What good is cap space if they don’t have anyone to sign?
While this isn’t necessarily a knock on the season specifically, Suns General Manager Ryan McDonough has lined the cap up to make a run at several notable free agents, and/or high-talent players through trade, this summer. But while a trade (or trades) are possible, the likelihood of landing a true young star through free agency to play alongside Devin Booker and Josh Jackson is highly unlikely.
In fact, at least from the free agency front, the odds of landing a star have got to be as about as slim as the team’s playoffs odds at the start of the season.
So what good is having cap space if there aren’t any star players that are likely to show any interest whatsoever in coming to Phoenix?
Who is Phoenix going to get this offseason in free agency that’s going to make a difference? Let’s be realistic here: LeBron James and Kevin Durant are not coming to the Suns. The one big free agent name who conceivably choose Phoenix over other destinations is Aaron Gordon, but he’s a restricted free agent meaning that unless he flat out demands to not be re-signed and makes the Orlando Magic’s lives hell in trying to keep him, he’s not going anywhere either.
Players like Clint Capela and Tyreke Evans are nice but they wouldn’t be “splash” signings each making the Suns better, but not that much better.
So if the Suns have money to spend, but no good players to spend it on, does that mean that they’re going to hold onto it? Spend it on lesser players that don’t really make a playoff-type difference? Over-spend on someone just to get anyone in Phoenix?
All in all, while there is cap space, with the ability to have more fairly easily, if there is no one to spend it on, then this team isn’t going to get much better next season, meaning that this season wasn’t a success either.