Pick and Roll: Rebuild now or take another shot

For this week’s Pick and Roll, Mark and I decided to focus on the Big Issue the Suns are facing right now: Rebuild now or take another shot with the current core of players.

We seem to agree this is going to be a long and painful road.

Here’s our thoughts:

Mark: The Suns are in a tough spot. They’re a mediocre team with a bad mix of players and possibly a lame duck coach.  Their owner is looking out for the bottom line (aren’t we all at this point?) and their GM has anything but a Midas touch going for him.

Rebuild or take another shot?

What many of us forget is there’s actually plenty of time to take another shot.  The core of Amare, Nash, Shaq, Richardson and Barbosa would stay intact if the front office decided to keep the status quo. 

Going this route uses the rest of this season as a chance to continue working out the kinks and improving as a team.  Think of the Suns as a college football team starting freshman and sophomores.  They need time to work through their mistakes, time to come together as a team.

This option isn’t palatable to the fans, because let’s face it, we’re spoiled and we’re impatient as all get out.  Franchise owner Robert Sarver isn’t exactly keen on it either, as I’m sure he’d rather not pay the luxury tax for a middling team learning on the fly.

The other route Kerr and Co. can take is to finish what they started last year by trading for Shaq, and tear the team completely apart.  Wipe the slate clean and start from scratch, build a team from the ground up with the GM’s vision coloring every decision.

Taking this path leaves the team with far more questions than answers.  Will Kerr get equal value for Amare?  Can his next draft picks contribute?  Who will sign with the Suns as a free agent?  Is Kerr the right head engineer for the reconstruction job?

If the Suns were to take the poison rebuilding pill, I’d love to see them remove the untouchable tag from our two time MVP.  When I think rebuilding, I visualize Leandro Barbosa running the point after Frank Johnson was fired, with a stripped down team surrounding him.  I don’t think of a player of Steve Nash’s character and ability being forced to babysit younger players, put up with mediocre players, and experience a miserable, losing season while giving his all every night.

Nash has done too much for this franchise and city to be saddled with such a burden. 

I’m not sure what the right decision to make is, but what I’ve realized these last few weeks is the Suns are more broken than Humpty Dumpty, and their pieces are too ill-fitting and too many to put back together in such a short time.

Kerr needs to get himself some new eggs.

Steve Fan: Throw away everyone and start all over again or give Nash and Co. one more shot? That’s the question. Of course, there could be a case for both “ways” as there is not a third way, I am afraid.

Why not give them one more shot? The Suns have an aging group of former (and present) All Stars. Too old? Maybe. Still good? Probably. Could they be Champions? Don’t know, probably not but under the right guidance (Porter won’t be coaching them next year anyway) they could contend for another season.

Like it or not this group of players could be the Suns best chance to win for the next 4-5 years at least. For a moment, don’t consider “the other” players, Barbosa, Hill, Barnes and the rest of the bench. The question could be better posed in these terms: Do you think Nash, Shaq and Stoudemire are good enough to win it all, now? I think they could if put in the right context and under the right guidance.

But, let’s be a bit more realistic. This aging team is past its prime. The Suns are not going to win this season nor the next one. Nash and Shaq will be older, not better, in 2010. Shaq will be thinking about his retirement party, Nash about one last shot in NYC and Stoudemire about his next contract. Barnes will be gone, the rookies won’t be ready anyway.

Next year’s Suns will be worse than they are now and after the 2009/10 season the US Airways Center could look like a lonely place. I doubt the Suns will be able to attract a superstar player in his prime, a LeBron James or a Dwayne Wade and the roster could look like the post MJ Bulls.

So, it’s time to rebuild, but please read the included instructions.

How long will it take for the Suns front office to build another group of players like this?

Rebuilding is not a quick solution in the NBA. Why a few teams seem always to be contending and others stink no matter? Why there are at least a dozen teams in perennial rebuilding process?

The best current rebuilding project in the NBA is going on in Portland. It took 6 years and the Blazers could make the playoffs for the first time this season after losing at least 50 games for three consecutive seasons and finishing at 41-41 last year.

What is killing the Suns right now is this sense of uncertainty on and off the court. Steve Kerr should put and end to this. Once the ownership is sure this current team is not going to win, right or wrong, don’t wait another NY minute.

Trade Shaq, Trade Stoudemire, Trade Nash (God, please forgive me), Trade Hill, Trade Barnes. Or rebuild around Stoudemire if you believe he could lead a team and trade everyone else and if Kerr is confident he can sign him to a long term deal.
Phoenix could acquire 3-4 young players or high draft picks and a good expiring contract (a Raf Lafrentz so to speak) to save some money and gain some cap room for next off season.

Will Suns fans continue to fill the US Airways Center, all 18,442 of them, every night even if they’ll have to pay 60-something dollars to watch a rebuilding team? In the middle of the worst economic recession of the last 70 years? Only if you provide talent and excitement every night

Rebuilding means young promising players if you’re lucky, not All Stars and MVPs. Rebuilding means losing more than winning for a few years at least.

This is not baseball, the Suns are not the Yankees. You can’t just clear the house and sign three All Star players next off season or draft a Kobe or a Lebron with the 15th pick in the draft.

As painful as it could be, it’s time to rebuild I think but only if Kerr can come up with long term value from trading away his best players. No mediocre players or useless expiring contracts, the Suns need basketball talent and top ten picks only, to build a young core of future stars in a year or two.

If not, let’s just give the guys one more shot.

GO SUNS !

Yours truly, Steve Fan

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