2023-24 Season Discussion and Speculation 4 - A Rocky Start

[Revived]

irony that halliburton and smith ended on the same team. while suns are empty handed with one generetional star and one solid starter. i hate what jones is doin or better say not doing in young player evaluation and draft.
means less work for him and play 2k-ish gm.
we will remember these acts in 4 years.

James Jones is a s**ty negotiator in trades imo. Like I feel the guy just caves into whatever the other team demands.

I’ll give you an example…how the hell did the Suns end up having to trade Camara in addition to Ayton in the 3 way Lillard deal when the Bucks were getting the best player in the deal AND the Bucks didn’t even have to give up their young prospects like Andre Jackson Jr, Chris Livingston, MarJon Beauchamp etc.

Bucks GM smartly avoided caving in and giving up any young player like that while James Jones gave up literally the one young prospect the Suns had with any potential.

And Camara hasn’t been anything worthwhile offensively but even as a rookie he’s been excellent defensively. Blazers fans are hyped af about him and I watched the Blazers/Bucks game tonight and Camara was spectacular in shutting down Giannis, providing great help and switching effortlessly onto Lillard.

Imagine if we had a guy like that on this team getting mins over utter worthless players like KBD, Metu etc.

I’ve said it before but James Jones needs to be fired and replaced with Bob Meyers. Ishbia can afford to make Meyers an offer he can’t refuse to come back and be GM again.

[Saberestar]

1) Where’s the rule book that states you must round up shooting numbers?

2) “much better” being 2/9 for a guy on a $50M/yr is concerning.


And yet for his career he is a 37% 3pt shooter (and unfortunately, there’s nothing to round here )…that is not “great” shooting numbers in the year 2024 unfortunately. Actually, it’s probably not “great” shooting numbers for the last 5 years or even longer.

He gets wide open looks. Grayson Allen has took advantage of this and made teams pay so now they leave Beal open.

Yeah, it's a rule.
34.7% is 35%, not 34% like you said.

If the last digit is less than 5, round the previous digit down. However, if it's 5 or more than you should round the previous digit up. So, if the number you are about to round is followed by 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 round the number up. And if it is followed by 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 round the number down.

What’s the source on that which says NBA shooting percentages need to be rounded up? Or is the excerpt from some college semester finals grading system?

Come on, lol. Just accept that you put the wrong number.

[SunsRback4Good]

Even when healthy, Bradley Beal shooting 34% from 3 on very wide open looks has been so disappointing. He’s shooting the same % from 3 as Okogie did for the Suns last season lol.

Teams have been daring him to shoot with doubles on Booker/KD and he’s been straight bricks especially in the 4th qtr.

He’s shooting 71% from the FT line too which is disgusting for a SG making $50M/yr. Same % this season as Okogie who’s on a vet min contract lol.

I don’t understand how he’s this bad when he was supposed to be a floor spacer.

1) Beal is shooting 35% from three, not 34%. There are rules to round off numbers.

2) He was shooting 38% from three just before his 2 mask games.

He struggled badly with the mask in Orlando (0/5) because he literally couldn't see the rim but he was already much better in the custom black mask in the last one against the Heat (2/9).

11 years in the league and everyone knows how great of a shooter he is... it's just a matter of time for him. He will average over 80% from the FT line before the end of the RS.

1) Where’s the rule book that states you must round up shooting numbers?

2) “much better” being 2/9 for a guy on a $50M/yr is concerning.

11 years in the league and everyone knows how great of a shooter he is

And yet for his career he is a 37% 3pt shooter (and unfortunately, there’s nothing to round here )…that is not “great” shooting numbers in the year 2024 unfortunately. Actually, it’s probably not “great” shooting numbers for the last 5 years or even longer.

He gets wide open looks. Grayson Allen has took advantage of this and made teams pay so now they leave Beal open.

5,6,7,8,9.. I’m most definitely rounding it up to 40% for my own sanity. 40% looks more neat and appealing than 37% besides rounding #’s up has its advantages.

[sunsbg]

Nothing unusual for those multi level scorers to make less than 40% on 3s. Doncic - 34, Booker - 36, KD - 39. On open shots one can expect Beal to hit > 40% though.

[SunsRback4Good]

https://youtu.be/aUy6tqMmQSI?si=Vv26Nm-Y7U1U7GM1

lol Ayton is weak, Nurk would have already scored a basket with so many opportunities at the rim. Meanwhile DA gets blocked by Giannis, passes the ball out gets the ball back and misses an easy bunny near the basket. Somehow recovers the ball and proceeds to lose it. This stuff is pretty comical.

[Fo-Real]

If Suns can trade for a bigger forward that can defend and hit open 3s, best thing to do would be to bring Beal off the bench. Our bench sucks ass (worst in the nba currently iirc) so having him come off that and provide a spark would be great. Plus he may perform better in more mins against other teams bench units as well. Of course he can still close games out for the Suns or whatever too.

Plus we need a defender at the wing position. Asking KD to do so much offensively and defensively at age 34 just isn’t logical especially longterm.

If Okogie can go back to hitting 3s at last year’s rate then I’d say that’s an option but ideally we can find someone better in the trade market using the 2nd rd picks and Little’s contract maybe.

Speaking of Little, would be nice if Vogel can give him more burn. He was a very solid player on the Blazers.

A big forward who can defend and hit open 3's? It seems like we've been needing that for close to 5-6 seaons now or possibly longer. If only we had a forward like what Indiana has in Jalen Smith!....LOL Wait, didn't we have a Jalen Smith, but we chose to let him walk so we could sign Monty's forever love (godson Landry Shamet)?? Luckily there are actually some forwards that are currently unsigned that fit that skillset/archetype whom are unrestricted free agents currently and some we could actually add via the 24' draft/ undrafted pool (IF only Jones can contain himself at the thought of trading our least favorable pick just so he won't have to do work on the draft!!

Whenever everyone is ready and it's closer to the actual draft, I have been building lists of very intruiging impact prospects in all VIABLE ranges of the draft for us. And maybe I'll start up a draft thread with a few surprising yet realistic options soon.

Chuma Okeke would be an amazing get but I'm sure we don't have enough to offer. Pf size with sf movement, untimate 3 and D energy guy. Defends and rebounds with vigor and was thought to be a good shooter coming out of college. Would be nice. Wonder if Orlando was one of those eastern teams who was interested in trading for Grayson? Okeke would be a better defensive fit than Allen. Or maybe with him out of thier rotation and expiring, maybe Little (controlled for another year) and second rounders?

[spanishninja]

https://youtu.be/aUy6tqMmQSI?si=Vv26Nm-Y7U1U7GM1

lol Ayton is weak, Nurk would have already scored a basket with so many opportunities at the rim. Meanwhile DA gets blocked by Giannis, passes the ball out gets the ball back and misses an easy bunny near the basket. Somehow recovers the ball and proceeds to lose it. This stuff is pretty comical.

I guess the one thing you give DA is that he tried to dunk it again over Giannis, despite the same result.

[Ghost of Kleine]

If Suns can trade for a bigger forward that can defend and hit open 3s, best thing to do would be to bring Beal off the bench. Our bench sucks ass (worst in the nba currently iirc) so having him come off that and provide a spark would be great. Plus he may perform better in more mins against other teams bench units as well. Of course he can still close games out for the Suns or whatever too.

Plus we need a defender at the wing position. Asking KD to do so much offensively and defensively at age 34 just isn’t logical especially longterm.

If Okogie can go back to hitting 3s at last year’s rate then I’d say that’s an option but ideally we can find someone better in the trade market using the 2nd rd picks and Little’s contract maybe.

Speaking of Little, would be nice if Vogel can give him more burn. He was a very solid player on the Blazers.

A big forward who can defend and hit open 3's? It seems like we've been needing that for close to 5-6 seaons now or possibly longer. If only we had a forward like what Indiana has in Jalen Smith!....LOL Wait, didn't we have a Jalen Smith, but we chose to let him walk so we could sign Monty's forever love (godson Landry Shamet)?? Luckily there are actually some forwards that are currently unsigned that fit that skillset/archetype whom are unrestricted free agents currently and some we could actually add via the 24' draft/ undrafted pool (IF only Jones can contain himself at the thought of trading our least favorable pick just so he won't have to do work on the draft!!

Whenever everyone is ready and it's closer to the actual draft, I have been building lists of very intruiging impact prospects in all VIABLE ranges of the draft for us. And maybe I'll start up a draft thread with a few surprising yet realistic options soon.

Chuma Okeke would be an amazing get but I'm sure we don't have enough to offer. Pf size with sf movement, untimate 3 and D energy guy. Defends and rebounds with vigor and was thought to be a good shooter coming out of college. Would be nice. Wonder if Orlando was one of those eastern teams who was interested in trading for Grayson? Okeke would be a better defensive fit than Allen.

He would be pretty solid as a positional and recovery defender for us off the bench! I recently proposed a trade package of:
Little/Eubanks/Watanabe/ 2 2nds for Okeke/ Bidatze/ Houston. Nassir Little is actually from Florida and grew up playing in Orlando when he was first gaining some hype! And the Magic could use a bit more dynamic depth at the wing position. right now, Okeke is listed as their 5th starter on their depth chart, with Bidatze as their 3rd rotation center option and Caleb Houston as their 4th/5th power forward option. So I think for equitable positional pieces and acquiring 2 additional 2nds, this trade is fairly doable!

And great for us as aside from Okeke's potential defensive impact, Bidatze would be a solid more fluid, slightly more athletic duplicate of Nurkic for backup center consideration. And Houston at 6'8 and with decent athleticism is actually fairly similar to Cam Johnson.

[Fo-Real]

A big forward who can defend and hit open 3's? It seems like we've been needing that for close to 5-6 seaons now or possibly longer. If only we had a forward like what Indiana has in Jalen Smith!....LOL Wait, didn't we have a Jalen Smith, but we chose to let him walk so we could sign Monty's forever love (godson Landry Shamet)?? Luckily there are actually some forwards that are currently unsigned that fit that skillset/archetype whom are unrestricted free agents currently and some we could actually add via the 24' draft/ undrafted pool (IF only Jones can contain himself at the thought of trading our least favorable pick just so he won't have to do work on the draft!!

Whenever everyone is ready and it's closer to the actual draft, I have been building lists of very intruiging impact prospects in all VIABLE ranges of the draft for us. And maybe I'll start up a draft thread with a few surprising yet realistic options soon.

Chuma Okeke would be an amazing get but I'm sure we don't have enough to offer. Pf size with sf movement, untimate 3 and D energy guy. Defends and rebounds with vigor and was thought to be a good shooter coming out of college. Would be nice. Wonder if Orlando was one of those eastern teams who was interested in trading for Grayson? Okeke would be a better defensive fit than Allen.

He would be pretty solid as a positional and recovery defender for us off the bench! I recently proposed a trade package of:
Little/Eubanks/Watanabe/ 2 2nds for Okeke/ Bidatze/ Houston. Nassir Little is actually from Florida and grew up playing in Orlando when he was first gaining some hype! And the Magic could use a bit more dynamic depth at the wing position. right now, Okeke is listed as their 5th starter on their depth chart, with Bidatze as their 3rd rotation center option and Caleb Houston as their 4th/5th power forward option. So I think for equitable positional pieces and acquiring 2 additional 2nds, this trade is fairly doable!

And great for us as aside from Okeke's potential defensive impact, Bidatze would be a solid more fluid, slightly more athletic duplicate of Nurkic for backup center consideration. And Houston at 6'8 and with decent athleticism is actually fairly similar to Cam Johnson.

Would you do Allen + Little for Okeke + Ingles

[bwgood77]

1) Where’s the rule book that states you must round up shooting numbers?

2) “much better” being 2/9 for a guy on a $50M/yr is concerning.


And yet for his career he is a 37% 3pt shooter (and unfortunately, there’s nothing to round here )…that is not “great” shooting numbers in the year 2024 unfortunately. Actually, it’s probably not “great” shooting numbers for the last 5 years or even longer.

He gets wide open looks. Grayson Allen has took advantage of this and made teams pay so now they leave Beal open.

Yeah, it's a rule.
34.7% is 35%, not 34% like you said.

If the last digit is less than 5, round the previous digit down. However, if it's 5 or more than you should round the previous digit up. So, if the number you are about to round is followed by 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 round the number up. And if it is followed by 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 round the number down.

What’s the source on that which says NBA shooting percentages need to be rounded up? Or is the excerpt from some college semester finals grading system?

Well since you are rounding in the first place you are rounding the wrong way. I think that's his point.

[bwgood77]

Looks like Houston is after Bridges too.

The Rockets are going star-hunting again.

This might seem like a surprise to some, but a team that entered Wednesday 22-24, sitting just outside of a Play-In spot as the 11th seed in the Western Conference, has big aspirations to be buyers and not sellers at this year’s NBA trade deadline. Houston has proven it is capable of quality wins, having beaten the defending champion Denver Nuggets three times as well as the star-studded Milwaukee Bucks.

So, why the sudden acceleration?

Six weeks ago, Houston was 13-9 and firmly settled in the West playoff picture, having won five straight games and thriving as the NBA’s second-best defensive unit. Since then, the Rockets have been hit with injuries at various points to the likes of Dillon Brooks, Jabari Smith Jr. and Tari Eason, and the franchise has dropped 12 of its last 19 games. During that time, Houston’s defensive efficiency has dropped to around league average while its offensive efficiency has plummeted to the bottom 10.

With the Feb. 8 trade deadline a little over a week away, the Rockets find themselves a game behind the 10th-place Utah Jazz. There have been strides made this season, but several factors have contributed to Houston’s slide in the standings — an uptick in schedule difficulty, injuries to key contributors and an offense that is still attempting to find consistency on a nightly basis. But the overarching theme, stemming from Udoka’s mentality and approach, is that the Rockets need to recalibrate and reinforce the aspects of their play that afforded them success early on — even if that means turning their attention to solutions outside of the current roster.

At the beginning of the offseason, Rockets officials outlined — both publicly and privately — their immediate goals: Improving the roster, transforming the culture and pushing the timeline closer toward winning basketball.

Names that have been linked with them as the trade market has developed — Atlanta’s Dejounte Murray and Chicago’s Zach Lavine — don’t appear to be enticing to the Rockets. The Rockets have joined the long line of teams showing extremely high interest in Nets forward Mikal Bridges, league sources say. Houston made an offer including multiple first-round draft picks for Bridges in recent weeks, but the Nets have zero interest in any deal involving Bridges, who is part of Brooklyn’s core moving forward.

https://theathletic.com/5240648/2024/01/31/houston-rockets-star-hunting-nba-trade-deadline/

[Saberestar]

Touches per game in the last 10 games for the Suns:

KD - 73.8
Devin Booker - 72.8
Bradley Beal - 72.1

Perk's job is to say stuff in an attempt to go viral online. He is the equivalent of an ESPN blue check clout chaser.

Read on Twitter

8W-2L in those last 10 games. The Big 3 is working perfectly for us.

[Bogyo]

Touches per game in the last 10 games for the Suns:

KD - 73.8
Devin Booker - 72.8
Bradley Beal - 72.1

Perk's job is to say stuff in an attempt to go viral online. He is the equivalent of an ESPN blue check clout chaser.

Read on Twitter

8W-2L in those last 10 games. The Big 3 is working perfectly for us.

Perk is just one of the wannabe attention grabbing media headline clickbait producing tryhard c*nts.
Time for Butler to leave Miami? GTFO you big c*nt, aint nobody care for you or your stupd "takes". Sick of these mofos.
(and I dont even like Miami)

[sunskerr]

Not a Suns post but I was thinking about the Rockets and how the early season/offseason talk was that they went and signed vets too quickly which might trap them/accelerate their progress at the expense of a lower ceiling ala Sacramento and I don't know if it's true.

They have a franchise guy it looks like in Sengun, and the other prospects in Smith, Eason, and Whitmore look promising. Now Green the last few weeks is turning the corner. Amen Thompson hasn't shown much nor has he been able to play his way into the rotation, but with those other five guys he will not even have to develop a multifaceted offensive game (defensively for him the sky is the limit). That's six core guys with varying levels of potential all looking like viable NBA prospects.

Time will tell, as all NBA teams are experiments and you can only test things with time. But it looks to be the opposite of what was said in the offseason - the Rockets look like they have enough for the future. My guess is that Whitmore becomes the #2 star after Sengun, but Green, Smith, and Thompson also have that potential.

Or maybe they all just suck next year who knows.

[NapoleonII]

Is this board even whinier when we’re winning?

[Fo-Real]

Is this board even whinier when we’re winning?

Just so negative. Like they have to bash it because if it fails, they can say they prepared for it and it hurts less!

[Ghost of Kleine]

Chuma Okeke would be an amazing get but I'm sure we don't have enough to offer. Pf size with sf movement, untimate 3 and D energy guy. Defends and rebounds with vigor and was thought to be a good shooter coming out of college. Would be nice. Wonder if Orlando was one of those eastern teams who was interested in trading for Grayson? Okeke would be a better defensive fit than Allen.

He would be pretty solid as a positional and recovery defender for us off the bench! I recently proposed a trade package of:
Little/Eubanks/Watanabe/ 2 2nds for Okeke/ Bidatze/ Houston. Nassir Little is actually from Florida and grew up playing in Orlando when he was first gaining some hype! And the Magic could use a bit more dynamic depth at the wing position. right now, Okeke is listed as their 5th starter on their depth chart, with Bidatze as their 3rd rotation center option and Caleb Houston as their 4th/5th power forward option. So I think for equitable positional pieces and acquiring 2 additional 2nds, this trade is fairly doable!

And great for us as aside from Okeke's potential defensive impact, Bidatze would be a solid more fluid, slightly more athletic duplicate of Nurkic for backup center consideration. And Houston at 6'8 and with decent athleticism is actually fairly similar to Cam Johnson.

Would you do Allen + Little for Okeke + Ingles

I wouldn't trade Allen at all honestly unless I had inside information that intended to leave in free agency anyways. And even then, Allen is far too valuable to us ( currently) for that return to be equitable. Okeke is solid but maybe worth a 2nd based upon his rotational hierarchy in Orlando.

And Ingles just isn't worth much at all anymore in my estimation. He's hardcore dadbodding it out there like he's been following the boris diaw diet plan and currently looks like thst weird uncle that plays rec ball at the "Y" trying to relive his glory days. For Allen, I'd need something more significant for sure.

[SunsRback4Good]

He would be pretty solid as a positional and recovery defender for us off the bench! I recently proposed a trade package of:
Little/Eubanks/Watanabe/ 2 2nds for Okeke/ Bidatze/ Houston. Nassir Little is actually from Florida and grew up playing in Orlando when he was first gaining some hype! And the Magic could use a bit more dynamic depth at the wing position. right now, Okeke is listed as their 5th starter on their depth chart, with Bidatze as their 3rd rotation center option and Caleb Houston as their 4th/5th power forward option. So I think for equitable positional pieces and acquiring 2 additional 2nds, this trade is fairly doable!

And great for us as aside from Okeke's potential defensive impact, Bidatze would be a solid more fluid, slightly more athletic duplicate of Nurkic for backup center consideration. And Houston at 6'8 and with decent athleticism is actually fairly similar to Cam Johnson.

Would you do Allen + Little for Okeke + Ingles

I wouldn't trade Allen at all honestly unless I had inside information that intended to leave in free agency anyways. And even then, Allen is far too valuable to us ( currently) for that return to be equitable. Okeke is solid but maybe worth a 2nd based upon his rotational hierarchy in Orlando.

And Ingles just isn't worth much at all anymore in my estimation. He's hardcore dadbodding it out there like he's been following the boris diaw diet plan and currently looks like thst weird uncle that plays rec ball at the "Y" trying to relive his glory days. For Allen, I'd need something more significant for sure.

Now I can’t get the description out of my head. Still pretty accurate and funny though. Nicely done, GOK!! #GOKMAKEAMERICAGREATAGAIN

[bigfoot]

Is this board even whinier when we’re winning?

Board not even on the whine radar since Ayton got the boot.

[garrick]

https://youtu.be/aUy6tqMmQSI?si=Vv26Nm-Y7U1U7GM1

lol Ayton is weak, Nurk would have already scored a basket with so many opportunities at the rim. Meanwhile DA gets blocked by Giannis, passes the ball out gets the ball back and misses an easy bunny near the basket. Somehow recovers the ball and proceeds to lose it. This stuff is pretty comical.

Did you watch the entire game or just this highlight?

Also do you seriously think Nurkic would have done better? The man has so many blown dunks and missed layups near the rim even being wide open it's pretty comical.

If you haven't been watching Ayton since him coming off the injured list he's actually been putting together some strong numbers and even dunking now lol and his mid range jumper is just really solid right now.