Dana, how are you? I'm great. How are you?
I'm excellent. Thank you for taking the time to join us. Here we are. Two games left in the season. Phoenix Suns are in action. Tonight against San Antonio, they hit the road against Sacramento.
And that's it. For a lot in the organization, for the fan base, is this now a sigh of relief just to get it over with and hopefully fast forward to July when they can move Durant? It's interesting, those games now. I remember the 19 win season back in 2018-19 when the two top players on the Suns were Devin Booker and TJ Warren. There was barely any people in the stands.
Basically, nobody booed because everybody expected them to lose. So, it's interesting that they basically have, like you said, dysfunction with three stars. Devin Booker as the mainstay, Kevin Durant now in his third official season with the Suns since the 2023 trade deadline, and also Bradley Beal since June of 23. So, it's basically what you said, dysfunctional, discord, disrespected because now it's become a dunk contest for opposing teams late in the fourth quarter and they're laughing at them. And also the media of what Spencer did, Woody calling them ass when that streamer showed that flashcard of the Phoenix Suns logo. And so many things that you can think of that might be disassembled as you just pointed out come this season for this team.
Even though Matt Ishbia doesn't want to use the word rebuild, so it'll be a semantic thing coming forward. Dana Scott is here with us, covers the Phoenix Suns for azcentral sports. Matt Ishbia a year ago, he gave us, there's a bunch of teams like right now today over the weekend in the West who are competing for playoff spots. They're like a game apart, five teams at a game apart.
The Suns are completely out of it. It was almost exactly a year ago, a little bit more, that Matt Ishbia said we have everything that we need to win a championship. Has Matt Ishbia spoken or do we have to wait another couple of days before he says anything? Well, there's an interview the next week and I anticipate that he will be addressing the media again because Matt Ishbia does love to hold press conferences at the arena. He will put whatever it might be for small player signings, meaning not small in terms of size, but in terms of the magnitude of the player to the coaches or maybe a new investment of a facility of some sort of upgrade.
He likes to do those things in grandiose style. So best believe he will be addressing this team's failure moving forward because of what he said a year ago compared to now. Dana, when you think about the acquisition of Bradley Beal, we know he has the no trade clause.
He didn't want to wait. But we know Kevin Durant was not cool with moving in the middle of the season, regardless of his reasons of, hey, I just don't want to move in the middle of season or not. Like he's the most likeliest of guys to go. The Suns have zero draft picks. Having acquired both Beal and Durant, they just have to move Durant. It's a foregone conclusion. He's going to be gone and they're going to have to get back draft capital and then I guess wait for Bradley Beal's contract to expire.
Is that best case? Well, there's some speculation that there could be possibilities that if they don't move on from Bradley Beal to another team to push him with, if they can't find a suitor like they could have the trade deadline, they may have the option of waiving and stretching. That might cost a lot being that Bradley Beal is, uh, they would have to stretch his contract over the course of the next five years because if they're over the second apron for a third year in a row, uh, then they will be basically, um, or second straight year at least. Then they will have their first round, uh, draft capital frozen in the next seven years. They don't have their own pick until 2032 and that's seven years from now.
So that could be frozen. Well, my apologies for interrupting you. What you just said is almost, it's hard to put a finger on. Correct me.
You just said as it stands today, 2025, the Phoenix Suns do not control their own first rounder until 2032. Is that correct? That is correct. Oh my God. Okay, go ahead. That's, uh, that's, that's crazy. Okay. Yeah. They got to trade the whole world and get picked back.
Go ahead. I mean, they have picked, I mean, they definitely, uh, broke up their picks into a little bite sized pieces and unfavorable picks with, you know, from that 2031 pick that was their own and they tried to make that deal, uh, by having a, I think it was the, uh, Cleveland's pick Utah jazz pick and they traded it, uh, and also leave it was the Hornets. Um, I'm, I'm just thinking of the fact that those are unfavorable picks in the years, 2020, uh, for late round picks in 27, 29 and 31. So, uh, those are things that they try to do to get Jimmy Butler that didn't work out. You saw where the warriors have turned the corner since they got that trade and they're, uh, in a six spot, avoiding the play in tournament as the sons were basically lowering their expectations. It's precipitously over the course of this season to get in a 10 spot and the fans expectations have basically gone from, yeah, we, we, we're, we're going to get back to where we were in the finals four years ago to, uh, we don't know if this team is going to make the play.
And hopefully we get in the 10 spot and then now the fans don't even care. They basically are just like, you know, uh, it's almost like coming home or going and that's in my own case, cause I'm not like that. I'm totally happy with my wife and kids, but it's like coming home to a wife that you know, is basically bound for divorcing you and there's nothing you could do to save the relationship. So really you're basically at a verbal impasse where you just don't speak and sleep in separate rooms. That's the best comparison I can come up to with the fans and the Phoenix Suns right now and how they've approached this basketball team coming to the arena.
Damn Dana, you're making me think about the days of sitting in the driveway, not wanting to go in the house, man. Oh, thank you. Yeah. I mean, there's, like I said, there's there, I just had my child, so I, uh, my son, so that doesn't apply to me, but I think we've all been there at some point in some relationship in the past where we know it's over.
But you know, you're basically like, uh, uh, I'm not breaking up with you until you break up with me. That's where it's at between the Suns and the fans and this front office and this team right now. Dana Scott is here with us, covers the Phoenix Suns, having a divorce with their fan base. Now, it is not to the Dallas Mavericks level.
They're a complete waste of time in and of themselves. What do you think is the most likeliest of scenarios over the summer, over the next couple of years? They're going to suck. They just got to get rid of a couple of these guys and start fresh, no? They have to get rid of some of a one piece to basically get back under the second apron, even though if they can't get on the first apron, they have to get back on the second. So at least they can get a player so they can use a mid-level exception of twelve point five million, which they can't do past the second apron after the first apron.
They can do that. But this is a prime example of what the collective bargaining agreement of July twenty twenty three when it was put into place. This is a example of what a super team looks like when you apply that CBA and how roster construction can be hampered. And what the CBA was initially designed to do to not allow free agents to just come together and basically make the the the league lopsided to one conference. And you see a lot more more parity now, even though the West is still the strongest conference in the league. So you see that the East still has some very good teams, even though the records don't show it from the bottom five all the way to the tenth in the play in. But they're still competitive in a way compared to the West. So the Suns are certainly just this lab rat of what basically a cautionary tale of what a super team is. And I don't know if we'll ever see a team like the Warriors or the Heatles or the Celtics of 2008 ever again because of it. Dana Scott, last question for you, man.
You cover this team. We saw what took place down in Dallas the other night. They were chanting for Negro Harrison to get fired. It appeared that James Jones, the president of the Phoenix Suns, runs the basketball side. He didn't want to go through with all of these trades.
And then Matt Ishbia buys the team and he kind of pushes the button like, hey, let's go ahead and bring in stars. James Jones, he's kind of Teflon right now. He's not going to be bothered or touched, right? People, he might have the case of, say, I told you so.
Well, here's the thing. Whenever it comes to an organization that fails, there's always going to be a fall guy. And I'm not saying that's going to be James Jones, but James Jones is somebody who has said in the past he does not like the draft. He understands why teams tank or why teams go through the draft process, but it's not for him. And I'm paraphrasing what he said, but he did know last summer that they had to get younger and have some youth energy. So you've seen that youth movement with Collins, Gillespie as the backup to waypoint guard getting more minutes. Ryan Dunn getting 42 starts out of his 72 appearances and also Iguodaro being the big backup and getting some time in his five starts this past season or this current season. I'm already thinking past tense.
Sorry. But there's there's just things that James Jones knows that he's like accepted that they have to get younger because he became executive of the year in 2021 from the youth movement of the suns in the draft after the bubble. So there are certain things that he didn't want to do, probably from the matters for you coming in. But when you have a guy with a big wallet and a billionaire spender who's willing to turn the tide with a big name like Kevin Durant, how can you say no to your Svengali, who's basically the black hand and opening up his checkbook that is bottomless. So but in this whole thing that we've seen over the past week with Calvin Booth and Mike Malone getting ousted together from the Denver Nuggets, we just won a title two years ago. Anything can happen.
And I wouldn't be surprised if James Jones becomes expendable in that sense. Phoenix Suns going to expect to go through quite a few changes. Well, Dana, thank you for coming through and breaking it all down. Please tell everybody where we can follow your work as these Suns implode over the next several months. Tell us. Thank you.
And I just want to say before I give you my information that I am not one to tell somebody or somebody else that they don't deserve their job because I don't want anybody to tell me I don't deserve mine. Just to be fair. But that being said, my handles on social media are at I am it, which is at I am underscore Dana Scott. D.A.
and a COTT that's on X as well as Instagram. Hey, Dana, thank you so much. Appreciate the time. I'm sure we'll be talking with you in a few months. Okay. When Kevin Durant is traded to X, Y, Z. Okay. Yeah. Or maybe even next week after the hatchet starts coming down on some guys. Let me know any time you want me to come back on. Thank you so much.
