important part....forcing bad decisions where none 'had' to be made.

Then when he saw his errors affect his company, he would overcompensate because he saw his 'stock' about to go down.

The less talent you have, the harder the decision's 'get' when making money. As we may someday see.

Each piece we sold off was an asset to the Suns that could have produced something. He decided to sell of our Suns economy piece by piece, so that he could meet the 'quarterly' bottom line, and forgetting about how that affect his potential profits in years ahead.

That's what makes me personally disgusted. We had the tools to have a chance at a dynasty. Instead we are where we are. Not because we had to, but because $arver did what he did, because he felt it was 'fiscally responsible'. When you look at the savings, at the time, they were peanuts. When you look at how he overcompensated, he wiped those gains away. So what was accomplished now a few years later....and we know the answer to that question for now, and in the future.

Even if we win a championship next year...I'd feel the same way. I'd be estatic that we won, but know we could have been better, much better, and wouldn't be talking about the end of the road, being the next couple of years, but talking about a stocked team until the like of Amare, LB, Deng, etc were in their or close to their mid 30's.

That said look at the celtics and lakers, and how they lucked into their talent, and so you never know. But when sitting on a gold mine, I wouldn't be selling off parcels of that land to make a quick buck like $arver did. The fact he didn't even know he was on a gold mine indicates why we should never believe that he will be a capable owner. He sold his kingdom from underneath him like it was swamp land instead.

I hoped he wouldn't make rookie mistakes. Maybe he'll learn the right way over time. But for now, what he did is done, and luckily we're not a bad team. But at this point he hasn't shown me any inkling that he'll be able to build a team. He'll have to do it for me to believe it. So far with the many areas where he's bombed at as being an owner, I cannot be realistically confident at all. But I will hope, and will root. It'll be interesting.

 

[Mainstreet]

I hoped he wouldn't make rookie mistakes. Maybe he'll learn the right way over time. But for now, what he did is done, and luckily we're not a bad team. But at this point he hasn't shown me any inkling that he'll be able to build a team. He'll have to do it for me to believe it. So far with the many areas where he's bombed at as being an owner, I cannot be realistically confident at all. But I will hope, and will root. It'll be interesting.

To put it simply, Sarver did not value the good GM he had in BC. Yes, BC made mistakes but he also knew how to correct them. Kerr doesn't have a clue.

 

[BC867]

Ever since the Suns inception forty years ago, Jerry Colangelo was an excellent promoter (for the Suns, as well as turning Phoenix into a 4-Major League town, plus downtown development) . . . and an absolutely sub-par basketball General Manager.

Mike D'Antoni didn't invent the Suns as a small-ball, 50-and-fade team. Jerry Colangelo did. D'Antoni merely took that obsession to a new level.

Come to think of it (as Phoenix long-term residents will remember), it was JC and the rest of the Phoenix 40 (with tremendous influence in the Valley) who fought building much needed highway systems in the '70's, arguing, "If we don't build the highways, people won't move here."

So we didn't build highways . . . and people kept moving here. And by the time highways were belatedly built, as soon as sections were opened in the '90's, they were obsolete.

Jerry Colangelo didn't know any more about the growth of a metropolitan area than he did about what it takes to win Championships.

I love Phoenix. But it has flaws . . . and Jerry Colangelo is in the middle of it in more ways than one.

 

[Mainstreet]

Ever since the Suns inception forty years ago, Jerry Colangelo was an excellent promoter (for the Suns, as well as turning Phoenix into a 4-Major League town, plus downtown development) . . . and an absolutely sub-par basketball General Manager.

Mike D'Antoni didn't invent the Suns as a small-ball, 50-and-fade team. Jerry Colangelo did. D'Antoni merely took that obsession to a new level.

Come to think of it (as Phoenix long-term residents will remember), it was JC and the rest of the Phoenix 40 (with tremendous influence in the Valley) who fought building much needed highway systems in the '70's, arguing, "If we don't build the highways, people won't move here."

So we didn't build highways . . . and people kept moving here. And by the time highways were belatedly built, as soon as sections were opened in the '90's, they were obsolete.

Jerry Colangelo didn't know any more about the growth of a metropolitan area than he did about what it takes to win Championships.

I love Phoenix. But it has flaws . . . and Jerry Colangelo is in the middle of it in more ways than one.

Thanks to JC he organized a group to buy the Suns after the drug scandal when attendance was already low and the Suns seemed destined to move out of Arizona. Also he later was able to get AWA built when it was a very difficult task (then and now) to get taxpayers to help build an arena. So Jerry's ability to make moves to keep the Suns in the Valley were monumental and primarily why the Suns are still in Phoenix today. His style of basketball was originally designed to keep a small market team exciting and competitive. As for the Valley highway system, I'll leave that for you to ponder.

 

[nowagimp]

Sarver knew D'Antoni did not have any GM experience but he placed him in that key position to replace an NBA Executive of the Year Award winner, Bryan Colangelo, probably to save a buck and/or hold the position open for Kerr. Now almost the same thing has arisen with the need to replace Mike D'Antoni, an NBA Coach of the Year winner. Certainly Sarver is not looking for a proven winner on the head coaching level so this most certainly will save another buck.

As for Steve Kerr, he really has not shown me anything. He clearly does not know how to negotiate with other GMs to even break even. See KT/James Jones debacle and selling draft picks. I won't even get into the Marion situation. Even on the Shaq trade the Suns saved money.

IMO, it always comes back to Sarver wanting to save a buck when a Championship was within reach.

yup, yup, and yup!

When you hire someone without experience(DA as GM), you ARE responsible for their performance as YOU pulled the trigger in spite of the prevailing evidence to the contrary. Sarver hired DA as GM and now Kerr, in attempts to replace BC, an established outstanding GM. Why do you think he did that? He did it because he wanted more control and less payroll(more control over the payroll). Bankers like to control investments, its the way they are. Some of you guys have to stop excusing sarver for his decisions. No he's not cheap, just BBall stupid. He pays more than he should for some assets and much less than he should for others.

Sarvers group wanted to play with a basketball team, fun stuff. And they got rid of the core basketball experience in the organizatioon(JC, BC). I'll bet he's paying Kerr more than he offered BC by quite a bit, kind of like how he's paying Diaw more than he would have offered JJ 1 year before his RFA, when JJ tried to renegotiate.

The loss of KT, JR and the two picks is square on Kerrs head, and may have been the worst deal of the team since they turned JJ down for 6/50 before he became a RFA. How ironic that if Sarver had kept KT, the suns would have still been playing and the extra home game revenues would have probably paid the lux tax. Then he could have just let the contract expire and probably sign him for less next year if desired.

 

[Treesquid PhD]

Originally Posted by Mainstreet
Sarver knew D'Antoni did not have any GM experience but he placed him in that key position to replace an NBA Executive of the Year Award winner, Bryan Colangelo, probably to save a buck and/or hold the position open for Kerr. Now almost the same thing has arisen with the need to replace Mike D'Antoni, an NBA Coach of the Year winner. Certainly Sarver is not looking for a proven winner on the head coaching level so this most certainly will save another buck.

As for Steve Kerr, he really has not shown me anything. He clearly does not know how to negotiate with other GMs to even break even. See KT/James Jones debacle and selling draft picks. I won't even get into the Marion situation. Even on the Shaq trade the Suns saved money.

IMO, it always comes back to Sarver wanting to save a buck when a Championship was within reach.

This is a good point. The blind faith in Kerr is similar to why guys like Mike Fratello and Doug Collins get so many chances and looks despite being average at best (See latest heat index for proof). These guys are visible, talk smart and are rarely challanged publically. Kerr has a ton of cred because of "his rings," which translates to knowing how to GM I guess, that fact that he is a glorified likeable version of Robert Horry escapes many in the media. I too would like to see him actually make a move that favors the Suns on the court, we are waiting.

 

[Maligzar]

Thanks to JC he organized a group to buy the Suns after the drug scandal when attendance was already low and the Suns seemed destined to move out of Arizona. Also he later was able to get AWA built when it was a very difficult task (then and now) to get taxpayers to help build an arena. So Jerry's ability to make moves to keep the Suns in the Valley were monumental and primarily why the Suns are still in Phoenix today. His style of basketball was originally designed to keep a small market team exciting and competitive. As for the Valley highway system, I'll leave that for you to ponder.

This post does nothing to dispute the point about him being a sub-par basketball manager. It makes Jerry an excellent owner though for sure.