Dragan Bender is playing to stay in NBA after Phoenix Suns

The only thing the Phoenix Suns former lottery pick is playing for right now is to stay in the NBA after this season is up.

With the fourth pick in the 2016 NBA Draft, the Phoenix Suns selected Dragan Bender. Three seasons in and he’s failed to live up to expectations or even been a decent player on a consistent basis. The Suns declined what would have been his upcoming option, making him an unrestricted free agent this summer. It seems he has played his way out of the valley.

If you just look at his stats for this season, it’s been far from great. He’s played in 39 games and averaged 3.8 points, 3.1 rebounds and 0.2 blocks in 15.5 minutes per game. For a big man, he’s only made 43% of his shot attempts, has struggled at the free throw line (58%) and jacked up some threes without much accuracy (20.5% on 73 attempts).

Even when given the chance to start, he hasn’t fared much better. In 20 starts, he’s made 47% of his shots, which is a leap forward but still only put up 5.9 points, 4.5 rebounds and 0.4 blocks in 22.1 minutes. That’s actually fairly decent but when given time to shine, he needs to do a lot more than that.

He’s been given more run lately and is still starting, despite no production. There’s likely two explanations for that with the first being the obvious in that the team has a serious weakness at the power forward spot.

The second is just a hypothetical but it isn’t a stretch to think that maybe the team, with not much left to play for this season, is putting him on display to help him get another NBA contract this summer.

There have been some good games this season. He made 6 of his 9 shots and hit a three against the New Orleans Pelicans on March 16th, posting 13 points, 5 rebounds and 1 block. In a 4 game stretch from January 20th to 25th, he shot 49% from the field and averaged 14 points and 7 rebounds.

Bender has shown some promise and is still only 21-years-old but his good games are too far and in between and he needs a fresh start elsewhere, somewhere where he won’t have the pressure of being the fourth pick. He will likely get a low money deal as a low risk talent that can blossom, perhaps in a winning environment that might be able to unlock his potential.

A good place to start in bringing out his full potential may be to play him as a center instead of a power forward. In the limited run he’s had there, he seems to play better. Also, he’s made 39 of 50 shots at the rim this season (78%). That’s impressive. The problem : he’s made only 19 of 85 shots taken 3 feet or more away from the rim (22%) and only 37% of the shots he’s taken have been at the rim.

Whoever takes a chance on him this coming off season will get a player with a ton of potential but will have a lot of work to do on bringing that out. One thing is for sure though, he’s already playing for his next contract.