Way too early predictions for the 2018-19 Phoenix Suns
By Adam Maynes
Trevor Ariza
Trevor Ariza is going to do exactly what the Suns want him to do: be better than Dragan Bender and Marquese Chriss, push them in practice, and with his veteran play make the Suns slightly better. He has never had a Win Share per-48 minutes in his career as low as both Chriss and Bender’s have been in each of their first two seasons and thus is guaranteed to be a better starting player than the two third-year pros.
That said, while his focus in Houston was from the outside, and he averaged 2.4-6.7 3-point attempts with the Rockets over his last four seasons, he has never made at least 200 in season, peaking at 194 in 2014-15.
My bold prediction is that he finally does break that number with the Suns.
It might take him 600 attempts (his career-high is 555 which he has done twice, in 2014-15 then 2016-17), but since he was strictly brought to Phoenix to play the stretch-four position, he is not going to lose any time to Bender or Chriss and the offense is not going to be set up for him to play down low since Deandre Ayton will be an anchor within ten-feet of the hoop.
In truth, like Troy Daniels, Ariza might never even need to take a shot from within the arc, and if he nails them at even a slightly better rate than he did in Houston (35.7%), he’s going to get enough shot attempts to make the 200+ makes happen.