Does anyone else get the feeling the NBA is starting to figure out the Suns? Amare went scoreless in the 4th quarter last night against Golden State! During the regular season when you see teams one game at a time, their style was shock therapy to everyone and was hard to adjust to. Now that most of the West has played them once or twice, it's not such a shock any more. In addition, the Spurs, Rox, Warriors and others have shown the way to beat Phoenix and they've had problems scoring in crunch time in the 4th quarter. Another problem: I've felt for a couple of years that Steve Nash never plays his best ball in the playoffs because he gets nicked up too much and this year is no different (plus he is not getting any younger). In fact, I think the Suns are wearing down as a team because of all the hard minutes their top 6 played before the trade deadline. Jim Jackson and Walter McCarty have helped, but it looks as if the Suns peaked about 30 games ago. From here on, they will continue to overwhelm some teams with their style and shooting, so don't expect them to fall off the map. But the good teams aren't scared of them anymore. If they play the Rox or Memphis in the first round of the playoffs, I look for a great series. To me, D'Antoni is an unproven coach. Things have gone too well so far. He will prove himself if he can make adjustments now that they are facing adversity. The other MAJOR issue they must address is their sorry defense. Teams that don't get rattled by their prolific scoring and fast pace can beat the Suns by simply scoring nearly every time down the floor. Just look at their last 2 home games. It's far too late to put a defensive mindset on the team so this will continue to be a weakness for them. For that matter, I don't think D'Antoni has much of a clue on coaching effective defensive basketball. Maybe he needs to hire the right assistant next year. Despite the great record, I can't see them winning 3 best of 7 series to reach the NBA finals. Unless injuries slow the Spurs, S.A. will cruise ahead of Phoenix for best record in the W.C. I'm a Rox fan, but since the Alvin Adams days, I've liked the Suns and their racehorse type of play. If you tallied the number of 50 win seasons and blowout wins over the last 30 or so years, I bet Phoenix has more than any other team. Problem is, they always get "out-defensed" in the playoffs or their shooting goes cold. This year will be no different.
I reserve judgement on them right now. In my opinion they have the most individually talented starting 5 in the league so they are still dangerous. The Rockets make an intriguing match-up with them. They have no answer for Yao and Tmac (no really has an answer for him) and we have a lot of difficult with their athleticsm in spots 2-4 (considering Amare a 4). Suns still one of 5 teams (SA, Det, Mia, Phx, us) that if it all falls in place could win it--but yeah it would be unlikely. SA, Det and Mia seperating as clear favs for going all the way.
There's nothing "new" in the NBA. Doug Moe tried to run-and-gun in the 80s. The Mavs have been trying it for years. The Kings before them. I really like the fast paced game, but it's been proven time and time again not to carry over to the postseason. Of the top 5 seeds in the West, the Suns, Sonics, Mavs, and Kings are automatically written off on that basis. Only the Rockets, imo, can present any sort of challenge to the Spurs.
I don't know if the league is "figuring them out"... but I do know that D'antoni has refused to (or is incapable of) make adjustments to the way they play on both ends of the court. They've essentially run the same half-court offense since pre-season, and the same style of defense. If you just play as hard as they do, you have a shot to keep it close... and if Phoenix tires out, or just stops hustling (which has happened on a few occasions this year), you'll have no problem winning. D'antoni did a great job of getting these guys to commit to the runnning game.... but he has done nothing to inspire them to play great defense, or to pick up the intensity at crunch time. He reminds me a lot of Mike Martz... all flash, big numbers, but severe holes in his coaching style that can be exploited.
Good point! Not to mention Sac and 2 Suns teams came within a bad bounce of winning titles over the last 10-12 years. Your offense canbe better than your defense, but the truth is almost always the winner plays defense and has some offensive mistaches they exploit. I am not yet convinced the Suns can't play good defense. They would seem to have most the ingredients except that required for slowing an offensive force center-- of which only two are in the whole league. I am not confident they will be able to turn it up in the playoffs, but it would not competely suprise me with the atheleticsim in the 2-4 spots
I really don't see much difference between this year's Suns and last year's Mavs. Maybe Amare is better finisher around the basket than Dirk. But they both play fast temple, have good shooters, and don't play much defense. Teams like that will have a chance at the title, but compares to teams that acutally can execute in the half court and play good defense, their chance are much slimmer. One thing people have to realize about the Showtime Lakers is that they acutally have a good half court offense. Jabbar can score against anybody in the post. Phoenix doesn't have that kind of low post presents.
The Kings runs the best princeton offense in the world. Their play book is about 10 times thicker than the Suns'. The Suns gets most of their points on the fastbreaks or before their opponents' defense gets set. Once their opponents force them to a half court offense, there are really only 2 plays they run: 1) Nash penetrates, force a double team, and kicks out to their 3 point shooters. 2) Nash pick and roll with Amare, Amare slip off the screen, get the ball back, go for a dunk. In the 4th quater of the Houston game we can see that we did a great job on transition defense, and their 3 pointers weren't falling, plus Yao did a great job on back off the screen and stay with Amare, and result is that Suns were destroyed by the Rockets.
Oh, you hit a hot subject for me. Unfortunately, I don't have time to expound. I will say this: It's funny how the Suns have metamorphisized into the same team they were 10 years ago. And we are damn close to the same thing too, and we always beat them. J
Nash is operating at 70% right now. They could not push the tempo as much as they used to be any more. Given the style they played this season and the history of Steve Nash's injure problem. no one should be surprised at all.
The Mavs were a healthy Dirk two years ago could've propelled them to the finals(and most likely won the whole thing). Also, Sacramento would've won the whole thing 3(?) years ago if the refs hadn't been blatantly against them in the Lakers series. Personally, I don't think running teams aret bad for the playoffs. A lot of times, they just run into BETTER teams. It's not like any half-court team can beat the Lakers/Spurs championship teams. It really doesn't come down to style, IMO. It comes down to how good a team you are.
I agree about the Mavs two years ago with a healthy Dirk, but they were much better in their half-court offense than this years Suns. That is the big difference. You also can't compare this years Suns to the Barkley/KJ Suns either for the same reason. Sir Charles was Mr. half-court offense personified. Also, he was not nearly as dependent on KJ as Amare is on Nash. Even the Kings could operate half-court pretty well before C-Webb got hurt. Running and fast breaking hasn't prevented anyone from winning the championship, just the LACK OF reliable half court sets that consistently work. In the playoffs, the Suns will be in the half-court a lot more than they are now and this is why they will fail. Whichever way you want to say it, the league is figuring the Suns out. Go ahead and blame it on D'Antoni's lack of adjustments. I agree it lies with D'Antoni. He may turn out to be a great coach, but he isn't there yet.
Wow, they asked Amare on NBA TV who the biggest star in the league was. His response: "Myself, LeBron, Carmelo, Dawyne Wade".
As if it wasnt bad enough that he picked himself, he actually added Carmelo to the group. He totally lost credibility right there.
Amare's attitude after getting stuffed 5 times by Yao also left something to be desired. After his 7 point 2-10 2nd half performance in last Friday's game, he said "I've just got to keep going at [Yao] and going through him". I'll cut him some slack because he's so young. However you could argue if he's already this stubborn, he may get worse. If he improves his mid-range jumper another notch and becomes a better passer, the guy will win multiple MVPs. His ferocity puts him on a different level from other players and he will gain strength in the coming years as he puts on weight. What a scary thought! Amare reminds me of a young Moses Malone except he can shoot better. Malone didn't even try to add the jumper until much later in his career.
to be honest, I honestly think Phoenix has been pretty damn lucky with their perimeter shooting this season. and like many others have stated, they don't have any kind of set half court game at all. this is the difference between them and the Kings team that almost won it all. The kings could run that uptempo style or, if need be, go into a set play and still execute soundly. Phoenix has been improv-ing most of the year. I'm not saying they're not good (looking at their record can tell you that much) but i think in the playoffs, it's more about mind over matter. You get into crucial periods in a game that needs a set offense. And those crucial periods can be .3 second or even a whole quarter. With a half court offense or even just a planned one, at least you know you have a 'plan b'. With the helter skelter offense they run, either they can run you out of the building or they can lose 127-107
But the Mavs didn't. I'd wouldn't belittle Sacramento by comparing the Suns to them. SacTown was robbed by the NBA refs in Games 6 that year.
I get your sarcasm but it lacks bite. That team you mentioned also had about the best half court and low post game in the NBA then (see Kareem). That is the point Sammy was trying to make. All run and no realiable half court game makes Suns a vanilla team (see plastic).
If you run and you play good D, it won't hurt you a bit. But play fast temple ball and not play D is a dangerous combination, because with that many possessions, no matter how much you scores, your opponent always have a chance to get back in (see the Rockets game).
