What is this team you speak of? Are they a dominating high octane offensive powerhouse or a second rate three-point dependent team trying to make the playoffs. I think the answer is somewhere in between. From valleyofthesuns.com; “The Suns’ Dr. Jekyll is a dominant, high-energy team that looks untouchable when it puts away the NBA’s best in teams like the Lakers, Celtics, Spurs and Magic. But just when everyone is ready to finally make the jump and call the Suns an “elite” team, their Mr. Hyde side shows up and the lethargic, poor-shooting Suns lose to teams like the Knicks, Grizzlies, Hornets and Warriors.” The article goes on to mention rebounding and three-point shooting as potential reasons the Suns have struggled t various times. I personaly think the three point shooting is the main factor. We live by it. When we are shooting good from behind the line all of our flaws go unnoticed.
The Suns bench has been amazing this year. Our starters are going to have fresh legs compared to other teams once the playoffs start. This 10 man rotation has a lot of beneifts and some drawbacks. The main drawback is finding minutes for everyone. That could mean some players will have situational roles and only play against certain lineups. From azcentral.com; “I’m not sure if we can play 10 men and have everyone be content with those minutes,” Suns coach Alvin Gentry said. Center Robin Lopez has been in the rotation the past three games because of the front-line size of the past three opponents, with traditional centers. Gentry is happy about keeping the wear down on his starters, none of whom rank in the NBA’s top 50 for minutes played per game. However, there is a balance that likely will turn Lopez into a situational rotation player.” That makes sense. The Suns style of basketball isn’t dependent on a big man, but it is nice to know you have Lopez around when you face a “big” team.
Roster moves? What? I can’t see a realistic deal out there that would make us any better. What ever move we make it has to taken with an eye toward not disrupting our style of basketball. From brightsideofthesun.com; “But the conclusion Steve seems to be coming to is that this team is who we thought they were before the season started. Not nearly as talented as we might hope for and needing to bring it every night to get the win. Fortunately, that’s no different than the rest of the tier 2 teams out there. I agree with Nash. Big picture-wise the Suns are still OK and certainly making any kind of panic trade would have the greater potential for being disruptive than constructive. Time to settle in and enjoy the roller coaster ride that is this Suns season. Sometimes you will be riding high and sometimes your stomach will be in your throat and you will be puking your lunch on some poor fool sitting next to you. That’s sports. Very few teams roll through a season with only minor bumps in the road. Most struggle. Some struggle more than they win. The Suns are better than most and worse than many. We knew that going into this season and nothing’s changed.” We are who we thought we are. And I am happy with that.
