PHOENIX — The dueling forces for what direction the Phoenix Suns should go in the future are actively playing a role in their current season.
Phoenix is 26-26, certifiably mid, as the kids say. Ever since starting the year 9-2, it has become clearer by the day that the Suns are not even an eagle’s eyesight within fulfilling their potential. It has inspired constant conversations about how they need to move forward.
It’s not just what they do with the roster in the offseason, though. It’s what they do with it for the remaining 30 games this year on the court.
Rotation choices are often a tiring and inconsequential subplot that annoyingly make up the majority of criticism from fans, but to stop being the old man telling you to get off my lawn, the protests this season have more meaning than they did previously.
Phoenix has to get bigger and more athletic. Look at the Suns’ direct competition at the top of the Western Conference for how they have to catch up in this department. You can also watch even the worst teams in the league like Charlotte, Toronto, Utah and Washington, where you’ll see those types of players too.
The Suns have added two recently in rookie wing Ryan Dunn and center Nick Richards. But because the two lack experience and are prone to the small mental mistakes that come with that, they are getting passed over for knowledgeable veterans by a coach trying to maximize every bit he can so his team is playing in the postseason.
Dunn and Richards, however, will only learn with, well, experience. Richards is older at 27 in his fifth NBA season but lacks reps in winning situations where execution triumphs everything, while Dunn’s ultra valuable to a Suns as a first-round pick for a franchise lacking homegrown talent.
The blueprint for how the Suns have to start winning games in this stretch run was a defiant win over the Warriors in which the energy from that pair to begin the second half swung the game.
To start with Richards, in the five non-blowouts he’s played in since starting, he’s only closed one of them. In those five games, he’s played a combined 14:05 in the fourth quarter. And over the last eight total contests, he’s at 22.3 minutes per game while backup Mason Plumlee is close behind at 19.7.
For long-time pod listeners, they will be well versed in “The Abdul Nader Rule,” a reference point for whenever you can’t exactly tell why a player is getting run, like Nader did under Monty Williams. That is because, like Nader, they are doing exactly what the coaching staff wants. Or, more accurately, needs.
Plumlee, a 12-year veteran, has 1,050 career minutes in the postseason alone. While he can’t move like Richards and lacks Richards’ explosion around the basket, Plumlee knows where to be. Richards is still figuring that out.
Head coach Mike Budenholzer was asked after practice on Monday some areas of improvement for Richards in order for him to close games more frequently.
“Part of it is I think just familiarly and knowing everything,” he said. “You have to have more reps, you have to have more time, you have to have more time of hearing what we’re calling, running a side out of bounds, and underneath out of bounds, a defensive coverage, an adjustment to a defensive coverage. You can’t make up for a training camp and makeup for all that time just instantaneously.
“So I think he’s just gotta continue to get as many reps as he can, take it all in, process it and be ready to do it to close a game. I think there is decision-making, passing, when to go get a basket, things like that where he’s gotta continue to grow. Defensively, communicating, letting people know where he is and what he’s doing. But he’s overall been good. To finish is probably maybe that next level.”
Despite what the eye test says with Plumlee’s proclivity for frustrating fans, in the 12 games Richards has played, Plumlee has the team’s highest net rating at 3.3. Richards, meanwhile, has the second lowest on the team at -5.8, per NBA Stats.
On offense, even if Plumlee has those bizarre rolls to the basket when he has a fairly clear lane to shoot and will instead pass, he’s making those passes on the move with relative consistency while finding those pockets of space routinely. Richards is not a playmaking big, so that’s a part of the Suns offense that came into the season with only playmaking centers Richards will have to keep improving at.
On defense, opposing teams have been targeting Richards more often. Portland in the blowout Suns loss ran a lob to Deandre Ayton to open each half, so Richards wound up defending Toumani Camara, only for Camara to then find himself the beneficiary.
From the untrained eye, one of the minor mistakes Richards can make is going for too many opportunities to block shots, leaving the Suns compromised from a rebounding perspective.
But in an example of how the Suns want Richards to play and how even some of the above clips are not totally on Richards, Budenholzer shut down that notion entirely.
“No I want him to go block shots,” he said. “I would like for the guys maybe in front of him to be better and not put him in those spots. We gotta be good defensively as a group and maybe rely less on him. But if there’s opportunity and there’s need for him to protect the rim, we need other guys that have his back and are getting hits and taking care of him when he does come to block shots.”
With a question based around the weak-side defender that has to help take on Richards’ rebounding position when he contests shots, Budenholzer started with dribble penetration. He confirmed that’s just as much of the problem, if not more.
“Yeah, if there’s penetration — and this league’s hard,” he said. “We want to keep the ball in front of us, we want to keep the ball out of the paint but there’s a realistic side to where he’s gotta be a weak-side shot-blocker. He’s gotta come and make an impact there and we gotta help him on that weak-side glass.”
Dunn’s lack of minutes has been far more befuddling. The Suns need exactly what he is, a large wing that denies dribble penetration. And he’s also showing progress!
Dunn is at 14.4 minutes per game over his last five. Some of this does have to do with a recent ankle injury for Dunn, but he said after Saturday’s loss it feels 100%, so scratch that now.
Like Richards, there is still some catching up to do for Dunn. He’s a rookie picking things up. Dunn’s net rating is the only one over these dozen games lower than Richards’ and it’s way down there at -11.3. On the entire season, it’s a far more tolerable -3.5.
Dunn has been a good NBA defender as a rookie through the learning curve, a legitimate feat for newbies, and obviously is going to grow into much more. The encouragement for his growth began building with his initial burst of confidence as a shooter offensively before it has now turned into how viable Dunn is as a contributor scoring the ball.
His 3-point shot is around where it was expected to land, 31.4%, and that is what is likely eating at his minutes the most since Grayson Allen, Royce O’Neale, Bradley Beal and Tyus Jones are all guys who play off Kevin Durant and Devin Booker with far more reliable 3-point shots that all sit above 40%.
But a lot of the pessimism for how Dunn looked as a prospect and could earn the ill-fated “zero” label on offense has not come to fruition at all.
Dunn has benefitted greatly from the league’s space, something hypothesized last summer thanks to his school Virginia’s plodding pace.
His best offensive skill in two collegiate seasons was as a play finisher, a position he played in by getting used as a screener. Phoenix has wisely put him there more often.
The key shot for him to continue to grow more efficient with is his floater. Both Dunn and fellow rookie Oso Ighodaro are not looking to barrel into the lane to finish through contact and draw a foul. That can still be overcome by having touch in front of the rim protectors, and Dunn is shooting a very good 31-for-62 (50%) from 5-14 feet, per Cleaning the Glass.
The screening actions allow him to get to that floater.
Dunn has began piecing together when to take advantage of his lack of gravity as a poor shooter. Ironically enough, the guy he was potentially nearly traded for in Jimmy Butler is who he should be watching more tape of this summer. Players are taught to maximize spacing and stretch the floor but there is always a window to slash into the space once the ball-handler begins attacking. The guy guarding Dunn is naturally going to be lackadaisical and drift away at times, so he has to be aggressive with that.
Dunn’s improvement with this has been great to see.
And the golden ticket has been more straight-line driving, a skill every NBA wing must have. These have to be rapid and decisive, the exact descriptors Dunn’s Virginia tape would have told you is going to be too much of an ask. But he’s doing it more.
Add those with opportunities in transition and on the offensive glass, plus the 3s that drop, and that’s how simple it can be to go from a guy struggling to touch double digits to being there nearly every night. In the 12 games Dunn has reached ’em, he’s made over two triples just four times, a testament to him finding other areas to score.
Across an 11-game spurt from late December to mid-January, Dunn was averaging 11.6 points per game and shooting 52% from the field. Two games later, he sprained his ankle. As Dunn will learn, that’s life in the NBA. Now that his ankle is OK, the Suns have to get Dunn back on track with the quite frankly amazing offensive progress he was showing.
There are no easy answers for how the Suns achieve this. The solution for Richards to get more time is easy enough. But more Dunn means less Allen, O’Neale or Jones, valuable veterans. That’s before getting to the newly acquired Cody Martin, who should play too. And then there’s Bol Bol, who has sparked the team in back-to-back outings and is still only 25 years old! Time will tell if the Suns are able to embrace development while desperately trying to hang around in the postseason picture.
