Roster Swap: Phoenix Suns and Sacramento Kings. Would you do it?
By Adam Maynes
Point Guard
Ricky Rubio, Tyler Johnson, Ty Jerome, Jevon Carter, Elie Okobo, vs De’Aaron Fox, and Cory Joseph
The Phoenix Suns had not had a legitimate starting point guard since Eric Bledsoe demanded out, a situation that really put the franchise behind the eight-ball in regards to attempting to actually succeed on the court.
On the other hand, the Sacramento Kings have one of the best young, up-and-coming point guards in the league in De’Aaron Fox, who for several seasons right off the bat puts the Kings at a decided advantage positionally, a swap that the Phoenix Suns would have loved to be able to make.
But now the Suns have Ricky Rubio, still only 29-years-old, and also an already successful player in the league, a prior steals and leader in the NBA and a career average of 7.7 assists per game. He looks to be the perfect compliment to a team of shooters as he himself if likely to take only a limited amount of shots per game due to his generally awful 3-point shooting percentage.
That said, while Rubio’s acquisition does make the team far more competitive and he was easily the biggest and most important acquisition of the offseason for the franchise, there is no doubt that Fox is the better player now, and will be well into the future.
Aside from the starters though, neither team has a single point guard off the bench that is light-years ahead of the others, and while the Kings will rely fairly heavily on Joseph and the Suns will look to play backup point guard by committee, the reserve players have no advantage over the other.