What is the best strategy moving forward?

[NashDishesDimes]

So for the first time in a few years, the Suns did something that will excite the fan base. I think we can all agree that its sad to see just how far this franchise has fallen. Inept management led to a great team breaking apart. poor management failed to keep young players and build for the future. Ultimately, it led to a team that lacked talent and was destined for mediocrity. The franchise i think has finally realized we will have to take another step back to take 2 steps forward. Fortunately, next years draft may be the opportunity to take 10 steps forward with the talent base in that crop, most notably Andrew Wiggins.

The current construction of the roster leaves many questions:

1. Are the Suns a running team?
Hornacek has said he wants to run but with Scola, Gortat, Len, Butler slatted for heavy minutes, how are they going to be able to run?

2. Very excited about Bledsoe, best move this franchise has made in 5-7 years. What will the Suns do with Dragic?
Dragic is a good kid and the type you like to root for. He was loyal enough to the Suns to return after they burned him before. I would love to see him lead this team into the future but its tough to ignore Bledsoes talent. Can they play side-by-side?

3. I think we can all agree the Suns have to be really bad in order to get better. It is darkest just before dawn so to speak. If so, what do we do with Gortat, Scola, and Butler? Those are all good supporting players and will help the Suns win games bur are clearly not part of future plans. What to do with them?


I personally think the franchise is starting to gain flexibility and move in the right direction. The suns have plenty of draft picks, flexible cap space, expiring contracts, a little bit of young talent in Wes Johnson, Dragic, and now Bledsoe who is the only guy with star potential.

In order to move forward, i think the Suns must play the young guys as much as possible, develop them, and hope the games are exciting and promising, but result in losses. Lots and lots of losses. A guy like Andrew Wiggins can turn this franchise around very quickly just like Kevin Durant did for OKC.

The Suns must:
1. Move Gortat to contender where he is valuable for future picks and youth
2. Move Scola to a contender where he is valuable for future picks and youth
3. Move Caron to a contender where he is valuable for future picks and youth.

If Len turns into something and Bledsoe and Dragic can formulate a great backcourt, the Suns could be one big piece in next years draft, and some free agents away from having a good team. Until they get that next big piece via the draft however, the Suns will continue to dissapoint for years.

What do you guys think of next years draft crop? What are the Suns chances at getting that top pick?
I think the Suns are fortunate to be in a deep western conference that should beat up on the Suns all year.

Thoughts on strategy moving forward? Next years draft could be franchise altering.

 

[Covert Rain]

Load the hell up on assets and picks. Seriously, look at what Danny is trying to engineer in Boston. That team appears to be ready to reload.

By the way, anybody that is depending on 2015 being the year just because the Suns clear cap space.....remember what happened the last time the Suns cleared up cap space only to have all the big name players scoff at us. We can't depend on clearing cap space. We have to load up on picks and assets and do it that way. It would be one thing if the Suns were fully loaded and a superstar away. That is the only way we get one IMO.

 

[Michael]

1. Are the Suns a running team?
Hornacek has said he wants to run ...

This makes me happy! In my mind, the Suns stand for attractive, fast-paced basketball. I know that many would like to see them turning into a defensive juggernaut, but since we are not going to win the championship anyway, we might as well play fast.

That way we might even buff up some player stats to make some of our tradable assets appear more valuable.

 

[Gaddabout]

I know Horny will get them back to sound floor spacing in offensive sets and running off of defensive rebounds. Bigs will know how to make that outlet pass at a traditional NBA pace. Anything else is a bit of a mystery to me. No idea if they'll switch on pick-and-roll, etc.

 

[Zobaczcie suki]

I really don't expect much in the way of picks for Scola and Butler, unless you are talking about 2nd rounders

 

[NashDishesDimes]

I really don't expect much in the way of picks for Scola and Butler, unless you are talking about 2nd rounders

I dont know how Caron did last year but in my opinion Scola played well enough to net a 1st rounder from a good team.

 

[SirStefan32]

Butler played well, though he didn't get many touches, and it's starting to be obvious that he is getting old. He is a decent-sized expiring contract, so I can see a team giving a late first round pick for him if they are desperate to shed salary.

I think a good team like OKC could use someone like Scola. Not sure if they'd give up a first rounder for him. I think he's worth it, but I guess we'll find out shortly if other teams think so too.

 

[PhxGametime]

I would've been interested in moving Scola, Marshall, and Lee for Paul Millsap - Utah could use a backup PG/possibly starter if Burke needs time, Scola would give Utah good bench player, etc.

Who knows though, some of these Freshman next year look promising... Gortat, Len, Millsap, Goodwin, Bledsoe, and Dragic could be exciting but I know most everybody wants to rebuild...

 

[Diamondback Jay]

I would've been interested in moving Scola, Marshall, and Lee for Paul Millsap - Utah could use a backup PG/possibly starter if Burke needs time, Scola would give Utah good bench player, etc.

Who knows though, some of these Freshman next year look promising... Gortat, Len, Millsap, Goodwin, Bledsoe, and Dragic could be exciting but I know most everybody wants to rebuild...

I'd be estatic to get Milsap here on a sign-and-trade deal.

Also, Butler offers the asset of being an expiring contract. Someone might be willing to jump on that. Or worst case, the Suns keep him and let it expire next year and have money to play with. Either way, it's a good position to be in.

 

[Errntknght]

I think we are all pretty much in agreement that we want to lose now and win later. Gortat is the biggest hurdle to that since he will be playing for his next contract this year and is fairly good when he plays hard.

IMO, we don't have to get much in return to make it worthwhile to trade him. Hey, if we traded him and Scola to OKC for Kendrick Perkins that should be even, $-wise, for the first year... we'd be stuck for one more year, though. The other players should love that as we'd be sending 20 FGA per game and getting back 4!

If we made that deal we could easily live with Butler, who scores and rebounds at about the same level as Dudley and contributes less in other ways. It would nice to shed his salary but I doubt anyone would take him off our hands unless we paid half his salary for them or took a bad contract in exchange.

I'm glad we got Bledsoe because it will exciting to see him play but he doesn't have much resemblance to a star PG. He's not a volume scorer and doesn't get many assists and still only has Asst/TO ratio of 1.7. He doesn't even get to the FT line as much as you'd expect - only 2/3 as often as Dragic, for example (comparison is per 40). He did shoot 3's well last year (.397) but he only took 2 shots/40. Where he's fun to watch is on defense and that's how he made his mark. He might learn to run an offense someday, but he clearly has a great distance to go. Until then he's a nice guy to bring off the bench to disrupt the opponents offense or he might pair well with Dragic, the latter being the principal playmaker.

McD and Hornacek know all this so I can't imagine they brought him here to supplant Goran. I don't think its outside the realm of possibility that their primary aim was to put on a more exciting show for the fans - especially important when we are not winning many games. It would also suggest to the league that we are not intentionally tanking... a smart thing to do if that is your plan.

 

[Mainstreet]

I think we are all pretty much in agreement that we want to lose now and win later. Gortat is the biggest hurdle to that since he will be playing for his next contract this year and is fairly good when he plays hard.

IMO, we don't have to get much in return to make it worthwhile to trade him. Hey, if we traded him and Scola to OKC for Kendrick Perkins that should be even, $-wise, for the first year... we'd be stuck for one more year, though. The other players should love that as we'd be sending 20 FGA per game and getting back 4!

Maybe I'm missing something other than you would like the Suns to be bad. Gortat and Scola have trade value, maybe not as much as we might like, but why throw them away for Perkins' bad contract with two years remaining.

 

[JCSunsfan]

Maybe I'm missing something other than you would like the Suns to be bad. Gortat and Scola have trade value, maybe not as much as we might like, but why throw them away for Perkins' bad contract with two years remaining.

Id rather just let Gortat expire.

 

[Errntknght]

Maybe I'm missing something other than you would like the Suns to be bad. Gortat and Scola have trade value, maybe not as much as we might like, but why throw them away for Perkins' bad contract with two years remaining.

No, you're not missing anything... I simply want us to be bad. The only way to do it and still play the guys that have earned playing time - which Hornacek said he was going to do - is to have an unbalanced team. My thought is to reduce frontcourt offense since we don't want the guys that provide it long term anyway. If we could get a pick or two out of it all the better but the main thing is to stink it up good.

 

[Mainstreet]

No, you're not missing anything... I simply want us to be bad. The only way to do it and still play the guys that have earned playing time - which Hornacek said he was going to do - is to have an unbalanced team. My thought is to reduce frontcourt offense since we don't want the guys that provide it long term anyway. If we could get a pick or two out of it all the better but the main thing is to stink it up good.

Please stay away from Ryan McDonough.

 

[Suns in rebuild mode]

Load the hell up on assets and picks. Seriously, look at what Danny is trying to engineer in Boston. That team appears to be ready to reload.

By the way, anybody that is depending on 2015 being the year just because the Suns clear cap space.....remember what happened the last time the Suns cleared up cap space only to have all the big name players scoff at us. We can't depend on clearing cap space. We have to load up on picks and assets and do it that way. It would be one thing if the Suns were fully loaded and a superstar away. That is the only way we get one IMO.

We actually could have a huge amount of cap space if MCD moved Dragic and Frye and did the 5 year spread thing on Beasley "next off season" or maybe even a buy out say were going to cut you and you'll only get 3 mil if you let us buy you out we'll give you 4 mil and avoid the cap hit.

I actually think we could attract free agents if we got one of the top 3 picks next year and Bledsoe shows he a star in the making not to mention Len with his potential and Size as well heck Lamarcus Aldridge is asking for a trade manly because he doesn't want to keep having to play center. Sometimes you just got to get lucky like Houston did last year with Harden looking back at that trade OKC really got nothing in return worth having at the moment and gave up a superstar maybe even a top 5 player.

I think Bledsoe has the skill set and athleticism to be a top 5 PG in this league the question is how good is he really? Let's hope we got a Harden type deal he never got the opportunity to really show case his skills stuck behind Durant and WestBrook even think he went back there last year and hung like 50 on them bet they were having 2nd though on that trade didn't think he liked being stuck on the bench even though that's a valuable role. Like i said sometimes you got to get Lucky hopefully we get Lucky with Bledsoe and made a good choice with Len and heck why I'm at it let hopefully get lucky and get Wiggins.

 

[Suns in rebuild mode]

I think we are all pretty much in agreement that we want to lose now and win later. Gortat is the biggest hurdle to that since he will be playing for his next contract this year and is fairly good when he plays hard.

IMO, we don't have to get much in return to make it worthwhile to trade him. Hey, if we traded him and Scola to OKC for Kendrick Perkins that should be even, $-wise, for the first year... we'd be stuck for one more year, though. The other players should love that as we'd be sending 20 FGA per game and getting back 4!

If we made that deal we could easily live with Butler, who scores and rebounds at about the same level as Dudley and contributes less in other ways. It would nice to shed his salary but I doubt anyone would take him off our hands unless we paid half his salary for them or took a bad contract in exchange.

I'm glad we got Bledsoe because it will exciting to see him play but he doesn't have much resemblance to a star PG. He's not a volume scorer and doesn't get many assists and still only has Asst/TO ratio of 1.7. He doesn't even get to the FT line as much as you'd expect - only 2/3 as often as Dragic, for example (comparison is per 40). He did shoot 3's well last year (.397) but he only took 2 shots/40. Where he's fun to watch is on defense and that's how he made his mark. He might learn to run an offense someday, but he clearly has a great distance to go. Until then he's a nice guy to bring off the bench to disrupt the opponents offense or he might pair well with Dragic, the latter being the principal playmaker.

McD and Hornacek know all this so I can't imagine they brought him here to supplant Goran. I don't think its outside the realm of possibility that their primary aim was to put on a more exciting show for the fans - especially important when we are not winning many games. It would also suggest to the league that we are not intentionally tanking... a smart thing to do if that is your plan.

Can't really know what Bledsoe's capable of remember he played Behind CP3,Chauncey Billups,Jamal Crawford then throw in Blake Griffin and you can even throw Caron Butler and there all are ball dominant or scorer's Bledose to be good is going to have to have the ball in his hands and he didn't get to do that much with the Clippers.

Who do we really have to take shots from Bledsoe? Dragic maybe? Other than him nobody else. Even before Paul and Billups and Crawford got there he still had Baron Davis and Eric Gordon in front of him. He's really never got a chance to either play big minutes 30+ or start.

This same kind of thing happened to Jermaine O'Neil he was stuck on Portland's bench in tell he went to Indiana and became an All-Star. C

Can't wait to see how good Bledsoe really is wish preseason started tomorrow. Who knows he might be overrated or underrated but at least we got something to look forward to seeing this season.

 

[95pro]

Can't compare Bledsoes backup role and minutes to Dragic starting and his minutes.

 

[Errntknght]

Bledsoe has started 38 games since he became a Clipper - in those games his playing time rose but his percentages and rates remained the same. The things you expect to scale with playing time did that, quite precisely. IOW, you do not get a different statistical picture of him in those games.

I admit he may breakout once he's no longer in Paul's shadow - it happens. But he was not deep in Paul's shadow - he was the leader of the second unit which got raves for the way they blitzed the other teams corresponding unit. He was the leader because he harassed the devil out of them on defense.

 

[mojorizen7]

Run-on sentence

def:A run-on is a sentence is one in which two or more independent clauses (i.e., complete sentences) are joined without appropriate punctuation or conjunction.

ex:My car is out of gas we cannot reach town before dark.

Reading paragraphs containing multiple run on sentences gets confusing,and may give the reader a feeling of unintelligence.

ie; hard to read.

 

[Mainstreet]

Run-on sentence

def:A run-on is a sentence is one in which two or more independent clauses (i.e., complete sentences) are joined without appropriate punctuation or conjunction.

ex:My car is out of gas we cannot reach town before dark.

Reading paragraphs containing multiple run on sentences gets confusing,and may give the reader a feeling of unintelligence.

ie; hard to read.

I just get dizzy, then lost and abandon reading the material.

I don't ask for great English, just a pause at the appropriate time when a thought is completed.

 

[Chaplin]

If we can't get young talent with SOME upside and a draft pick for Gortat, then his expiring deal has value for us on its own. If McD is valuing the free agent market next summer over the trade market this year, then letting him expire is the best option.

 

[Gaddabout]

Spoken to a couple people inside the Suns. Word on Horny's philosophy:

- Expect the pace to be upper half of NBA, but not insane. This part Horny, part McD. Emphasis will be on running on defensive rebounds, but not off of buckets.

- Spacing in half-court will be emphasized + ball movement. Horny doesn't want big guys thinking a lot, so don't expect a lot of pick-and-roll. He doesn't like that combo with the current personnel right now, anyway.

- Biggest concern Horny expressed besides shooting was defensive rebounding. There may or may not be a concerted effort from the wing players to improve there.

 

[SirStefan32]

If we can't get young talent with SOME upside and a draft pick for Gortat, then his expiring deal has value for us on its own. If McD is valuing the free agent market next summer over the trade market this year, then letting him expire is the best option.

If the Suns plays their cards right, they could have a lot of money available next summer. Brown, Gortat and Butler will be off the books, Beasley can be bought out, Morris brothers and Marshall have team options. Haddadi and Lee will be gone as well. That around $32M if my Beasley calculation is correct. He can be bought out, but that amount will still count against the cap- so around $3.5M. If Frye retires, that's another $7M or so. That's a lot of money to spend.

 

[JCSunsfan]

If the Suns plays their cards right, they could have a lot of money available next summer. Brown, Gortat and Butler will be off the books, Beasley can be bought out, Morris brothers and Marshall have team options. Haddadi and Lee will be gone as well. That around $32M if my Beasley calculation is correct. He can be bought out, but that amount will still count against the cap- so around $3.5M. If Frye retires, that's another $7M or so. That's a lot of money to spend.

Let's see, we'll have

1. Bledsoe 3.7
2. Dragic 7.5
3. Len 3.5
Total for the players who will definitely be on the roster: 14.7

Then there are the question marks,

4. Frye 6.8 (may be gone bc of health, but don't count on it)
5. Beasley 6.2 (can be bought out I think, but don't know for sure)
6. Scola 4.5 (could be traded, but will likely get salary back)
7 and 8 Morris and Morris each at 3.1 (weird) (team option)
9. Marshall 2 (team option)
10. Draft pick #1 (roughly 3.7 cap hold)
11. Draft pick #2 from Minny (roughly 2.6 cap hold)

Minimum total for question marks: 6.3
Probable total if we go after big free agents: 17.6 (includes Frye, Scola, and the rookies)

Total salary: 32.3.

I would assume that will leave about 28 million for free agents. But if we find a way to trade Scola for an expiring, avoid trading Gortat for more salary, and eliminate Frye, we could add another 11 million.

That's enough to sign 2 max free agents plus more. The problem is that there will be a boatload of teams with money burning a hole in their pockets.

 

[Matt L]

Do we get the Laker's first round pick next year?