Michael Schwartz: Two seasons ago the Phoenix Suns faced a franchise-altering summer and came away with a slew of overpriced role players after Amare Stoudemire departed.

The Suns are embarking on another critical offseason in which they may lose another franchise icon and be left with a few banks worth of cash to start the rebuilding process. Or Steve Nash could return and they could try to put the best team out there while getting younger at the same time. Or maybe Nash returns along with a stud free agent like Eric Gordon and the Suns are good again. Or maybe the first scenario occurs and the Suns keep their powder dry until next offseason.

This offseason could go in many different ways and whichever way it does will color the direction of this proud franchise.

At a lunch with the media on Wednesday, Suns president of basketball operations Lon Babby hammered home the point that the Suns will not spend just to spend with just over $30 million in commitments for next season. They will be disciplined in their approach and will not just fling around money because they have it as seemed to be the case two years ago.

The counter-argument (which I do not subscribe to) is that Babby is just setting up the Suns to be cheap if they don’t re-sign Nash.

Kevin Zimmerman, are you with me that this is the right approach to rebuilding the Suns back into the “elite” team Babby proclaimed he wants them to soon be?

Kevin Zimmerman: I’m with you in that the philosophy Babby was trying to sell is a good one. Now we get to find out if that’s an honest plan from the man at the top in Robert Sarver, or if it is indeed the counterargument of Phoenix being cheap.

Look, at some point all those sold draft picks has to culminate in something.

To Babby’s credit, he did mention those sold draft picks this week, saying the Suns really need to do better in developing young talent. So I think that while spending money on free agents — and wisely at that — is important, watching the amount of activity on draft day will also lend evidence as to whether or not Phoenix is really trying to work toward building an elite team.

Before the trading deadline, I thought it would be a good sign if the Suns made some small moves to free up more cap space/acquire young players, or even if they were rumored to trade a guy like Robin Lopez. In that, we could at least see that the Suns were really trying hard to go in a new direction. We didn’t hear so much as a peep.

This summer, there had better be a little more action between the draft and free agency. While it’s not the worst thing if they hold off and sign some one-year contracts to look to next summer, they at least need to show the fans that they’re active in change, because the status quo isn’t working.

Home run signings aside, what would you consider a positive offseason?

Schwartz: Very interesting question that’s difficult to answer before we know what choices they have, but if they avoid any and all dumb moves I would consider it a positive offseason. Making a smart draft pick should also be part of this equation, but coming from the guy who thought Earl Clark was a smart pick it might take time to judge that part of the summer.

I understand to some that could be seen as a fairly low bar to set, but I just hope we’ve seen our last mid-level contract for a role player for some time. The reason I’m grading this on a scale is because there just isn’t very much of that top-shelf talent available, so if they don’t get the big fish what else can they really do?

For it truly to be considered successful, I’ll add that they need to make one savvy, Sam Presti-style move. That could be making a lopsided trade, winning an amnesty auction or whatever else. Just something to give hope that the Suns are going about things the right way.

If Nash leaves, bringing back The Dragon would qualify as a good move in my book and taking a shot at a talented but thus far underwhelming young gun like O.J. Mayo or Jerryd Bayless could be interesting as well. Just as long as they don’t overpay.

So two questions for you. How do you think this Nash thing plays out and who are some under the radar free agents you think the Suns should go after?

Zimmerman: I think it’s evident that this early into the process Nash has no clue what he’ll do, but I do think that he’s a unique beast in how he will handle this process.

Everyone agrees that Nash, more than most, deserves to sign with a championship contender, but even some of Nash’s teammates had gut feelings that he’d stay. That’s important to note. Those guys know Nash as a person better than anymore, and it’s proof that his Canadian-bred loyalty will go a long way in the potential for Phoenix re-signing him. In the end, I believe the Suns have a realistic shot at re-signing the two-time MVP if they have a solid plan going into the offseason and into the next few seasons. Then again, if the free agent market is as dry as it appears, maybe he’ll have to jet if he doesn’t think Phoenix is a playoff contender.

I think what we’ve heard on every front is true; the Suns want Nash back and he’ll look for a good reason to stay.  But that doesn’t mean he will. The front office will have to give him reasons to stay early in the free agency signing period.

As for other signings, I think we’ve all agreed that Eric Gordon is the main get after Deron Williams. After that, there are some interesting names that might fit what the Suns need.

Especially if Grant Hill doesn’t return to Phoenix, adding a player like Mayo can go a long way. He’s a do-it-all guard that fits with or without Nash. He can be another lockdown defender alongside Jared Dudley, he can shoot the ball, and he can act as a primary ballhandler capable of shouldering some of that workload.

And this might just be me, but J.R. Smith in a Suns uniform would be exciting in the system that won’t hinder a player of his ability from putting up shots.

I’m not jumping on the Nic Batum or Jamal Crawford trains. How about you?

Schwartz: Crawford, definitely not, at least on a multi-year deal. The only scenario in which I would like him is if Nash returns but they want to save the rest of the powder and go with one-year deals. He could fit in the Shannon Brown instant offense off the bench role, but other than that I’m not feeling him at all.

I do actually like Batum quite a bit, but not for how much he will cost. Really first of all I don’t think there’s any way Portland lets him go shy of a just stupid deal. They dumped all those contracts and certainly have more than enough money to keep a player they really like.

I think Batum would be a great piece on a contender but not necessarily a first or second banana. He defends and can shoot threes and would be a great star role player, but his cost will be much higher than you can bear when the words “role player” are involved in the least bit. If he could be had for a reasonable price, I would be on board.

Now to shift the conversation a bit, one of the most interesting points Lon Babby made on Wednesday was that he hates tanking.

He said, “I’m adamantly opposed to this concept of tanking. I don’t think it’s the right way to go about things. I don’t think it’s good for our franchise, I don’t think it’s good for our fan base, it’s not good for our city. Quite often what it does is I think allows you to mask bad decisions year after year claiming that you’re in this idea that you’re trying to get bad to get good.”

What should we make of that in light of the possibility that Nash leaves and this team needs to rebuild? Do you believe in tanking if this team has no choice but to be bad? Or is it admirable that the Suns could be the one team unwilling to tank?

Zimmerman: I think it’s admirable for Babby and company to be against the mindset of tanking at this point, if simply because you never go into a season expecting to be downright awful.

I mean, do you think the Bobcats planned this season to go as it has? No, but at a certain point in the season where it’s not worth it to win games, I think the philosophy of tanking can begin to be discussed. So whatever Babby says now, I think you absolutely can’t be ready to tank before the year begins, even if Nash isn’t re-signed and the team doesn’t have a big free agent signed in the offseason.

If that’s the case, the Suns still need to put enough of the best one-year contracts together and attempt to win. It’s not fair to the fans to do otherwise. And that’s especially true because this roster isn’t composed of very many young players where the team can use the excuse of player development as a synonym for tanking.

As for later in the year if it all goes downhill and Phoenix is already looking toward next year, then Babby’s anti-tanking comments can be further criticized. And that will have to be later in the year, because I’d argue that the late-season playoff push this year was good for fans’ attitude toward the team as well as business.

Now, I don’t see any other path than to swing for the best basketball team possible.

From your point of view, what should the Suns do if Nash splits town and they aren’t in line for the likes of an Eric Gordon?

Schwartz: It’s funny you bring up the Bobcats. I actually do think the Bobcats went into the season knowing they were going to be at the bottom of the league. Maybe they didn’t set out and make it a goal to be the worst team in NBA history during training camp, but when they traded Stephen Jackson around the draft and dealt Gerald Wallace at the previous trade deadline, they were going for the all-out tank, especially with two lottery picks in their back pocket from the 2011 draft.

As for your question, if Nash leaves and they aren’t in line for a Gordon I would go into all-out savvy move mode. That means I would save my flexibility for next offseason and be disciplined unless I could use the cap space for valuable future assets.

That could mean making the Kurt Thomas trade in reverse whereby the Suns could pick up future picks to take on a bad contract, it could be a lopsided trade to acquire a talented player for nothing, it could involve winning an amnesty auction, any of that kind of stuff. I’d even be willing to take a chance on a guy like Mayo if his deal is reasonable and you feel he can become an important part of your future.

Quality youth and picks would be the mantra, and all mid-level deals would be avoided.

Add it all up, and that would signal the start of the Suns’ rebuilding process. That’s inevitable if Nash leaves, so all moves I would make would revolve around getting solid young players that can help you build a team that can contend once you land that superstar.

OK, time for final thoughts. What do you think goes down this summer in the Valley?

Zimmerman: Oof, way to put me on the spot. If I’d have to guess as an optimist I’d say Phoenix can’t get enough help for Nash to consider returning. That’s not so optimistic but at the end of the day, the free agent class isn’t worth spending all their money upon. Phoenix makes a pickup or two of solid role players, but the Suns hold off on spending this offseason in hopes of hitting the jackpot next offseason.

Oh, and they also make a good draft of a future All-Star despite being at the end of the lottery.

Schwartz: My official stance is that it’s 60/40 Nash returns. In his heart of hearts I think he wants to come back, he just doesn’t want to spend the twilight of his career competing for the eighth seed year in and year out. If the Suns show any signs of being able to put a competitive team around him I think he’s back.

So I’ll predict that the Suns chase Gordon but New Orleans doesn’t let him get away. They will sign an upside guy like Mayo to take some of the creating pressure off Nash and Two Time returns.

But I wouldn’t exactly be willing to go to Vegas to bet on that. It’s such a tough situation to judge and I’m sure variables will emerge as we get closer to July that we haven’t even considered yet. To throw out a wild one, what if the Suns win the Anthony Davis lottery?

If Nash leaves, I think they will make a run at a guy like Gordon and then go into powder-saving mode while investigating the trade market.

So many possibilities exist that I’m entirely unconfident about all those predictions, but I do know that the Phoenix Suns are in for a franchise-shaping offseason no matter how it goes down.

To him, that defines a squad “that’s going to legitimately compete for championships every year.”

“That’s what we aspire to, that’s what we work towards every single day that we’re here,” he said.

In actuality, the Suns are a .500 team after consecutive seasons in which they missed the playoffs with a combined record two games below that mark.

So the billion dollar question is, how do the Suns transform from a perfectly mediocre team with a 38-year-old star to a team that can “legitimately compete for championships,” as they did during the SSOL era?

If I had that answer I would probably be working in the Suns’ front office rather than running a Suns blog, but I can report that during an hour-long chat with the media on Wednesday Babby laid out his vision predicated on patience and making smart decisions to build the Suns “brick by brick” into the aforementioned powerhouse.

The most important point Babby made is that the Suns won’t rush into bad deals just to make a splash because they have money to spend. Or in other words, they will do the exact opposite of the Summer of 2010 post-Amare.

“We have cap space, but cap space doesn’t mean you’re going to go out and sign free agents,” said Babby, whose team has just over $30 million in commitments for next season. “It could also mean that we’re going to make one-sided trades, and there’s a distinct possibility we don’t use our cap room this summer because we’ve worked hard to put ourselves in this position to have this kind of flexibility, to have a range of opportunities, but I am absolutely determined that we’re going to be disciplined in how we approach this because we cannot get ourselves right back in the same spot that we were in by doing bad contracts, not assessing value properly, not making the right choices in terms of personnel.”

Babby later went on to say, “We’re not on any artificial time frame.  If the opportunities are there, we’re going to seize them, but we’re going to make decisions that we feel are going to put us in position to be elite, which again is about competing every year for a championship. I’m not interested in patching it up and getting good for a year or even two without making progress. It may be that we make the decision that we kind of do a little bit of what we did last year and wait a year and keep our powder dry and be as competitive as we can be. We’ll see how that plays out. We have to make the decisions from the standpoint of not only what’s good for us today but what’s going to be good for us tomorrow.”

I can already foresee some of the objections in the comments about this being “just another way for the Suns to be cheap,” but personally I could not agree more with this line of thinking.

We learned in the Summer of Amare what happens when you rush into decisions and make moves just because you have money. All of a sudden you end up with Turkoglu, Warrick, Childress and Frye at bloated numbers.

The Suns will do their due diligence, and if they can add that star power then they will. However, a quick glance at the list of free agents this summer will tell you how unlikely that is.

Babby reiterated Steve Nash’s demand that the Suns’ biggest need is “another dynamic weapon on offense wherever that might be whether it’s at the wing or down low.” This has been an issue since Amare left, and until the Suns find such an offense player to pair with Nash it’s hard to see them getting too much closer to elite status.

Eric Gordon is the one dynamic offensive player who could be available through restricted free agency, and based on the fact that Alvin Gentry has often gone out of his way to heap praise on Gordon in the past, I fully expect the Suns to pursue the Hornets’ guard, as well they should.

But the biggest mistake the Suns could make is to strike out with guys like Gordon and Nicolas Batum (who isn’t leaving Portland I wouldn’t imagine) and then tossing dollars at the next Josh Childress, as Babby clearly understands.

“Look, I’ve taken advantage of this situation as an agent,” Babby said. “When you’ve got a team that can’t get what they want, can’t get their first choice, and the pressure builds to do something you get teams to make some very bad decisions, and we’re not going to do that because I’m not going to sell false hope.”

After pointing out how much the Suns’ players said they enjoyed playing in Phoenix during their exit interviews, Babby also addressed “some skepticism about our ability to attract free agents, which I was an agent, and I don’t get it why anyone wouldn’t want to play here and I don’t believe for one minute that they don’t want to play here.”

We will soon find out, and if nobody wants to play here and nothing else works out then the Suns will duplicate their 2011-12 strategy and sign one-year deals to delay their cap bonanza for another offseason.

In the meantime the Suns will take advantage of all the other potential options for teams with cap space, which includes making lopsided trades with teams desperate to dump money and potentially even winning an amnesty auction.

Whereas during the crucial summer two seasons ago the Suns seemed to enter without a plan once Amare fled and flung their money around recklessly, this time they know exactly how they want to fill their cap room if not the specifics.

The NBA is a star’s league, and a glance at the current elite teams (think Miami, Chicago, OKC, San Antonio, the Lakers) shows multiple stars at the top for each squad.

That the Suns plan on being fiscally responsible and taking their time to make smart, savvy moves is fantastic, but along the way they must add another dynamic player to depart the treadmill of mediocrity and accelerate their return to the ranks of the elite.

And 1

Along with his comments on Steve Nash’s situation that Zim wrote about yesterday, Babby discussed the following potential personnel moves:

• It is “quite likely, if not certain” that the Suns will match any offer to restricted free agent Robin Lopez. It kind of sounded like he was trying to send a message through the media to scare off other teams from making an attractive offer to Robin, so I would not be surprised if this becomes less certain once an offer reaches a certain threshold.
• The team will extend a qualifying offer to Aaron Brooks to preserve his rights. He cannot be dealt in a sign-and-trade because he wasn’t on the roster last season.
• Babby would be “disappointed” if Grant Hill wore another team’s uniform, but he was fairly confident that if Hill does not retire he will be wearing purple and orange next fall.
• The Suns will consider using the amnesty clause if it helps them make a corresponding advantageous move. If they end up saving their powder for next offseason, it would make sense to save it for Childress down the road at that point.

Michael Schwartz: Right now all the Phoenix Suns can bother focusing on is the next game.

With three games remaining, they are two victories (if one comes in Utah) away from securing a playoff berth that even some people in their own locker room must have had trouble forecasting back when this team stumbled into the All-Star break at 14-20.

Now that the Suns are two wins away from becoming the first Western Conference team since the 1996-97 Suns to earn a playoff berth after entering the break at least six games under .500, I must ask you Mike Schmitz if it’s even worth it for this team to sneak into the playoffs as a likely first-round sacrifical opponent when this franchise so desperately needs a franchise star out of this year’s loaded draft?

Mike Schmitz: It’s easy to argue why the Suns sneaking into the playoffs as an eighth seed and getting bounced in the first round is counterproductive for the franchise. It’s no secret that Phoenix is in dire need of young talent. Steve Nash and Grant Hill are clearly in the final stages of their careers and the talent outside of those two simply isn’t going to cut it.

But with all of that said, it’s still more than worth it for Nash and the Suns to make a push at that final playoff spot. Yes, it would be nice to have a lottery pick, but really what’s the difference between the 13th or 14th pick and the 15th or 16th? Is there really that big of a difference between an Austin Rivers and a Tony Wroten Jr. or a Terrence Jones and John Henson?

The Suns aren’t going to be exponentially better off in the future with a low lottery pick as opposed to a pick in the late teens. If the Suns really wanted to land top-tier young talent they would have had to commit to tanking at the All-Star break. It makes no sense to throw away a chance at the playoffs if you’re not going to be able to target guys like Anthony Davis, Andre Drummond, Thomas Robinson, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist or Bradley Beal in the draft.

People wonder what good it does to go one-and-done in the playoffs. But there’s still merit in making the playoffs, especially for a team with such limited talent like this one. The Steve Nash era could be coming to a screeching halt after this season, so why not give him one more chance at making an improbable playoff run?

Playoff basketball brings excitement to the city of Phoenix. Regardless of how short-lived it may be, a Suns playoff appearance has a sizable economic impact on the city and the franchise. Not to get too financial, but season tickets are more likely to be renewed and fans are more likely to go back to games next season.

Not every team is going to have a shot at a championship. You can’t just rebuild and expect to walk to a ring in five years. It doesn’t work like that. Some teams get stuck in the rebuilding process and never come out.

With all that said, it’s extremely worth it for the Suns to sneak into the playoffs, no matter when they get eliminated. This season marks the end of the Nash era and that combined with the minimal difference in talent between the end of the lottery and just outside the lottery is more than enough to motivate the Suns to make a playoff push that some have so adamantly argued against.

Schwartz: First off you caught me in my tracks when you said this is the end of the Nash era. It very well may be, but it would not surprise me if we have three more years of this.

I certainly agree with your argument, though. The tanking train left the station once the Suns got hot on that long homestand after the All-Star break. I understand tanking for a talent like Anthony Davis that can completely change the direction of your franchise, but after that the draft is just such a crapshoot.

I don’t know if there is another surefire star after Davis (although a lot of guys there at the top very well may become one), but I really do like the depth of this draft. At the start of the season I thought the Suns needed to do everything possible to acquire a franchise-altering player or two in this draft, but like you said at this point the Suns will be resigned to roll the dice and hope whatever mid-first round talent they pick turns into another important piece of their future and not Earl Clark.

At last year’s Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, former Blazers GM Kevin Pritchard broached the concept of the treadmill of mediocrity, which basically says the worst place for an NBA team is to be not good enough to make a serious playoff run but not bad enough to acquire a franchise-changing star in the draft.

Fast as they may be pacing, the Phoenix Suns franchise is squarely on that treadmill.

However, the treadmill of mediocrity is only a hazard if your only goal is to win a championship. But only one team wins a title each year, and NBA history doesn’t possess much parity as to who wins them.

The Suns’ season has been infinitely more exciting than say the Wizards or the Kings, but those teams on paper roster the kind of impact young talent you get by following the Thunder model and building through the draft — and although they will be adding even more in June there is still no end in sight to their losing ways.

Should we only measure success in championships, as some around the league certainly feel is the case, or can we celebrate this Suns season (if it finishes with a postseason berth) as a laudable achievement even though it doesn’t seem to put them any closer to a parade?

Schmitz: I do agree that Nash could be back in Phoenix, especially if the Suns add two major pieces in the offseason to give them a legitimate shot at a Western Conference Finals run. There’s also no question that Nash can be a productive point guard for two or three more seasons.

But the question is, do you really trust this management group to bring in the right pieces? The same group that gave Goran Dragic away and tried to replace Amare Stoudemire with Hedo Turkoglu, Josh Childress and Hakim Warrick? Sure the Markieff Morris pick is looking like a good one, Shannon Brown and Sebastian Telfair are working out and Michael Redd has more or less resurrected his career, but Phoenix’s front office has been far from perfect. It’s hard for me to think Nash believes in this front office to put the right pieces in place to make a deep playoff run. There’s no question, however, he believes in Alvin Gentry, his teammates and the fan base.

All of that is somewhat beside the point, though. In terms of the treadmill of mediocrity argument, I really don’t think you can just put together three bad seasons and then poof, you’re the Oklahoma City Thunder. So many things went right for that team.

They very easily could have drafted Hasheem Thabeet or Jonny Flynn instead of James Harden in 2009. Think if they ended up with O.J. Mayo or even Michael Beasley instead of Russell Westbrook in 2008. Imagine if the Trail Blazers chose Kevin Durant with the No. 1 pick in the 2007 draft, leaving the Thunder with Greg Oden.

Oklahoma City hit back-to-back-to-back home runs in three consecutive drafts, which is basically impossible to do. The Thunder are the exception, not the rule. Few other teams have been able to use their model with even close to the success of the Sam Presti-led franchise.

Sure, everyone wants to believe that landing that Durant, Westbrook or Harden is right around the corner. Ideally, everyone thinks tanking beats a few playoff appearances because it will ultimately end in a ring. But the reality is, that’s not the case at all.

How many different teams have won NBA championships over the last 13 years? Six. Only six different teams have won the last 13 championships, with the Lakers and Spurs winning nine of them. Winning a championship isn’t easy, and implementing a championship-or-bust mentality will only lead to disappointment.

Being a fringe playoff team and every few years over-performing and making a Western Conference Finals appearance is something most NBA teams would be more than happy with. Would you have traded the 2009-10 WCF run for the shot at a top-five pick in the next year’s draft? Probably not.

As the saying goes, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. The Suns could very well have tanked and in a few years those same fans who called for a rebuilding process would be complaining over botched draft picks and lost seasons.

Enjoy what you have. Take in an over-performing team and a masterpiece of a coaching job by Alvin Gentry. Marvel at Steve Nash’s production at age 38, Morris’ growth as a rookie, Telfair’s emergence as a legitimate backup point guard, Redd’s return to the NBA and the other story lines attached to this season.

These guys deserve to play in the playoffs, and the Suns’ franchise won’t take a hit because of it. The way I see it, if the Suns sneak into the playoffs they’ll most likely get bounced in the first round but will still have space for two max free agents (pending a Nash re-signing). They’ll still draft in the 15-18 range and have a shot at legitimate lottery talent in this deep draft. Missing the playoffs this season would do nothing for them but move them most likely three or four spots up in the draft.

Rebuilding has far too positive of a connotation. Some teams never make it out. Like Kentucky winning a national championship with mostly all freshmen, the Thunder are the exception, not the standard. Success shouldn’t be measured in championships because it’s not realistic, and rebuilding shouldn’t be seen as some short road back to the NBA Finals.

Schwartz: Lon Babby would want me to remind you that he and Lance Blanks weren’t around until after the damage had been done in the Summer of 2010, but I suppose that’s besides the point. An even bigger issue than a lack of faith in the front office is the reality that there just aren’t a ton of home run moves out there right now.

I am staunchly on the Eric Gordon bandwagon, but short of him there’s nobody I would throw a max contract at, and even Gordon’s a stretch for that with his injury history, but you have to overpay to steal a restricted free agent.

After him I would love to see Nicolas Batum in purple and orange, but I don’t see any way Portland lets him out of their grasp, and if they did Phoenix would have to vastly overpay. There could be some nice bargains, but the biggest thing the Suns must do is avoid doling out bad mid-level contracts, or in other words don’t repeat 2010.

My fear is they will try to appease Nash in any way possible and thus panic sign somebody at a price that’s laughable before the ink dries.

Back to the main topic at hand, you make a great point about the Thunder and their luck. They sure did hit three home runs, but they started it off with a walkoff grand slam when the alternative (Greg Oden) was a game-ending triple play. If OKC has Oden instead of Durant they may still be a nice young up-and-coming team, but in no way would they be the league’s model franchise. That might be Portland (or at least it would be if Roy’s knees had held up).

Just look at Sacramento. They’ve been picking in the lottery for several years now and still possess a disjointed core. Or even Minnesota, who has been atrocious since 2004-05 and only now FINALLY can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Then there’s Memphis, who traded Love for Mayo and then drafted Thabeet over Harden, Evans, Rubio and Curry yet are still a sleeper title contender.

The bottom line is that unless you are located in South Beach and a Big Three coalesces on your shores, you are largely at the mercy of luck, something the Suns have received little of throughout the years.

How different would these past few years have been with Al Horford or Joakim Noah instead of Robin Lopez if the Suns had received a high lottery pick from Atlanta in 2007?

And then of course once you build your championship contender you need even more luck to make it through the cauldron of the NBA playoffs that have been dominated by the Lakers and Spurs the past several years as you point out.

The argument for blowing things up is that you might get lucky and draft a franchise player, but you might not and be the next Sacramento or Minnesota — teams that thrived at the beginning of the past decade — rather than the next OKC.

That’s why the Suns want to hang on to Steve Nash as long as possible and it’s why they have rejected rebuilding this season as much as they need a young star.

So let me end this with one final series of questions since we seem to be in agreement that this playoff run was for the better: How should the Suns reload? Is rebuilding inevitable or can they continue to try to put a worthy team around Nash? Should every move be centered around building toward a championship or can we enjoy a fun, overachieving Nash team with a dubious future?

I say that because I don’t see a real championship move in the Suns this offseason although we know they will make a hard run at Nash, so this could be the status quo for a few more years since you can’t exactly rebuild and start over around a soon-to-be 39-year-old.

Schmitz: I couldn’t agree more with your points about the weak free agent class. Eric Gordon would certainly be a great fit, and like you said, he and Batum are two of the only, young and attainable guys who the Suns could somewhat build around. There are some other potential nice pieces out there like Gerald Wallace or even a Roy Hibbert (if Gortat were to move to the four) but there’s no doubt the field is slim.

So how would I deal with this situation if I were the Phoenix Suns’ GM? I think you try to re-sign Nash, add a few pieces around him in the offseason and stay competitive until Nash retires. If you could roll out a lineup of Nash, Gordon, Batum, Frye and Gortat with Markieff vying for that starting four spot you have to like your chances to at least be a four or five seed type of team in the West. Landing both Gordon and Batum is a bit of a stretch, but improving at both those spots with players of that caliber isn’t out of the question with their cap space.

While the Suns compete with that team and enter the final two or three years of the Nash era they should draft a point guard of the future type of guy. I know the Suns need a traditional four man, but there isn’t much of a market for that outside of the top 10, where the Suns won’t be. So that brings us to their next position of need, which in my opinion is the heir to Nash’s throne. Sure, Sebastian Telfair is proving his worth more and more by the game, but I don’t think he’s a franchise point guard by any stretch of the imagination.

It would be ideal if the Suns could move up a few spots and draft a guy like Kendall Marshall, who I feel would be the perfect guy to take over the torch from Nash. But even if that’s not possible the Suns could still land Tony Wroten Jr., who may not be a true point guard but has a world of potential with his size — 6-foot-5, 205 pounds — and ability to attack the rim.

Austin Rivers, who ESPN draft expert Chad Ford has going to the Suns at No. 14 in his current mock draft, would also be a great pick given his go-to-scorer mentality and ability to shoot the three ball. He is a combo-guard as well, but there’s no question he would hone his point guard skills behind Nash.

The moral of the story is, the Suns should try their best to keep Nash around and put their cap space to good use. They can still be a decently competitive, and fun to watch, team until Nash retires all while that point guard of the future develops, Morris grows as a player and those pieces they add in the offseason continue to get comfortable in purple and orange. As we’ve said, tanking and landing a top three pick has its intrigue.

But given the Suns’ situation with Nash and Grant Hill, along with their current record, the depth of this year’s draft and their cap space this offseason, the aforementioned strategy should be their initial plan of attack.

Schwartz: I don’t think they will have the money to sign all three of Nash-Gordon-Batum (assuming any of them would even want to play here) and that would leave Phoenix with minimum contracts to replace the rest of their free agents, but I would consider that the best-case scenario.

Ultimately the direction of the offseason will be decided by general manager Steve Nash. I feel the Suns will make an honest effort to keep him and reload around him. If he signs on, moves will be made to acquire players that fit the Nash system.

If he leaves, the Suns would not have much choice but to rebuild since they would be left with no impact players depending on how you feel about Gortat and tons of money that no elite player would want to take.

At that point, like the Bobcats this season, I think you would have no choice but to depart the treadmill and be really bad next season. I would advocate the young talent and picks strategy and roll over the cap space to next summer if they can’t use it to obtain said young talent and picks.

It’s kind of crazy how the entire direction of the franchise will likely be determined by Nash’s decision, but as Cleveland learned on a much greater scale, such is life in a system geared around a star.

But for now, let’s sit back, relax and enjoy what could be the final improbable chapter of Steve Nash’s career in Phoenix.

Steve Nash said he won't return to the Suns if they don't plan to "upgrade the roster seriously." (AP Photo/Bob Levey)

Steve Nash sent a message Thursday that Suns management must have heard loud and clear: he will only return next season if Phoenix improves.

Nash spoke to everyone from Bill Simmons to Dan Patrick to Jim Rome as part of a Dove Men Care promotional media circuit and touched on a variety of interesting topics but none more important than what he said concerning his pending free agency.

“I definitely do want to win,” Nash told Patrick (which can be heard here). “I’m not going to come back to the Suns if there isn’t an improvement, if they’re not ambitious and they’re not looking to upgrade the roster seriously. And I think they are.

“They’ll have a lot of flexibility in free agency. They’ll also have been standing pat in many ways so they could do some things this summer. I think they’ll become a definite possibility for me. I do want to win. I do want to consider all my options, so it will be interesting to see what happens this summer.”

To my knowledge this is the first time Nash has made such a definitive statement on what Phoenix must do to placate him this offseason. Many have questioned why he would not demand a trade to a contender while playing for a Suns team that floundered before the All-Star break. His competitive nature was questioned by being so at peace to play out his age 38 season on a lottery team.

However, now we know Nash will not be content to play out his days in a system he enjoys, in a city whose fans adore him (where his kids happen to live), for a coach he respects and with teammates he genuinely likes. He also wants to play for a winner.

Such a proclamation (or at least the line of thinking itself) puts a tremendous amount of pressure on the front office to make moves worthy of keeping Nash. This will not be easy since any potential addition would likely want to know Nash is returning as well.

As Larry Coon recently wrote, the Suns are slated to have about $26 million to spend on upgrades next offseason, tied with the Cavs for most in the league. The Suns could likely hand out a max contract and re-sign Nash if such a scenario presents itself.

However, there are not many elite unrestricted free agents aside from Deron Williams (who is not coming here). In theory, the Suns could make a run at an aging star like Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett or Ray Allen, or they could toss some money at a young restricted stud such as Eric Gordon, Nicolas Batum, Ryan Anderson or Brook Lopez.

If they cannot acquire a player worthy of a big dollar contract I would prefer the Suns to sign some one-year deals and save the money for the next summer, but it appears as if such a scenario would mean Nash walks based on today’s comments.

I had been an advocate of exploring a Nash trade due to how easily Two Time could escape for nothing if the right contender calls.

In that vein Patrick asked Nash how he would respond if LeBron James tried to recruit him to Miami.

“I would listen,” Nash said. “He’s phenomenal. I love what they’re doing there. A lot of people don’t like them because they put all that talent there. But they’re professional, they play hard, they play together. Their coaching staff has done a great job, so I have a tremendous amount of respect for them.

“I would definitely listen.”

To me such a scenario seems unlikely unless Nash was willing to play for a mid-level contract and become more of a complementary piece rather than a player the system revolves around as is the case in Phoenix.

Still, if the Suns do not make the requisite improvements so that Nash can stop talking about how much less talented Phoenix is than other teams, it is certainly no stretch to think he would bolt with only cap space left to show for him (which would not be terribly awful if the Suns nabbed a pair of restricted studs, but how likely is that if Nash leaves?).

After a quick 2011 offseason in which Phoenix essentially punted any important decisions to this summer, Lon Babby and Lance Blanks really have their work cut out for them.

They will have to balance bringing back a team good enough to entice Steve Nash to stay with the opportunity to potentially acquire some quality young players. Ideally a player like Gordon (if he’s healthy) could accomplish both goals — serving as a go-to scorer in the present next to Nash as well as a player to build around — but the Suns must resist the urge to overpay a short-term solution.

Now we all know that Nash really does care about winning and that he is not content to lose games in a comfortable situation the rest of his career.

At this point it will be up to the Suns to add the right pieces this summer to convince Nash he can both win and be comfortable in the desert.

 Other interesting tidbits

 I listened to Nash with Simmons on the BS Report and he had many interesting nuggets to share:

• Nash feels the 2006-07 Suns were the best SSOL team: ”I think that was the best of all the teams because of a number of factors. We added a couple of pieces and had been through a few wars. .. 2010 was kind of a magical year.”
• With Mike D’Antoni recently resigning as the Knicks’ head coach, Simmons asked whether his system can work at the highest levels of the NBA. That led to a discussion on all the bad luck the Suns suffered during the SSOL years, with Nash saying the suspensions of Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw hurt the most with that team being undersized to begin with. ”You can’t look back on that series and go, ‘If the suspensions didn’t happen we were through.’ But we were also at an all-time high. It was a team with a lot of belief. We had gotten our heads chopped off a couple years in a row. We were poised to chop someone else’s head off. … That was the year you couldn’t say D’Antoni’s system didn’t work.”
• To Nash, the biggest thing the team was missing during that era was a defensive center to play even as few as 15-20 minutes a game.
• Nash said he made sure potential trade rumors about him did not become a distraction because he did not want to do that to the Phoenix fans or his teammates. He also said the team has been playing better this past month due to improved rebounding and bench play and that getting a good night of sleep is one of the keys to his late-career success.
• Nash told Patrick that he “could be back for sure, but that will be more interesting than the trade deadline.” He said he has not spoken to Dirk Nowitzki about a potential reunion in Dallas and he said he was a lockdown defender at times who pressured fullcourt early in his career as a Maverick.

During the week before the trade deadline we heard nary anything about the possibility of Nash being moved whereas Dwight Howard seemed to change his mind about his future every five minutes.

That could just be because the Suns did a superb job of controlling any leaks but it is most likely because there legitimately was no Nash trade talk making the rounds. The Dwight rumors completely overshadowed what the Magic were doing on the floor, but the Suns quietly went about their winning streak before the deadline passed with hardly a whimper.

“I’m proud of it,” president of basketball ops Lon Babby told Coro. “It was my goal and our goal as an organization to avoid having his situation be a distraction all season long. The only way to do that is to be in partnership and Steve has been a wonderful partner all year.

“I suppose there are people who disagree with whether we should have traded him, but the way he’s handled himself validates and reinforces why we decided to keep him. Stability, loyalty and respect are important in laying our foundation.”

Every time Nash was asked the question he gave the same response about being oblivious to trade rumors and just focusing all his energy on the season. The Suns, meanwhile, continued to reiterate that they would only consider moving Nash if he brought a trade request to their attention.

As I have said all along, my preference was for the Suns to at least see what they could get for Nash. I have felt that they owe it to their future to at least consider such a deal if they could get back a package of legitimate prospects and/or picks.

At the same time, Nash and the organization deserve credit for preventing this from becoming the Dwight Howard circus. Only time will tell if the Suns made the right decision by refusing to deal Two Time, but the way Nash and the Suns have handled this potentially tricky situation has been done with nothing but class.

As for whether he will re-sign, Nash’s agent Bill Duffy had this to say, per Coro:

“He will have options and one he will strongly consider is Phoenix, based on what they’re planning to do. They respect him and he likes (Suns Managing Partner) Robert Sarver, (President of Basketball Operations) Lon Babby, (coach) Alvin Gentry and his teammates.

“I know they’d like to re-sign him, but that’ll be his decision.”

That certainly does not sound like a slam dunk so the Suns’ front office must be a bit concerned that they could have just lost their final chance to acquire some value in return for Nash.

Perhaps there is a reason loyalty is so seldom seen in major sports these days.

Meanwhile, with the trade deadline now behind us I will now officially stopped thinking about lottery picks and instead focus my attention on this playoff race the Suns have found themselves in.

Perhaps I deserve blame for being late to this party, but I just did not think the playoffs were an option after the Suns dropped back-to-back home games to Cleveland in New Jersey after falling at home to lowly New Orleans earlier. Even when Phoenix made a mini-run by winning four of five games in early February I thought their subsequent four losses in a row (including three on consecutive days) would bury them, and if that didn’t surely the Golden State loss before the All-Star break would.

At that point the Suns were three games out of 12th in the loss column, and thus it seemed impossible that Phoenix could pass five teams on its way to a playoff spot regardless of how bunched up the bottom of the West playoff picture was.

Today tells a completely different story. The Suns sit all alone in ninth place and could tie No. 8 Houston in the loss column with a victory over the Rockets tomorrow night in US Airways Center. Suddenly, the playoffs don’t seem so out of the question regardless of how difficult Phoenix’s closing schedule is.

Looking at the team’s future and how badly it craves a franchise star, a part of me still really wants the Suns to get a top 10 pick in this loaded draft. This hot streak may just serve to put the Suns in the no man’s land of being not good enough to make the playoffs but not bad enough to get an impact lottery pick either, which is what I fear the most.

But by not even considering trading Nash the Suns are clearly going all in this year while trying to rebuild on-the-fly, and I suppose there would be worse things than an unexpected run to the playoffs even if it makes the eventual rebuilding process a little harder.

And 1

• Despite the recent run, John Hollinger’s Playoff Odds give Phoenix just a 19.0 percent chance of reaching the playoffs. That is worse than three teams Phoenix leads in the standings — Minnesota, Portland and Utah — and puts them in 12th place in the West with a projected record of 31-35. SCHOENE is not buying the Suns either, projecting a 9-14 finish (including the Detroit game) for a 30-36 final record that would also rank 12th in the last behind the Wolves, Blazers and Jazz.
• ESPN’s Tom Haberstroh ranks Nash as the fourth-best 2012 free agent behind Deron Williams Brook Lopez and Ryan Anderson. Writes Haberstroh: “Can you imagine if Nash played on a contender rather than spending his time in NBA purgatory (also known as the Phoenix Suns)? The magic is still there even as he approaches 40 years young. He owns the top effective field goal percentage in the league, the top assist rate in the league and arguably the top make-everyone-around-him-better rating the game has ever seen. It’s almost a crime that a talent of his caliber hasn’t played with an All-Star since Amare Stoudemire in 2009-10. Nash won’t play at this level forever (we think), and you can expect multiple contenders will be bidding for his services even though he’s one of the oldest players in the sport.”

Chad Ford and John Hollinger released their most recent NBA Future Power Rankings on Wednesday, and if you’re a Suns fan, you probably know what I’m about to tell you.

Let’s just say that if you went to a psychic and they somehow knew everything about your personal life, gave you a very detailed description of how that all could come crashing down, and you could shake your head and say, “Yes, that’s entirely possible,” then you’d be the Phoenix Suns.

Hollinger and Ford ranked the Suns as having the 29th best future in the NBA for the next three seasons, moving them down from their previous rank of 26.

Their thoughts:

Our rankings have been really effective in predicting the rise of certain teams like the Pacers. It’s also been strongly predictive of the catastrophic fall of a few teams like the Suns, who have slipped again from 26th to 29th this time.

They might just stay there a while.

Besides Steve Nash, Marcin Gortat and Jared Dudley, every other player on the roster who gets significant minutes has a PER below the league average. Meanwhile Nash is in the last year of his deal and the Suns continue to insist they don’t want to trade him. The truth is, given how long they’ve waited, it’s doubtful they could get much back in return anyway.

If Nash and Grant Hill bolt, the Suns will have some cap space next summer. But thanks to the senseless contracts owner Robert Sarver gave Hakim Warrick and Josh Childress two summers ago it won’t be nearly as much as it could have been. Besides, who exactly on the free-agent market is going to replace Nash when he’s gone?

Sarver’s bumbling over the past few years has caused us to rank the Suns’ management 30th in the league. Yes, we think even Minnesota’s David Kahn and Glen Taylor could do this better. That’s saying something.

The only good news? The team should have enough cap room to make at least one significant free-agent addition this summer, and the team should have high draft picks in the next few years. There’s really not much more to say.

The rankings are based upon five categories and the final score falls on a scale from 0 – 1,200. The Suns finished with an ugly 350, earning a 50 points out of 600 in their future players (29th in the NBA), an 18 out of 200 points in management (30th), a 140 out of 200 points in money (8th), a 59 out of 100 points in market (10th), and a 83 out of 100 in draft (4th).

**Find a table for definitions of the five categories at the bottom of the story

Charlotte has the least exceptional future, according to Hollinger and Ford. Detroit (28th), New Orleans (27th) and Toronto (26th) fill out the bottom five futures in the NBA.

Clearly, most of the negativity stems from the belief that the Robert Sarver-led management of the Suns is the worst in the league. Bad past signings cramping the cap space and distrust in good future decisions cancel out any advantage Phoenix has in its fairly strong market.

But as Schwartz has written in the past, I’m not of the belief Phoenix deserves that depressing of a future prediction. In the above scenario of visiting a psychic, you could believe them. But no matter how much of the past they know, the future has yet to be written, and a franchise having a strong brand to lean upon goes a long way.

Team and player options aside, it’s not a stretch to say Phoenix will have a solid core of returning role players. Signed through at least next year, Marcin Gortat is one of the better starting centers in the league, Channing Frye is a solid rotation forward to stretch the floor, and Markieff Morris still has time to develop into a potential starting power forward with his surprising skill-set. At the guard spots, Jared Dudley fits as an energy bench player that could fit on any solid playoff team, and Josh Childress could be a Thabo Sefolosha-like, defensive-oriented two guard.

Those are all important roles for championship-level teams, but the clear catch here is the lack of a single All-Star caliber player once Nash is gone.

And thus we come to a future that’s the second-worst in the NBA. With the free agent market not looking very diverse, signing a star will ultimately be very difficult. Still, I’m not certain that teams like Toronto, Detroit, or New Orleans have any better of returning players nor the capability to steal a big-time free agent.

Do the Suns belong in the bottom five of the league as far as future success is concerned? For sure. But with a fairly strong market and fan base, it’s not like Phoenix will all of a sudden become irrelevant when the Steve Nash era comes to a close.

The key probably lies in how much extra cap space — if any — the Suns can dump via trades in order to pick up some decent free agents. They’re not going to hit a home run deal like the Nash signing in 2004, but with a few above-average players added via free agency and some smart drafting in a loaded class this June, at the very least, the future will be brighter than the Charlotte Bobcats and then some.

**

HOW FUTURE POWER RATING IS DETERMINED

Every time they lose a few games — as the Suns recently did in dropping five straight — the Nash whispers will grow a little louder. When the Suns are winning games (especially if they rejoin the playoff race), we won’t hear a peep (well, hardly a peep).

We’ve been through this song and dance enough to know where everybody stands. Nash is the “sun, moon and stars” of the franchise and the Suns won’t trade him unless he makes a request. Nash, meanwhile, has remained resolute in his stance that all his effort is going toward the season and that he does not plan on making such a request.

To me so long as the Suns have a shot at the playoffs, this is a non-issue. I don’t see any way that Phoenix moves him in such a situation.

However, if the bottom falls out and the Suns become a definite lottery team before the trade deadline it would not surprise me if those stances are softened. That’s because all along the Suns’ plan has been to rebuild while staying competitive with veterans like Nash and Grant Hill who can set a fabulous example for the younger Suns. But if the “staying competitive” part of that goes out the window, it would make sense for the Suns to skip right to Step 2.

For the first time I can remember, Suns president of basketball operations Lon Babby seemed to acknowledge that possibility last week on the Doug and Wolf show, as Adam Green reports.

“Sometimes you do have to go through a cycle in this league, and that’s the reality of it,” Babby said.

Such a cycle would involve the natural phase of being bad to be good, a scary proposition since franchises like the Timberwolves and Clippers are just starting to get good after years of doing just that. Yet with enough cap space to potentially offer two max contracts and a potential high lottery pick if Nash is dealt, the Suns would have assets to make a quicker rebuild possible.

John Gambadoro wrote that a Nash trade won’t be easy because some of the most logical trade partners don’t have the kind of assets to deal for him, but a Nash deal would not be about an equal swap of talent, it would be about officially starting the rebuilding process by hopefully obtaining at least a decent future asset or two along with likely improving their own draft pick without Two Time.

If that were to happen, CBS Sports’ Ken Berger reports that the Magic would have serious interest in Nash, but this time around they don’t have a Gortat to offer in return. I think Indiana (Collison/filler/pick?) could be a possibility as well.

The speculation is only beginning as (barring a Howard/D-Will trade) Nash will be one of the few players potentially available who could swing a conference race.

To me it’s time to start thinking about the future and the bounty this draft could provide because the Suns need more young top end talent to contend, but with the scarcity of legitimate trade offers and due to what Nash means to this franchise it’s understandable that the front office would only take that viewpoint if the Suns fall completely out of the race.

A sprint of a schedule

This week the Suns received a large dose of scheduling hell, darting around the country to play games in seemingly every region of the nation.

But every team will feel that travel pain (as Suns fans know after previous visits from exhausted Portland and Milwaukee clubs), and NBAStuffer.com did a nice job of breaking down the schedule to see who really has it worst.

According to the site, the Suns will not play five games in six days as 19 unlucky teams will have to do. They also luck out in that they will only play four games in five nights on six separate occasions, which may be more than a usual season but is half as many as Charlotte must play.

Phoenix has 21 back-to-backs, which is about middle of the pack, and 14 three in fours, which is near the league average as well.

As far as the opponent rest breakdown goes, the Suns will face seven teams playing their fourth game in five nights, and they will get 17 games against teams playing on a back-to-back. There’s a wide range of teams playing opponents on a back-to-back as the Bobcats will get 28 of them but the Heat just 11.

What’s wrong with Amare?

Mike Schmitz broke down how the Suns shut down Amare Stoudemire on Wednesday night, but these days everybody is having success limiting the artist known as STAT.

During the Knicks’ six-game losing streak, Amare is averaging 13.3 points and 6.7 boards on 37.6 percent shooting, and for the season he’s going for just 17.6 and 8.0 on 41.3 percent marksmanship, which aren’t exactly max contract numbers.

We won’t be able to fully evaluate the Suns’ decision not to offer Amare a fully guaranteed max deal for another few seasons, but the early returns this year are that it was a good one. Amare was a beast last season so perhaps this is just an early season slump and his numbers will revert to normal, but watching the Suns-Knicks game STAT didn’t exactly resemble a max player with three years left on his deal.

Of course, the Suns definitely botched the aftermath of that summer, but those errors can be rectified much easier than whiffing on a max player since Hedo has already been banished and Childress likely will be as well via the amnesty clause next offseason.

This season it seems like we’re beginning to see why the Suns did not offer Amare a fully guaranteed max deal as much as it would have helped in the short term.

And 1

• Entering Saturday, Nash led the league in assists (10.0) and Gortat in field goal percentage (59.9 percent).
• The Suns’ ranked 15th in offensive efficiency (99.8) and 21st in defensive efficiency (101.0) despite a season-best defensive effort in Boston. The Suns limited the Celtics to an efficiency of 78.9 and were downright defensive in New York as well, holding the Knicks to 89.8.
• Nash somehow ranks poorly in adjusted plus minus, with a minus 9.15. He annually ranks among the league’s top players in this stat. Grant Hill (13.94), Markieff Morris (10.36) and Robin Lopez (9.20) lead the team.
• Morris has dropped to ninth in David Thorpe’s rookie rankings.

No such charges can be levied against the Suns’ front office this offseason as all moves have been made with one goal in mind: maintaining 2012 cap space.

That’s why the Suns plan to sign Shannon Brown and Sebastian Telfair to one-year deals on Friday, and it’s why they have offered Grant Hill a one-year deal for $5.5 million but are hesitant to go to two. Brown will make $3.5 mil for his year of service and Telfair $1.5 mil, although Paul Coro reports he also has a partial guarantee for the following campaign.

This part of the plan makes sense. Even if the Suns don’t have a chance at the Big Three free agents Dwight Howard, Chris Paul and Deron Williams — and I don’t think they do — cap space under the new CBA is still so valuable.

The fear is the Suns spend just to spend and once again waste it all on role players like they did last year, but aside from the shot at landing elite talent it opens up opportunities to post a winning bid for a talented amnesty player or perhaps take on a crummy contract in return for a king’s ransom in draft picks (a la the Kurt Thomas trade, just in reverse). Cap space, if employed correctly, is one of the best ways the Suns can rebuild.

Therefore, it should be considered holy and as much as everyone in this city would like to see Grant Hill back, they just can’t afford to up their offer in years.

However, today’s deals effectively end the Suns’ offseason pending Hill’s decision and any potential minimum additions. Our ValleyoftheSuns writers in today’s 3-on-3 were unanimous concerning the Suns’ need for a go-to scorer but as I figured it just wasn’t going to happen when the best you can offer is one year and $5 million and you lack trade assets.

Now we know for sure that the closest thing the Suns will get to acquiring a go-to scorer this offseason is Shannon Brown, which is to say they aren’t acquiring one.

That should not be seen as a criticism of the signing. I was going to be at least moderately pleased with any deal that starts out with the words “one year,” and to grab Brown for $3.5 million is solid value. He will provide energy and excitement and his game fits the Suns’ style. He is no go-to player, but he is a savvy pickup.

Same goes with Telfair. Not much risk when you sign for less than two million dollars, and the Suns were not going to find anyone too much better for the salary they had to offer.

But now that we know what the Suns will look like this season I wonder why they don’t decide to start the rebuilding process a year early. Sure, this team can be fun and exciting and if things break right they very well might be a playoff team or at least push for a berth. It would be fun to watch Nash lead such an unheralded squad to an underdog playoff berth, but why play for a No. 7 or 8 seed at best in the loaded West when rebuilding is right around the corner?

The Suns’ brutal January schedule could crystallize the scenario. Do you see more than one or two wins the second half of the month? If the Suns fall behind big by February, the team could reverse course on a Nash trade and prepare for the 2012 rebuild early.

I like the moves the Suns made today. They needed wing scoring and a backup point guard, and they acquired both at a cost that will not affect their future. It also eliminates any need for Aaron Brooks this season and should put his rights firmly on the trading block when he returns to the country.

But, assuming the Suns don’t have a blockbuster up their sleeve that nobody sees, this squad is no better than a low-tier West playoff team.

Today’s moves show how serious the Suns are about waiting until 2012 to make their move. So long as that’s the case, why not just go all in for 2012 by initiating the rebuilding process now?

With the lockout all but over, those poor general managers now have a road map by which to base future decisions.

Now it’s time to make sense of the post-lockout landscape both on a team level and an individual player/executive level, as I do below by analyzing 10 important questions surrounding the Suns in light of the new labor agreement:

1.  Did the Suns benefit from the new rules imposed by the lockout?

The Suns were among the teams hoping for widespread change to the rules of the NBA system. They did not get that, but at least the stiffer luxury tax penalties should dissuade more teams from becoming tax payers or at least from going deep into the tax.

These penalties likely ensure the Suns won’t go more than a few million over the luxury tax ever, if that, but if it ends up reducing the Lakers’ payroll down the road and preventing other teams from spending wildly it could end up leveling the playing field a bit.

The rules also allows non-taxpayers to offer a more lucrative mid-level exception (starting at $5 million over four years with 3 percent raises after the first two years as opposed to a three-year deal starting at $3 million), so a Suns team that stays under the luxury tax would have another added advantage over the tax teams.

However, a hard cap or at least a tax that works as a hard cap, would have been better for Phoenix.

In addition, the shorter extend-and-trade rules won’t affect the Suns at the beginning at least since they don’t have any such player to deal nor the assets to bring home a major extend-and-trade candidate.

2.  How does the deal impact the Suns’ summer of 2012 plans?

Seth Pollack feels the the new CBA throws a wrench in the Suns’ future plans. I’m not so sure.

Yes, it is now even more difficult for the Suns to land one of the Big Three of Dwight, CP3 or D-Will, as Seth explains, but that was very unlikely to happen anyway. They always would have had to take less money to come to the desert and there always were better options for them.

Seth notes that it’s never good to have lots of cap space to spend but no big name player to use it on because teams often are “prone to overspend on lesser players” in such cases as we saw in 2010 with the Suns, but I’m optimistic the Suns will have learned that lesson.

Cap space is always valuable, and there are certainly attractive players beyond the top three, particularly in the restricted free agent realm. With teams potentially fearing the adverse affects of the new luxury tax, talent could be available in trades in return for cap space as well.

To me the plan should always have been to build through the draft and supplement with that cap space, and I don’t see this deal changing that in any significant way.

3.  What will the deal do for the Suns’ free agency plans this year?

It shouldn’t do much. Aside from re-signing Grant Hill and shopping for a wing scorer perhaps, the Suns would be wise to save their money for next year, which seems to be the plan if Hill is their top priority.

They don’t have much cap space this year, so regardless of the rules the Suns weren’t likely to be players in any system.

4. How does the new CBA affect Steve Nash’s situation?

It could make him easier to trade since non-taxpaying teams can now take on “up to the lesser of 150 percent plus $100,000, or 100 percent plus $5 million of the salaries they trade away,” as Larry Coon writes. Before teams over the cap, not the luxury tax, could only take on 125 percent plus $100,000. In theory this will open up some more options and will make it less complicated to match contracts to make a trade work.

The Suns could also theoretically take on more salary in any potential Vince Carter trade if they wanted to pick up a useful asset in return for providing that instant cap relief, although such a move could push them into the tax.

The new extension-and-trade rules aimed at preventing another Carmelo Anthony situation shouldn’t affect Nash much because although players can only sign for two additional years in an extend-and-trade, it’s doubtful a team would want to sign Nash for anything longer than that. After all, he will turn 40 during that second additional year.

5. What was Sarver’s involvement in the lockout?

This is a question I cannot wait to have answered by the Suns’ owner himself.

At Brad Casper’s introductory news conference, Sarver said, “I can say that eventually when it’s over the facts of my role and my involvement will come out, and I look forward to that happening. I’m prohibited from commenting about it, but as you know don’t believe everything you read.”

Sarver was vilified for being among the most hardline of the hardliners and reportedly made the strange comment of saying his “wife had asked him to bring back the middle level exception in a designer bag.”

But in recent weeks we learned that Sarver and Gilbert “have not been as hawkish in the negotiations as they have been portrayed,” courtesy of CBS Sports’ Ken Berger, and then ESPN’s Marc Stein wrote a couple days before the lockout was resolved that Phoenix along with win-now teams like the Lakers, Heat, Magic and Celtics were among the teams pushing hardest for a deal in principle.

That just doesn’t jibe with the image of Sarver that has been drawn throughout the negotiations, as one would think the Suns would be among the last teams pushing for a deal alongside big money teams like that based on Sarver’s prior portrayal.

It will be interesting to find out if the villainous reports were exaggerated or if the Suns’ owner merely experienced a change of heart near the end.

6. How will the Suns use the amnesty clause?

I have already publicized my thoughts on the amnesty clause, and they remain largely the same after we learned that the amnesty clause will remove 100 percent of a salary from a team’s cap (although of course it must still be paid in full) and that the player must currently be on that team’s roster with a contract signed under the prior CBA.

In essence it lets a team wipe out one mistake made before the current rules were put into place, and it can be pocketed for later use as well. This is too bad for teams that have managed their caps well (although I’m glad it can only be used on current players so a big market team can’t buy talent in return for wiping out a small market team’s mistake), but should eventually be put into play by the Suns, who have three potential candidates.

Mickael Pietrus seems like a poor choice unless some compelling immediate benefit can be derived from waiving his $5.3 million expiring contract. Otherwise, he could be traded for an asset to a team needing cap space or just play out this season before providing that cap space to Phoenix.

For me, therefore, it comes down to Hakim Warrick and Josh Childress. Warrick has two years and $8 million of guaranteed money left (and a team option for $4 mil the year after), and Childress four years and $27 million.

It makes sense to keep both guys this season and make the decision next year when every cent of cap space will be at a premium. If Childress proves to be an effective rotation player, then you shave off $4 million of Warrick’s money. If Childress is a bust, then you kiss his final three years and $21 million goodbye. Either way the Suns will be able to reverse one of their 2010 mistakes (if Childress indeed ends up being a mistake), to accrue more cap space for their big summer of 2012.

The other interesting aspect of the amnesty rule that is that any team with salary cap (not luxury tax) space can submit an offer consisting of as much room as they have under the cap for a waived amnesty player. The winning bidder will then take on the player’s contract for the amount bid, and the waiving team will be on the hook for remainder of the contract.

This likely won’t be an option for Phoenix this season, but it definitely will be next offseason. That could be a time the Suns could nab an overpaid but productive player at an affordable price with some of their cap space.

7. Will Lon Babby find any loopholes?

One of the reasons the Suns hired Lon Babby as their president of basketball operations is because he is a long-time lawyer and agent adept at analyzing complicated contracts, which is exactly what this new CBA is.

Babby has now had a year on the job to get his feet wet, and the Suns will expect him to take advantage of some of these new rules to give them some sort of a competitive advantage. We will soon find out if this lawyer can help the Suns see something that the average GM glosses over.

8.  What happens to Aaron Brooks now?

Aaron Brooks could not have worse timing. A week after signing a one-year deal with a Chinese team that includes no escape clause, the league is back in action.

What we know is that Brooks is likely gone until at least March, when the CBA playoffs end.

I’m not quite sure what will happen at that point. For now the Suns have a $5,041,730 cap hold on their cap for Brooks, which is 250 percent of his previous salary, and have extended a $2,976,636 qualifying offer. The Suns could always renounce his rights if they needed the cap space (which they won’t if they indeed are not players).

To me the most logical scenario would be for Brooks to re-sign with the Suns for the rest of the year when he returns to the States and then for the Suns to make any long-term determination on him next summer.

For now Brooks can lament his lost shot at restricted free agency for the time being as he will toil away in China for a few months instead of playing in the NBA.

9. How does Dudley’s extension look in light of the new CBA?

Jared Dudley signed a five-year, $21.25 million extension that could be worth as much as $22.5 mil with incentives at the start of last season, a contract that seemed like a sweetheart deal for the Suns at the time.

But JD was cognizant of the changing labor landscape and the fact that role players like him just weren’t going to get paid like they used to.

If Dudley was going to test the restricted free agency market this offseason instead of awaiting the first year of that extension he could have taken a four-year deal for $20.45 mil from a non-taxpayer or a three-year deal for $9.27 million from a taxpayer (or more if a team felt he deserved better than a mid-level salary).

Dudley may have left a few dollars on the table in terms of average salary, but if he was concerned with long-term security he could not have done any better. With teams likely to be cautious when spending on role players anyway, perhaps Dudley took one look at this potential new labor landscape, considered his happiness in Phoenix and then decided to sign on the bottom line on a deal that looks as fair as ever now.

That’s because the deal looks good from the Suns side as well, assuming Dudley continues to produce at the clip he has the past few years. Locking up players long term is only bad if they underperform, and Dudley should be able to outproduce the $4 million plus he’s owed on a contract that gives the Suns an important piece of their future at less than the average annual (non tax) mid-level price.

10. Would the new max rules have kept Amare in Phoenix?

It certainly won’t help the Suns now, but they would have had a better shot at keeping Amare Stoudemire last summer because the New York Knicks would have only been able to offer him a four-year deal with 4.5 percent raises rather than a five-year deal with eight percent raises as was the case under the old CBA, according to Coon’s breakdown.

The Suns were only comfortable guaranteeing the first three seasons of Stoudemire’s contract, but they could have offered a more lucrative first three years than the Knicks. Perhaps at that point they could have gotten creative with that fourth year and STAT would have been more amenable to it since there wouldn’t have been $100 million sitting on the table in front of him in the Big Apple. That is, assuming he was genuinely interested in returning in the first place.

It won’t help the Suns now with nobody even close to worthy of a max deal, but if the Suns luck into a star in the draft down the road the new rules should make him easier to re-sign than Amare was.

And 1

ESPN’s Chad Ford and John Hollinger broke down how the new CBA affects each and every NBA team. Their analysis of the Suns is below:

How it helps: The amnesty rule will give Lon Babby a chance to undo a disastrous summer that saw owner Robert Sarver throwing away money on free agents like Josh Childress and Hakim Warrick.

How it hurts: The Suns were another team pushing hard for major changes to the CBA. They didn’t get them, and now it looks like there will be a long rebuilding process ahead in Phoenix.

The lockout also cost them Aaron Brooks, who inexplicably signed a deal in China with no NBA out just a week before players and owners reached a tentative agreement.

Immediate impact (this season): No CBA can undo the damage Sarver has done to the team in the past few years. In an attempt to save money, he gutted one of the most exciting teams in the league and is left with a roster of middling, overpaid players and Steve Nash. Nash is leaving sooner or later and the Suns will have to seriously consider moving him now if they want anything back.

Long-term impact (future seasons): Ehhhh. The Suns have Marcin Gortat going forward. But the rest of the team? It’s going to be a frustrating few years for fans.

It made sense, as they were 27 games behind San Francisco in 2010 and 25 back of the Dodgers in 2009, and their offseason was more of an under the radar success than a free agency spending bonanza a la the Red Sox or Yankees.

That’s why you can’t exactly fault all 45 of ESPN’s baseball experts and 12 from Sports Illustrated from failing to see the D-backs had playoff potential.

Yet here they are, six games up on the defending World Series champs and threatening to run away with the division after ripping off eight wins in a row following a seven-game win streak earlier this month (sandwiched around a six-game losing streak).

I thought of the D-backs when reading the responses from the rest of the participants in this month’s 5-on-5 segment on the Suns in which everybody but me pegged Phoenix for a 2015 or 2016 playoff return.

The D-backs are just the latest piece of evidence that surprise seasons can materialize when all the pieces fit (along with just a touch of luck).

Everything important (save for Stephen Drew’s ankle) has gone right for the D-backs this season. One of the worst bullpens in baseball history now boasts five relievers with an ERA around 3, Ian Kennedy and Daniel Hudson have pitched like aces, Justin Upton has turned into an MVP candidate and surprises like Josh Collmenter, Ryan Roberts and Micah Owings have sprouted up all season.

In that way the D-backs kind of remind me of the 2009-10 Suns. After the Suns missed the playoffs in 2008-09 and then swapped out Shaq for Channing Frye, nobody really expected them to be anything more than a No. 7 or 8 seed.

But like these D-backs that Suns squad enjoyed a torrid second half of the season behind a team that was exactly that in every sense of the word with its 10-man rotation and the way everybody pitched in throughout the year.

We could debate all day whether winning begets chemistry or chemistry begets winnings, but both of those squads seem to have that extra intangible factor that often leads to overachievement.

We knew the Phillies, Yankees and Red Sox would be there at the end of the season. In the NBA, we know the Heat, Lakers and Celtics will be in the championship mix as well. Those teams all have enough talent that something would have to go pretty wrong for them not to have a shot in the playoffs.

In Arizona where teams don’t often lead the league in payroll, it typically comes down to chemistry.

The 2007 D-backs enjoyed that same special chemistry this squad has where Hudson tries to match Kennedy every time he throws a gem.

Sure, the 2004-05 Suns were loaded with talent, but the only other two Western Conference finalists of the Nash era (2005-06 and 2009-10) were plucky squads that came within a sniff of NBA Finals’ that few thought they had a chance at when the season tipped off.

This all isn’t to say chemistry will get the Suns back to the Finals anytime soon. There’s a reason that many doubt the Suns will return to even the playoffs for a good couple years if Nash cannot coax out another playoff run next season.

But as we saw in 2004 when the Suns staged a 33-game turnaround and are seeing with the worst-to-first D-backs this year, if you put the right pieces together with the right mentality in the right system, what appears to be a glacially slow rebuild can turn into the kind of special year where players take advantage of the most powerful motivator in sports, wondering why nobody believed in them.