SUNS - MAVS aka The Season GAME THREAD!!!!

[mojorizen7]

Okay, so we can't run as well as we used to, and we don't have as many good defenders as we used to. But that's due to the moves that the organization made and not anything that Nash has done differently. If you have bad defensive players on your team, but you rely on those players to run your offense or to score the ball, then you need to devise a defensive scheme and/or add defensive players that enable you to hide the defensive limitations of your bad defenders.

Agree.
Championship teams hide bad offensive players,not bad defenders.
Blow this crap up...starting with Nash.

 

[cly2tw]

He had too basically, he bend over to Nash because Nash was unable to play efficiently at a slower pace under Porter. Trading Bell and Diaw for Richardson was a move to get our offense rolling again which it wasn't.

Also Diaw was overpaid for what he did and except for a few games every once in a while he is still the same in Charlotte while Bell is declining fast.

If Kerr wanted to improve the defense it had to start with trading Nash because Nash was a killer under Porter. He was bitching and he was a turnover machine despite fewer posessions plus the fact that he is an easy target to attack for any team offensively.

This season is just a waste, 50 games of Terry Porter trying to play slow and some defense with a team full of offensive players and a PG who can only play the opposite and then 30 games without our best player and another 10 with our best bench player on top of that.

If Kerr still wants to build a contender he has to start from scratch and rehaul the entire roster because we will never adapt a successful style as long as Nash forces a run and gun no defense style on our team.

Oh and I doubt D'Antoni is laughing, he is coaching the 2nd worst team in the East and that's only because it is very hard to be worse than Washington.

Agree on all accounts.

We could have been in the game, had we trusted the bench more. With Nash being embarassed so long out there by Kidd, Mavs got confident with shooting and there was no way we could beat a confident Mavs team.
In all of our good wins after Amare injury, aside from maybe the Jazz win, we lost every single game when Gentry didn't trust the bench and played Nash too long. The fact he didn't learn makes me think he might not be a good coach to adapt to ingame situations. Even Nash insertion had brought us back by half time, he'd be spent by the 4th and we'd have lost a close game just like in that 6 game losing streak against good teams!

 

[Andrew]

did the sound go out for anyone else?

 

[Bert]

Lead is down to 29 with 5mins left! LETS GO SUNS!!!!


lol, was a lil joke.

 

[Sunburn]

Maybe the best value is cap space with the guys. We would have one mediocre year with the old guys or a bad year with new players.
In the offseason, we could just be stuck with no draft picks and our new players or we could try to go after some free agents with the cap space freed up due to the ending contracts of O'Neil and co.
Not sure if we could become attractive to FAs in one year, but we'd still have Leandro and Amar'e as a core.

You have a point. I would say trade now for youth and draft picks, but I can also see how this could backfire. Say we did this and were horrible next year but we don't have our draft pick. We then gel a little bit and are not as horrible the following year, but end up not getting as good a draft pick cuz we're not as bad. This whole situation sucks all around. Thank you management. Thank you so f'ing much. I'm amazed at how they've taken a model franchise and decimated it. You've broken my baby.

 

[Covert Rain]

It's time. Sorry but this team is not going to get it done with Nash at the helm, past their prime vets and a PF who talks like a Super Star but doesn't play like one on both ends.

The very foundation of this team is weak. It's time to trade Nash, Amare, Shaq, stock up on young talent and work your way up. It's time. At along as this team continues to retool, retool, retool, your never going to have the defensive foundation that wins you a title.

 

[Michael]

You have a point. I would say trade now for youth and draft picks, but I can also see how this could backfire. Say we did this and were horrible next year but we don't have our draft pick. We then gel a little bit and are not as horrible the following year, but end up not getting as good a draft pick cuz we're not as bad. This whole situation sucks all around. Thank you management. Thank you so f'ing much. I'm amazed at how they've taken a model franchise and decimated it. You've broken my baby.

Do you remember guys like Danny Manning signing for the veteran minimum just so he could join the Suns?

*sigh*

 

[slinslin]

Free Agents in 2010 won't help us, rarely do big time players change teams through free agency. We will only end up overpaying for players who may be good enough to make us a good team but not good enough to contend.

Good drafting is the key to success..

San Antonio - Duncan, Parker, Ginobili
LA Lakers - Kobe, Bynum
Boston - Paul Pierce and traded Al Jefferson for KG and a #5 pick for Ray Allen, Rondo, Perkins..
Orlando - Dwight Howard, Jameer Nelson
Cleveland - Lebron
Miami - Wade
Portland - Roy, Aldridge, Outlaw, Fernandez, Batum etc

Phoenix? Could have been Amare, Barbosa, Iguodala, Joe Johnson etc

We wouldn't have had the 60 win seasons Nash gave us right away after one bad season, but long term we would have been way better off.
We would have been much younger, could have kept our picks, built a team slowly and play a healthier system which would have developed our young players to be better all-around players.

Kind of like what Portland did... only we had the much better core of players to do it.. as we already had Amare , Barbosa and Johnson in place plus a #7 pick to add to it. A team young enough to add even more young firepower through the draft in the following years and devellop it into a great team.

Instead the Suns like always tried for quick fixes and of course it ultimately failed again. Yes you can say we were unlucky those years with injuries in the playoffs and stuff but that isn't worth anything in the end.

I can't believe we wasted the great picks we made with Amare and Barbosa and trading for JJ just to be in this mess now which should have been just before their prime.

 

[Covert Rain]

Do you remember guys like Danny Manning signing for the veteran minimum just so he could join the Suns?

*sigh*

Yep and it's in the past. Look how many Vets passed on signing with the Suns the last few seasons only to sign with other teams for less or the same amount of money.

 

[boisesuns]

suns suck

 

[cly2tw]

Please check a few pages back, I did say that in hindsight keeping Porter would have been better even if Nash would have continued to bitch about Porters' style behind closed doors and struggled on the court.

That being said, I think Porter is a horrible coach anyway and we needed to get someone better sometime. But going back to Gentry and our old style with all of its flaws and STILL coming up short just goes against everything Kerr wanted to accomplish. That is why I find it absolutely ridiculous how Kerr can come out and talk about how Gentry is doing a great job etc.
On the other hand it is not like he has a choice right now since he was still hoping we could make the playoffs.

This offseason will determine Kerr's fate.

Both Porter and Gentry are bad coaches. For the former's idea to work, he gotta sit Nash longer to make some points of insisiting on defense, which he didn't have the guts to do. Larry Brown would have done that to Iverson. And Gentry is slow as evidenced by sticking to Nash on Kidd who backed him down for 4-5 consequentive trips withou reaction, and despite great bench play brought back Nash too early to make it sure the Mavs got back to their confident offense Nash's defense earlier created.

 

[Covert Rain]

Steve Nash is the #1 liability on this team defense wise in the starting lineup. He not only gives up lots of easy points, turns the ball over but gets our bigs in foul trouble constantly by guys beating him off the dribble and others coming to help.

I am sorry. You just can't build around that.

 

[Andrew]

Wow, I can't even put into words my disappointment.

Truly sad, and I hope that this team does something to move into the right direction next season, a team this full of talent shouldn't be out of the playoffs.

Under achieving and lack of heart is what did them in.

Here is to hoping next season is somewhat more enjoyable.



On a side note, how sad is it I am going to rewatch this game online because the ABC channel here SUCKS and was crappy throughout the game?

 

[Sunburn]

Sarver, Kerr. You broke my baby. Took a model franchise and decimated it. Almost on the order of New York Knicks dysfunction. What a fall from grace.

 

[slinslin]

To be fair Bryan Colangelo and Mike D'Antoni played a big role in this as well, in fact in my opinion they are the root of the problem. They decided on the path to take when we had Amare, Barbosa, JJ, a #7 pick and 12M$ capspace.
Traded away the #7 pick to sign QRich, who had to be traded away with picks just one season later for Kurt Thomas who had to be traded away with even more picks later.

 

[cly2tw]

Okay, so we can't run as well as we used to, and we don't have as many good defenders as we used to. But that's due to the moves that the organization made and not anything that Nash has done differently. If you have bad defensive players on your team, but you rely on those players to run your offense or to score the ball, then you need to devise a defensive scheme and/or add defensive players that enable you to hide the defensive limitations of your bad defenders.

That's why both Porter and Gentry are bad coaches. Sometimes, less (Nash) is more (chance to win). With his age and def. burden imposed on teammates, it's time to play Nash less min. and fit his court time to do the optimization of off. gain vs. def. cost. We can't play (Nash) indiscriminatorily like DA used to, and must worry about matchups and other fine strategic aspects DA's trackmeet SSOL didn'd need to. Yet, Gentry seems unable to come up with something innovative along this line. We are easy to prepare for when playing Nash this way, to expose our def. weakness and profit from the implications.

 

[joshstmarie]

i dont even know how some of you cry babies call yourself fans.

 

[cly2tw]

To be fair Bryan Colangelo and Mike D'Antoni played a big role in this as well, in fact in my opinion they are the root of the problem. They decided on the path to take when we had Amare, Barbosa, JJ, a #7 pick and 12M$ capspace.
Traded away the #7 pick to sign QRich, who had to be traded away with picks just one season later for Kurt Thomas who had to be traded away with even more picks later.

I believe we had around 14 mil cap. We started Nash at 8+ and Q at 6+. But I wouldn't blame that decision, as we should not judge a risky decision by its realization alone after the uncertainty gets resolved. Trading the pick was the bad decision though. The cap hold of #7 could be created somehow by trading away other pieces. And there was no reason to trade it before we had a chance to see whether Igy was there at 7, who everyone believed we would have taken despite the cap issue.

 

[Bufalay]

i dont even know how some of you cry babies call yourself fans.

Didn't your profile say "F-Quan" right before the Super Bowl?

 

[Lorenzo]

It's tough to see nash go through this season. Part of me wishes that nash stayed in dallas. I kind of wonder what would have happened if he stayed in dallas under johnson. I know johnson improved the mavericks at the defensive end. Nash has led the league in offense for so long now....but teams have lit his teams up at the other end as well. He's always been one of my favorite players and I hope he can get back to the level that he was at two years ago. Now cuban letting nash walk was ok with me at first because I thought the mavs improved and they got a young PG in harris and a good guard in terry. but trading harris away IMHO was the dumbest move cuban has ever made aside from paying mike finley like he was dirk.....if he was going to trade harris anyway for kidd... he should have just matched the suns offer to keep nash.

 

[slinslin]

It was a bad decision afterall...

Imagine we would have just kept #7 and kept our capspace to resign Joe Johnson.

We would have had Barbosa, Iguodala, Johnson, Amare + X and Marion to trade away.

We likely would have had another lottery pick the next year which could have been Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Marvin Williams, Andrew Bogut, Andrew Bynum, Raymond Felton, Charlie Villanueva or whoever.
Just imagine Chris Paul or Deron Williams, Andre Iguodala, Joe Johnson, Amare Stoudemire, + X, 6th man Barbosa! And trade Marion for a starting center even if it was just Dampier.

We would have never had the problems with the luxury tax to force us into bad trades.

And for every year we continued to suck, which is unlikely since we had a tremendous core even without Nash at that time, we would have had another good draft pick to add to our team, basically what Portland did. We would still have a bright future now as nobody on our team would be older than 28.

Going for Nash and signing QRich while trading #7 was a typical Colangelo and D'Antoni move, going for the fastest chance at success, Colangelo has always done this instead of going through a healthy 2-3 seasons to rebuild a new team.

Are two MVP seasons by Nash and a lot of "what if" scenarios worth what we missed out on? Imo clearly not, we are waiting for a championship, not MVP trophies.

 

[Andrew]

On a lighter note, KTAR just said I called in and I am talking now and I am not lol...

 

[Andrew]

Either someone here was making fun of me on the radio or....I have a twin

 

[Andrew]

This is just painful

 

[Bufalay]

Either someone here was making fun of me on the radio or....I have a twin

Or you're not the only person on earth named Andrew