Valley of the Suns
Fansided

Ranking the 6 worst Suns starters of the Steve Nash era

By Luke Duffy

SEATTLE, UNITED STATES: Phoenix Sun Elliot Perry (C) holds the arms of his teammates Wayman Tisdale (L) and A.C. Green (R) during a moment of suspense in overtime during their game against the Seattle Supersonics 05 April in Seattle. Seattle won in double overtime 128-121. AFP PHOTO Dan LEVINE (Photo credit should read DAN LEVINE/AFP via Getty Images)
SEATTLE, UNITED STATES: Phoenix Sun Elliot Perry (C) holds the arms of his teammates Wayman Tisdale (L) and A.C. Green (R) during a moment of suspense in overtime during their game against the Seattle Supersonics 05 April in Seattle. Seattle won in double overtime 128-121. AFP PHOTO Dan LEVINE (Photo credit should read DAN LEVINE/AFP via Getty Images) /
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LOS ANGELES, UNITED STATES: Shaquille O’Neal of the Los Angeles Lakers against John Williams of the Phoenix Suns . AFP PHOTO Vince BUCCI (Photo credit should read Vince Bucci/AFP via Getty Images)
LOS ANGELES, UNITED STATES: Shaquille O’Neal of the Los Angeles Lakers against John Williams of the Phoenix Suns . AFP PHOTO Vince BUCCI (Photo credit should read Vince Bucci/AFP via Getty Images) /

2. John “Hot Rod” Williams

If you could make a defensible case for every player on the list up to this point, that comes to an end with John “Hot Rod” Williams. A big man no doubt, he wasn’t offering the Suns much else in the center position from 1995-1998.

That he started an astonishing 154 games (and appeared in 201) goes to show the lack of big man talent in the league at the time, and where the Suns were at after the glory days of the early nineties. When it was all said and done Williams had averaged as many points per game as he had rebounds at 6.2.

Williams also appeared in nine postseason games, but as you can probably imagine, his numbers dipped. Putting up 5.2 points and 4.4 rebounds in 21.1 minutes of action was — not good. It wasn’t all bad for Williams though, as he had been not only a good big man with the Cleveland Cavaliers for nine seasons, but one who endeared himself to a lot of fans there.

It was just a case of his best days being behind him, and by the time he left the franchise for a single season with the Dallas Mavericks before retiring, Williams was 35-years-old, which was ancient for the time.

He was big and lumbering and nowhere near as athletic as he had been, and it showed. The prospect of Nash running a two-man game with Williams (he started 96 games when Nash was on the team) is unthinkable today.

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