Well, my fans have been clamoring for another post. And, like always, I am here to please my fans. In my last post I gave a suggested the Suns make a run at Troy Murphy, an outside-shooting power forward who can stroke it from outside. Unfortunately, the Suns did not take my advice. I can’t imagine that Lon Babby does not read all of these posts, so my only conclusion is that they are just ignoring me. I’m okay with that, now let’s get down to business.
It turns out that the Suns were looking to make a deal, even if they didn’t go for my idea. On December 18 the Suns traded Jason Richardson, Hedo Turkoglu and Earl Clark to the Orlando Magic for Vince Carter, Mikael Pietrus, and Marcin Gortat.
At first glance, the deal is surprising, seeing as how Richardson was the Suns leading scorer and was the so-called “x-factor” on the team’s improbable run to the Western Conference Finals last season. At second glance, the trade looks terrific. I look at it this way: the Suns upgraded two positions and in the worst case scenario downgraded slightly at another.
Let’s evaluate. Earl Clark was not going to see the floor. It didn’t matter how hard he worked, he just wasn’t going to “get it” on the court. He had ideal size to be a great combo forward, but something was missing. The front office had already decided to decline his option for next season and he likely was not returning anyway. In return for Clark, the Suns picked up another wing in Pietrus, who is a good perimeter defender, something the Suns desperately needed, if only to give Grant Hill some much needed relief. Pietrus is also an above average spot up three-point shooter.
The hardest pill to swallow in the trade was definitely the loss of Jason Richardson. He was the Suns’ leading scorer and was well-liked by everyone on the team. Which cannot be understated based on last season’s success with a team built around chemistry. Insert Vince Carter. Carter, in my opinion, is the biggest waste of talent in my basketball memory. I know I hear a lot about Derrick Coleman and Vin Baker, but they were mostly before my time. Vince Carter has more physical talent than anyone who entered the league since Michael Jordan. I missed a lot of Jordan’s athletic prime, but I’m not convinced the Jordan was more physically gifted than Vince. I think I’ve commented on this before (take a peek at my archives, it’s in there somewhere). When you look at the two, Richardson is definitely better. He’s younger, has more left in the tank and is overall having a better statistical season. Now, there are two ways to justify this loss. One, all signs pointed to the front office not re-signing Richardson (who is under contract for over $13 million this season). Since he was not going to return, trading Richardson for a similar talent is justifiable. Add to that is Carter’s semi-expiring deal could be a very appealing trade asset to many teams looking to shed over $17 million in payroll. The Suns still might be able to flip Carter’s contract for some young, quality talent or picks. Second, the Suns probably wouldn’t have had a chance to get Gortat and Pietrus had they not helped Orlando get rid of Carter’s lackadaisical style.
Now the best part of the trade, Hedo Turkoglu for Marcin Gortat. Clearly, we can all agree that the Hedo Turkoglu experiment failed miserably. I’ll admit that I thought this would work. I thought Turkoglu could be Dirk Nowitzki to Steve Nash’s…well, Steve Nash. Oh, did it fail. I forgot (and I guess so did Alvin Gentry, Lon Babby and Robert Sarver for that matter) to look at his defensive and rebounding numbers. They are bad. From the start of the season it was clear that the Suns missed Stoudemire’s defense and rebounding, crazy huh? Turkoglu was getting beat on EVERY SINGLE rebound! Excuse my all caps. Trading Turkoglu for Gortat was a brilliant move. Even though Gortat is mostly used as a center, he can still back up Lopez and give the Suns some much needed depth, or even play alongside of Lopez at the four. He is agile enough to run the pick and roll with Nash as well as contribute on defense and rebounding.
There, on paper it looks like a good trade. Unfortunately the team has only gone 1-5 since the newly acquired players joined the team. So far the defense and rebounding are still quite poor with the only defense being the offense…which is now worse than it was before. As a life-long Suns fan, I am still holding out hope that this team can turn it around. With Steve Nash running the offense, I believe things will get better as the new players continue to acclimate themselves to the new system. And if not, then there’s always an expiring contract we can shop around…oh and another lottery pick. Go Suns!
