MVN - Most Valuable Network

Suns chase for a PG

While Steve Nash is still a very good NBA point guard, he is getting rather old, and the Suns want to get him more time off and less minutes because of it. However, right now, they’re having lots of trouble finding a backup who could come in for him and make some occasional starts. The key issue in their pursuit, and why they weren’t able to ink Tyronn Lue, is that they’re only able to give a minimum contract, hoping to avoid the luxury tax. There aren’t many veterans out there who will accept that offer.

The Arizona Central lists some guys who they think the Suns should/will show interest in:

• Sam Cassell(UFA)
• Damon Stoudamire(UFA)
• Carlos Arroyo(UFA)
• Jason Williams(UFA)
• Shaun Livingston(UFA)

All of these guys have problems that won’t go away. Cassell appears too old to even be a decent backup anymore, as shown by the Celtics barely playing him after they acquired him. Arroyo isn’t that big of a scorer and isn’t very good at passing either. Stoudamire has issues with his character. Williams’s career is almost over, and other teams are interested in him, making it unlikely that he’ll come to Phoenix. Livingston’s knee still doesn’t look to be completely ready for action, and he might need another year for it to heal.

Ya, not the best group of players. Therefore, the Suns might just try to fill the hole with some guys already on the team. DJ Strawberry played at the point in college, but he needs to play much better, as he didn’t look very good in his rookie season. Their second-round pick, Slovenian Goran Dragic, could come to the US to play for the Suns, but he’d cost too much and they would need to get rid of some salary, which they might do next offseason. Playing Leandro Barbosa at the point would be a sign of desperation, but they could make it work. Or, they could possibly use him to get a point guard in a trade.

The best option seems to be Dragic, if they can’t get one of those free agents, in which case Williams or Arroyo would be the way to go, but they may end up just having a committee. Finally taking someone in the first round does have repercussions.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 17th, 2008 at 1:49 pm and is filed under The NBA Source. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.