3 Goals for Royce O'Neale for the 2024-25 season

Royce O'Neale was a really nice find by the Phoenix Suns at the trade deadline last season, coming over in a trade with the Brooklyn Nets. From there his importance to his new franchise quickly grew, and he was one of the few players who came out of the playoffs with their heads held high.

With Grayson Allen - a similar kind of player who had a career year - far from his best in the postseason as a result of an ankle injury, O'Neale's ability to gel quickly with Devin Booker and Kevin Durant was a welcome sight for the Suns. Not enough to save head coach Frank Vogel's job, but O'Neale certainly did his part in keeping the team competitive.

Which is why his goals for the 2024-25 season are more lofty than you would expect them to be.

The Suns did an excellent job of remaking the back end of their rotation this offseason, but it is the players in the middle who will have to perform even better than they have in the past. That would be O'Neale, Allen and center Jusuf Nurkic, with the first two having signed new deals to remain in The Valley.

3. Start 25 games

This is not as negative as it might first appear, as you would assume the only way O'Neale will be starting games is if an injury occurs to a player in the starting lineup. The most obvious answer is Bradley Beal - limited to just 53 regular season games in his first campaign in Phoenix - but there are other ways for O'Neale to get there.

One scenario could be if Beal comes off the bench, or if the Suns have to restructure their starting five to accomodate the inclusion of point guard Tyus Jones. O'Neale would struggle to get the nod to move into the starting group in that scenario though - as for all of his willingness as a defender - he can be undersized in a lot of matchups.

Really though if Allen can start all bar one of the 76 regular season games he appeared in last season, there's no reason O'Neale can't push to start a quarter of the Suns' games this time out. He's already proven he's a nice complimentary player next to Booker and Durant, and his shooting touch might just seal the deal here.

2. Career high in 3-point shooting

It should come as no surprise then that O'Neale should be aiming to have he best 3-point shooting season of his career in his first full season in Phoenix. That bodes well as in 30 games with the Suns after coming across at the deadline, he managed 37.6 percent on 5.2 attempts (way up on the 3.7 he's hoisted throughout his career to date).

With O'Neale's career high being 38.9 percent (achieved in two occasions with both the Nets and Utah Jazz), the smart money is on him taking that number to the next level. We've seen him do this before, knocking down over 40 percent of his attempts twice in the playoffs while with the Jazz.

That 2020-21 campaign would look to be a best case scenario here, as O'Neale shot a blistering 46.7 percent on 5.5 attempts in 11 games in the playoffs for the Jazz. If he can replicate that form for even a month to six weeks during the regular season, he is going to make a strong case to be the sixth man here.

Helping his case even further is the fact he will be sharing the court with at least one - if not two - stars at all times, being afforded the kind of space that allowed Allen to lead the league in this category (46.1 percent) last season. Allen might be the better shooter of the two naturally, but it's close and O'Neale can now benefit in the way Allen did last time out.

1. Be out there in crunch time in the playoffs

There's a reason the Suns went and got O'Neale last season, and it is because he is a veteran who can actually help them to win games. Lost in the shuffle of this summer was the fact the Suns went and drafted two rookies in Ryan Dunn and Oso Ighodaro. Their path to minutes is not guaranteed, and they will only get so many chances to prove they can contribute to this roster.

O'Neale exists on the other end of the spectrum for the Suns. He is a finished product, and one who has already shown he can handle a larger workload when the spotlight gets brighter. Last season he managed 25.1 minutes per game down the stretch, before managing to do even better and play 26 minutes a night during that playoff sweep at the hands of the Minnesota Timberwolves.

That humbling defeat goes on the resume of O'Neale as it does every other Suns player, and it is also true that Allen's ankle problems also resulted in O'Neale getting more run. But he still managed to get 5.5 attempts per game in that series, with a whopping 4.5 of those coming from beyond the arc.

If O'Neale can improve as a two-way player in even a small way, it is going to mean he is out there when the Suns need to win close games, regular season or playoffs. That was exactly what he was brought in for, and it will be fascinating to see if he can both beat out Allen, Jones, Monte Morris and a pair of rookies to take on that responsibility.