It took too long, definitely, but too late, I disagree. It's never too late to stop making stupid decisions. We didn't give up Dunn and picks to bring in Butler, that shows remarkable restraint given our current situation so I'm hoping it means better things in the future for us. Better things such as, trading our way out of this hole rather than trying to bandaid this mess into something it can never be.
As I view it, the Suns had three basic options approaching the trade deadline.
1. Make a trade to improve the team, preferably at the 4/5 position, so they could at least pretend to be a serious playoff team.
2. Start trading off assets to prepare for a rebuild, partial or full, to prepare for the future.
3. Do nothing. Actually, I think the Suns did worse by dumping Nurkic' salary… not even bothering to replace the vacancy in the front court.
I could have respected the first two options, but I never suspected the Suns would choose the third position.
Throwing in the towel without addressing the problem is unacceptable.
Replacing James Jones as the Suns GM might be the only mitigating factor. I no longer trust his judgment in making player personnel decisions.