Jerry Colangelo talks to Bloomberg about the Phoenix Suns, the business of sports in the current economic climate, the challenges of owning a professional sports franchise and muses about the changes coming during the 2010 free agency period.
Suns forward Louis Amundson, along with The Gorilla, will visit with fans and sign autographs at Santisi Brothers in Phoenix Thursday, March 18, from 6 – 7 p.m. Prior to Amundson’s arrival, members of the Suns Dancers will greet fans between 5 – 6 p.m.
Santisi Brothers
2710 W. Bell Road
Phoenix, AZ 85053
(602) 789-7979
The Timberwolves had to have something positive to talk about after last night’s mauling at the hands of the Suns. Too bad Robin Lopez was the victim. And we mean victim (see below). Still, aside from being a foolish poster boy, Lopez had a good night (along with everyone else wearing a Suns uniform). Devin likes the bench with Barbosa’s scoring at its disposal, but agrees with Gentry that he’ll have to earn his way back into the rotation.
Were we too harsh on Lopez? Not harsh enough? And what’s your take on LB’s return? Let us know by e-mailing sevenminutesorless@fanster.com, and we’ll respond this Saturday.
S.M.O.L. is a Phoenix Suns podcast for the fans, by the fans, in seven minutes or less. Saturday features a full 24-minute shot-clock for the show, with a more in-depth look at the Suns, including responses to e-mail questions/comments from fans and listeners. If your comment/question is good, you could be asked to make an appearance on the show.
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Weekends are my most productive time. Plowing through piles of laundry, eliminating clutter and whipping up a few dozen cookies are all in a Sunday’s work. This past weekend I came across the copy of Free Throw I grabbed back in November when the Phoenix Suns played host to the New Orleans Hornets. At the time, save for Steve Nash, I knew none of the Suns by name so stats and polls meant nothing to me.
Back to Sunday. I flipped a few pages into Free Throw and came across something entirely surprising. The Burning Question of the November 11th edition asked: Which young Suns player are you most interested in seeing develop? The results had Alando Tucker and Taylor Griffin at 10% and 11% respectively, Robin Lopez clocked in at 17%, 22% for Goran Dragic and Earl Clark was the overwhelming favourite with 40%.
Clearly Goran Dragic’s performance in the ‘08/’09 season left much to be desired and Robin Lopez spent much of the start of the current season benched with a broken left foot. Understandably, Suns fans had put their hope in Earl Clark to shine. Fast forward a handful of months and we have a team entirely different than what was expected. Clark has since been assigned to the D-league team in Iowa, Lopez has emerged as the Suns’ star center since mid-January and Goran Dragic has proven to be nothing short of inspiring on the hardwood.
With little more than a dozen games left to play in the regular season, let’s revamp and revisit the question. Which of Goran Dragic and Robin Lopez has proven to be more effective for the Suns this season? Which of them will have an even bigger year in the ‘10/’11 season?
Drinking is an emotional thing. It joggles you out of the standardism of everyday life … It yanks you out of your body and your mind and throws you against the wall. I have the feeling that drinking is a form of suicide where you’re allowed to return to life and begin all over the next day.
Substitute the word “Drinking” with, “Rooting for the Phoenix Suns” and place the word “fan” before “suicide” and you have encompassed what I interpret as my experience with this team.
In this case, no, it is not – six of those 11 came from 2003-2008, a span during which the Suns could have coasted to that round in a historically pathetic East at least four times.
The question is begged, “Why do the Suns consistently field strong teams that falter mightily in the playoffs?”
The answer is, of course: to kill me.
I hated those Pistons teams of the 2000s – they were arrogant, boring,BORINGand they self-importantly coasted for years off a fluky Finals win over a reeling team whose best players hated each other (one of whom was facing prison time).
I still claim that Detroit only pushed San Antonio to seven games in ‘05 because the Spurs were bored out of their minds.
The point to which the last several statements speak, however, is not that those Pistons teams should be stripped of their accomplishments; rather, the words function as a giant floodlight upon my pathetic bitterness as an NBA fan.
I can say I hate those teams all that I want and I can assert that the Suns have been as good, or better, since 1976 … while their fans simply need to point to the scoreboard.
They win.
I must deal with the Suns – the consummate NBA bridesmaid.
A team for which I challenge anyone to find a parallel in any of the three major professional leagues (this reporter chooses not to recognize hockey, in any capacity).
In this series, I will document the various cases in which I was summarily kicked in the groin by the donkey that is Phoenix Suns Playoff Lore, beginning with the first time …
May 13, 1990
I am nine years old.
I have on one of those shiny, vinyl, olde-timey-lettered purple Suns jackets –inMay– amongst a frenzied crowd in Veterans Memorial Coliseum, which is essentially a giant, 13,000-seat stone saddle that was originally meant for cattle shows, has never fully lost its cattle-ey musk and in which one almost never feels safe, as its structural soundness is decidedly suspect.
The place rattles like a 90 year old drunk when the Suns are humming – the floor shakes violently and the echo of the crowd is like a constant missile assault to the eardrum.
The team has recently escaped a half-decade of mediocrity by fleecing Cleveland in a trade that brought it Kevin Johnson, Ty Corbin, Mark West and a pick that became Dan Majerle (badass defensive/dunking Thunder Dan Majerle, who can’t make a shot beyond 15 feet, not the later 3-point shooting incarnation – no offense to the guy, who was great in both roles, it simply must be pointed out).
Thunder Dan packed a lot more wallop in 1989 than in 1995 … he also packed a lot less shorts.
Sporting some of the league’s most epic white dudes – Rambis, Hornacek, Chambers, Majerle, Legler, all on the same squad – the Suns have just coasted to a 114-101 win in Game 4 of the Western Conference Semifinals, taking a 3-1 lead on the hated, #1-seeded Los Angeles Lakers and a funny thing is happening:
I’m not cowering in the corner, wondering how they are going to screw it up.
Quite the contrary …
For the second year in a row, when I excitedly slipped the “BEAT L.A.” insert – it is so cool that we get to have signs saying this, as it makes me feel like Phoenix is a legitimate pro sports city (while it likely makes pompous Lakers fans snicker, due to their perception that it is anything but) – out of my family’s morning copy of The Arizona Republic, I really believed the Suns could do it.
Why wouldn’t I?
Sure, the Lakers swept the Suns out last year, but that was their first year bouncing back from a 28-54 season … and I am a third-grader who roots for the Detroit Tigers, beginning every year with the assumption that they will win the World Series.
No, I don’t have years of baggage from watching the Suns put forth a consistently scrappy/skillful/lovable effort, then seeing them somehow get pummeled by the sledgehammer of defeat in epic and mind-melting fashion … why do you ask?
I have no time for your nonsensical chicanery – I have to go get prepared for the Suns to finish off L.A., kill Portland and then dispatch Detroit or Chicago in the same manner that they will the others.
Kicked while down
Moving out of my surprisingly insightful 9-year old world – I will fight you tooth-and-nail if you suggest that I wasn’t using phrases such as, “nonsensical chicanery” in ‘90 – the Suns did win Game 5, 106-103.
It became a game and a series that often gets swept under the hearse when people speak of the Suns and their playoff life-and-times.
Why?
Because, after clawing back from an 0-2 deficit to tie Portland, 2-2, the Blazers clipped off two straight wins and left the Suns with pants down and jocks in hand – this is not to say that the Suns didn’t put forth a tremendous effort, as always, but the idea that the team pushed the Lakers out of the way so that another team could walk through the door to the Finals was almost worse than just losing to the Lakers, again, and moving on with sports death/life.
Even worse, Portland managed only one, 1-point victory against Detroit in the Finals, before bowing out in five games – thus crushing the notion that the Suns ever had a true chance.
But the worst part is this – play this game with somebody:
1)Pick a person
2)Ask them who Clyde Drexler’s Portland team beat to make the Finals in 1990
3)Punch them in the face when they say the Lakers
Because, unless this person is some kind of lame/obsessive Phoenix Suns historian – like me – he/she will
guess that it was the Lakers.
It’s only common sense.
I recently mentioned it to my Dad and he didn’t remember it until I reminded him with some details – the man was at the games!
My father’s selective memory aside, the achievement of beating the Lakers in a playoff series for the first time in history was rendered meaningless/a little sad and it became my starting point for the storied litany of great seasons that have been continuously rendered as such in May and June over the last 20 years.
As the Suns spend this season puttering around the second tier of the Western playoffs, it occurs to my greatly-eroded-fan-sense-of-hope that there is a chance that they will play the #1-seeded Lakers in the Western Conference Semifinals … maybe things have come full circle … in which case the Suns would beat them and then lose in the next round …
Which would actually be kind of awesome – does it say something that these last 20 years have made me lust after a fate that so destroyed me at age nine?
Yes.
Yes, it does.
Regardless of what happens – and much as Bukowski woke up from his drunken grave to be reborn so many times (until he didn’t) – the Suns will play again, next year, and I, too, will be reborn with hope that will gradually wane as the season goes on … until it doesn’t.
It’s a question we can seriously consider in the wake of Amare’s sustained tear: is he the best power foward in the league? Thanks to Keaton wondering this aloud, we ponder both the answer and the gravity of the question. Plus, we give thanks to Robin Lopez for doing a better job than Shaq bringing out the best in Amare.
That’s not to say we don’t understand if you disagree. If you do, by all means e-mail your own argument to sevenminutesorless@fanster.com, so we can answer it when we bust open the mailbag this Saturday.
S.M.O.L. is a Phoenix Suns podcast for the fans, by the fans, in seven minutes or less. Saturday features a full 24-minute shot-clock for the show, with a more in-depth look at the Suns, including responses to e-mail questions/comments from fans and listeners. If your comment/question is good, you could be asked to make an appearance on the show.
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Suns forward Grant Hill is listed as probable for tomorrow night’s home game against the Timberwolves.
After falling and hitting the back of his head on the floor with 5:14 left in the third quarter of Sunday’s game against the Hornets, the seven-time All-Star remained on the bench for a few minutes before heading back to the locker room so he could be tested for a concussion. Shortly afterwards, Hill returned home to nurse his headache.
“You know the whole thing with hitting your head is the first 24 hours,” Suns Head Coach Alvin Gentry said. “They (Suns medical staff) monitored him last night. He feels fine, looks good, but just has a little bit of a headache because he hit the floor pretty hard.”
Hill was being guarded by the Hornets’ Julian Wright as he dribble-drove to the basket from the right side of the court. New Orleans’ Marcus Thornton rotated over and blocked Hill as the 15-year veteran went tumbling to the floor.
Suns head athletic trainer Aaron Nelson performed some basic tests on the floor to determine whether
Hill had sustained a concussion and Hill checked out just fine. Hill then walked to the bench unassisted, remaining there for a few minutes.
“I wanted to stay on the sidelines so I could yell at the refs a few times before I went in the back,” Hill said.
At practice Monday, he didn’t participate for precautionary reasons. As of after practice, the only difficulty he was having was a headache and some soreness in the neck and back.
“I want to play but if it’s not right then I’ll wait,” Hill said. But I think it’ll be fine. A lot of times with any kind of injury, it’s always the next day and how you feel when you wake up.”
Gentry believes that Hill will be ready to go tomorrow.
“As long as he’s not cheering for North Carolina or anything crazy like that, then we’ll know he’s fine to play tomorrow,” Gentry said of the Duke standout.
PHOENIX – The Phoenix Suns today assigned rookie forward Earl Clark to the Iowa Energy of the NBA Development League, it was announced today by Suns President of Basketball Operations and General Manager Steve Kerr.
The 6-10, 225-pound Clark was selected by the Suns with the 14th overall pick (first round) of the 2009 NBA Draft and has appeared in 45 games this season for Phoenix. Clark will spend his first stint in the D-League.
The three-year standout at the University of Louisville, Clark owns averages of 2.7 points and 1.1 rebounds in 7.6 minutes this season for the Suns. Clark has scored in double figures three times in 2009-10, including a career-high 14 points off the bench Nov. 27 at Minnesota.
Currently sixth in the ultra-competitive Western Conference, the Suns (41-26) return to action Tuesday night, hosting the Minnesota Timberwolves (14-53) at US Airways Center at 7 p.m. Phoenix time. The game can be seen locally on FOX Sports Arizona and heard on Sports 620 KTAR.
Much was made of Lou Amundson’s 11 point, 10-rebound effort off the bench against the Lakers, and deservedly so. He succeeded where Robin Lopez (zero rebounds in 19 minutes) failed miserably, and the hope that Lopez would give the Suns a better chance against the bigger Lakers fizzled quickly amid fouls and other poor decisions.
But in a much more subtle way, another Suns reserve and Stanford alum showed how his deployment in the playoffs might pay some dividends. Playing his first meaningful minutes in months, Jarron Collins didn’t score but showed off a lot of the guile that could make him a useful pawn in a playoff series.
Collins is a master of getting in the way and getting under people’s skin. He draws fouls in a variety of ways and knows how to make opposing big men pay for their own lack of basketball savvy.
Collins drew two charges. He masterfully goaded Kobe Bryant into an early second foul by forcing the two to get entangled early in the second quarter. Every pick comes with a little something to remember, every collision or semi-collision comes with the appropriate body movement and facial expression designed to attract the corner-of-the-eye attention of officials.
And when the Suns capped their rally in the fourth quarter, it was Collins who was on the passing end of the alley-oop that Amundson flushed to forge a brief one-point lead.
“He’s a real pro,” Phoenix coach Alvin Gentry said. “There’s a reason why he’s stayed in the league and there’s a reason why he’ll stay in the league.
He hasn’t played in a lot of games, but keeps himself in great shape. He’s always ready to go. We told him that we had to have him tonight and he played (12) minutes took a couple of charges, made some defensive stops got some rebounds. It’s all you can really ask.”
There are plenty of limitations in his game as well, but he’s an interesting pawn to have on your bench when the chess match begins in the postseason…
As the Coyotes close in on what could be an exciting postseason (let’s face it any postseason that is your first in almost a decade is pretty exciting), there’s more ominous news from the official franchise newspaper – the Toronto Globe and Mail – tells us that the bid to buy the team is once again in peril and the team’s viability in Glendale beyond this season is again in question.
That’s bad either way you slice it. Either the G&M is right – and they have a hit-and-miss track record over the years – or they are making a mountain out of a molehill just as the Coyotes are starting to turn heads around town.
This team just can’t buy a break:
*Dave Tippett is going to win Coach of the Year – well deserved, but not exactly a coveted award in the NHL since Jack Adams winners have a funny way of getting fired not long after.
*Goalie Ilya Bryzgalov is getting a lot of publicity as a Vezina Trophy candidate. The Coyotes are neck and neck with Vancouver, Pittsburgh and New Jersey in the point standings. Take a look at the four rosters and tell me if that makes any sense at all.
*GM Don Maloney appears to have pushed the right buttons at the trade deadline – although Peter Mueller, as was the fear, has seven points in five games with Colorado and doing all the things he flat stopped doing here.
But the Coyotes had lost three straight and were looking to Maloney for help before he made seven deals and brought in a slew of new faces to town. Since then, Phoenix has won three straight and remains in the fight for home ice in the postseason.
Several of the new Coyotes played major roles. Wojtek Wolski beat his old Colorado team with 20 second left in regulation. Lee Stempniak looks like the 27-goal scorer he was in St. Louis (three goals in three games). And the new depth gave Tippett the ability to bench the struggling forwards like Taylor Pyatt, who responded to the banishment with his best game in months in Wednesday’s win over Vancouver.
Now young Viktor Tikhonov, who has regained his confidence and his scoring touch (14 goals in 25 games on the Russian KHL) has joined the team. The skaters are now on notice : Bad shifts will get you benched and bad games will get you scratched. Try to remember the last time that was even an option with this franchise.
There is so much to enjoy about this team, only to hear that behind the scenes that the Valley is again in dire danger of losing its NHL hockey team – now that it finally has one.
A Fanster exclusive blogger and Steve Nash enthusiast, Steve Fan provides takes on Steve Nash and the Suns. Watch out because he has MVP caliber talent.
A new fan but seasoned author, Keira-Anne brings her passion for all things basketball to add her take on things from north of the border. Hailing from Steve Nash's stomping ground of Vancouver Island, this Vancouver blogger has been writing about life on the coast for more than five years. An eternal optimist and sometimes realist, Keira-Anne hopes that her love for the Phoenix Suns will translate into nothing short of exciting views of life on Planet Orange.
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The Timberwolves had to have something positive to talk about after last night’s mauling at the hands of the Suns. Too bad 
Charles Bukowski, my favorite writer,
