Shooting Guard
Devin Booker, Cam Johnson
Obviously Devin Booker, if he is not playing point guard, is the team’s primary shooting guard, likely now to get even more minutes than last season with the potential loss of Troy Daniels (I have long advocated for the extension of Daniels, but at the moment, he remains on the outside looking in).
Unless Jones adds that star-powered point guard who we are all clamoring for (*ahem* we’re talking about you, D’Angelo Russell), Booker might have to pull a Russell Westbrook and average 30 points and 10 assists a game while Deandre Ayton throws up 20 points and 12 boards a game for the team to be competitive.
That said, Booker can do that – he does love to put personal stats – and if he is able to harness what Russell can do in Oklahoma City, the Suns might actually take a larger step forward this season than expected, even without the addition of a star at point.
Unless Daniels is signed (which for James Jones makes perfect sense with his obvious desire to add as many shooters as possible), then tweener rookie Cam Johnson is going to be the presumed backup shooting guard, for now.
At 6’8″, one might expect that Johnson would be a power forward, however he was generally a “guard” at North Carolina, and if he can keep up with his opponents if only in off-the-bench spurts, his shooting alone will keep him on the court.
Johnson shot an amazing 45.7% from beyond the arc last season (on 210 attempts), raising his college five-year-career average to 40.5% (259-639).
If he is able to carry that average to the Association, and is given the open shots due to a more free-flowing and moving offense than Phoenix had last season, then the Suns will have considerable depth at the position, a desperate necessity the team needs to compete.