7. Too Much Iso Offense
At one point in the season, the Phoenix Suns were one of the NBA’s top ranked offenses…despite being dead-last in assist percentage. How did they do it? It’s honestly baffling, but when Goran Dragic was spreading the floor with efficient shooting and Isaiah Thomas was doing his sixth man act off the bench, the Suns’ up-tempo playing style was tough to stop.
Unfortunately, once those two were sent packing, the Suns offense couldn’t sustain itself on that same playing style. The tempo slowed down, the fast break points tailed off and Phoenix went from having too many point guards to not having enough following Knight’s injury.
There were a number of factors that contributed to the death of the offense, but at the root of the problem is everyone just wanted to score. Bledsoe is a ball-dominant guard who looks to score first. Markieff Morris is an excellent face-up player with an array of one-on-one moves he can execute on just about any defender, but his shooting started to decline after the break.
Len has a decent midrange jumper, but between injuries, foul trouble and general growing pains, his offensive game was usually limited to easy dunks at the rim, which, again, didn’t come that often since the Suns didn’t move the ball well. Knight’s injury forced Marcus Morris, more of a bench scorer, into a starting spot and P.J. Tucker has never really been much of an offensive weapon.
At that point, the Suns’ best scoring options off the bench were rookie T.J. Warren, youngster Archie Goodwin and Gerald Green, who shot the damn ball every time he caught it. No wonder the Suns finished the season on a 1-10 skid and were the worst three-point shooting team after the All-Star break.
The three-point attacks of teams like the Golden State Warriors and Atlanta Hawks are deadly not only because they have so many good shooters, but also because their offense is predicated on ball movement that provides quality looks. The Suns didn’t get many of those this season, especially after the trade deadline.
Some of the blame has to go to head coach Jeff Hornacek, but things like moving without the ball and making the extra pass are things he emphasized all season long. It’s not exactly Hornacek’s fault his players failed to execute, and when they did, good things happened. Why do you think he singled out Warren’s movement off the ball so many times this year?
With Dragic gone and the ball in Bledsoe’s hand more often, the Suns pushed the tempo less frequently and committed a higher number of turnovers, something Bledsoe himself acknowledged as an area of improvement for his game. For the offense to find its groove again next season, that ball needs to move far more than it did in 2014-15.
Next: No. 6