| Porter to Bring New Look to Suns |
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| Written by Phil Partington | |
| Wednesday, 10 September 2008 | |
 In the last three seasons, the Suns are just 4-13 when Nash hasn’t played and has lost those games by an average of 13 points. Conversely, the Suns have a record of 166-63 in games Nash has played in the last three years. D’Antoni has looked lost at times without Nash, relying on high pick and rolls for deep three-pointers whenever Nash wasn’t around to create open looks for perimeter gunners. Terry Porter’s philosophy is very different, and it took new General Manager, Steve Kerr, to identify Phoenix’s major problem. Kerr recognized the need for a big man to clog the paint on defense and free up Amare Stoudemire to play against players his own size. While his solution of trading Shawn Marion for Shaquille O’Neal may not have been the wisest, it’s hard to criticize him too much for at least addressing the longstanding problem. O’Neal is getting older and slower each year, and isn’t the best defensive big man anyway. He’s one of the most foul-prone players in the league. Rather than simply trying to adjust a penetrating player’s shot, Shaq has always had a tendency to reach. That may be due to a lack of lateral quickness. Porter is more of a defensive-minded coach than D’Antoni, and will look to run more defensive schemes. While this is a good thing for Phoenix, it’s safe to say that this new style might take some of the Suns players time to readjust after playing under D’Antoni’s comfortable system for so long. Moreover, D’Antoni’s player rotations were often questionable. He would frequently give major minutes to his stars, like Nash and Stoudemire, despite blowing another team out. Nash, who’ll be 34 in February, should be rested as much as possible. Porter’s plan will be to rest these veterans, especially Nash and the injury prone Grant Hill. Porter may not bring more season wins to Phoenix, but he should be a better fit for playoff basketball. Time will tell if he’ll be enough, though. With the toughness of the West, the Suns might be aging too quickly.         Set as favorite Bookmark Comments
(1)
Nice
written by Jbuckley , September 11, 2008
Good article, you hit the nail on the head, Phoenix have the offensive talent and the great point guard skills of Steve Nash that doesn't require much coaching. They should probably begin to at least start training a solid young PG for when Nash does fall off
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