How the Phoenix Suns fumbled their breakout 2013-14 season
By Ryan Bawek
The Brandon Knight Contract
We all know what happened from there, Knight flashed a little potential in limited time and McDonough doubled-down on his mistake in acquiring him in the first place by giving him a five-year, $70 million contract that has literally haunted until this day as it was flipped for a terrible Ryan Anderson contract and later a terrible Tyler Johnson contract that finally expires this summer.
The Suns would finish 39-43 and in 10th place in the Western Conference.
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They would find themselves back in the NBA bunker by the 2015-16 season as Knight and Bledsoe struggled to mesh with one another and stay healthy and the failed attempt at landing LaMarcus Aldridge in the summer of 2015 (once again, can’t fault them for trying) led to overpaying an over-the-hill Tyson Chander. They finished 23-59.
The promise of two years before had completely vanished and the Suns found themselves virtually back at square one in building the first great Suns team, post-Steve Nash.
However, it wasn’t all bad.