7 teams who are still better than the Phoenix Suns

With the eyes of the NBA shifting gears to international play and the Olympic Games in Paris, now is a good time to take stock of where the Phoenix Suns are at as an organization. Thanks to some solid moves by the front office, the team is definitely in a better place than it was a year ago.

Although Eric Gordon is going to be missed, adding some rookies for regular season juice and bringing back the trio of Grayson Allen, Royce O'Neale and Josh Okogie are all positive moves. Even the likes of Okogie may be traded down the road to improve this roster.

Yet despite all of the good vibes that are quietly building around The Valley, the Suns are still way down the pecking order in the league.

Last season proved that the franchise was not a true contender, and this was proven when they were swept from the playoffs in the opening round. Armed with a new head coach and the second year of the Bradley Beal experience, the hope is that things will be different this time round. Unfortunately for the Suns though, all of these rivals are better than them until further notice.

7. Minnesota Timberwolves

Why not get the most painful opponent out of the way first, and talk about the Minnesota Timberwolves. It is not just that they were the team doing the sweeping when the Suns were bounced from the postseason, there's much more to it than that.

If you had to build around one of Anthony Edwards or Devin Booker for the next five seasons, it is clear Edwards would be the answer. He's ascension caught some off guard - unless you were paying attention to Team USA during the World Cup last year - and he alone puts the Timberwolves among the better teams in the league.

But it is the fact they were one of the two best defensive groups in the league last season that the Suns just can't hang with. The tandem of Karl-Anthony Towns and the much maligned Rudy Gobert worlds better than Jusuf Nurkic, who admirably manned the paint against these two behemoths.

It is not a given that the Timberwolves are going to continue their forward momentum, and it may be that Towns is moved in the future. But when these two meet again in 2024-25, there is no doubt that the Timberwolves will be rightly viewed as the favorites in any matchup.

6. New York Knicks

Shifting East and perhaps no team had a better offseason than the New York Knicks. They somehow convinced Jalen Brunson to leave over $100 million on the table (for now), and then went and added another member of the Villanova crew in former Suns favorite, Mikal Bridges.

Fans wish Bridges nothing but the best - but in teaming up with Brunson, OG Anunoby, Josh Hart and Donte DiVincenzo - he has a legitimate chance to make it out of the Eastern Conference. More than that, he probably has better odds of getting back to the NBA Finals before the Suns at this point.

The Knicks are an in their prime beast who can get it done on both ends of the court - and although they will miss Isaiah Hartenstein - they still have the equally capable when healthy Mitchell Robinson. Then there is Julius Randle - a player we once suggested the Suns exploring trading for - who can become their x-factor.

This Knicks group is deeper than the Suns' roster, and they have a team chemistry that was lacking in Phoenix last season. If the unthinkable happened and these two somehow met in the finals, it is not the Suns who would be favored to win what would be a first ever championship.

5. Denver Nuggets

This one is painfully easy, and yet you could make the case the Denver Nuggets are the most vulnerable name on this list for the Suns to attack. They might boast Nikola Jokic - winner of three of the last four MVP awards - but they did just lose Kentavious Caldwell-Pope to the Orlando Magic.

Aaron Gordon is in an ideal situation next to Jokic, and Michael Porter Jr. has the kind of offensive talent that kills opponents as the fourth option for the Nuggets. As starting groups go, there are few better than what Denver has at their disposal. Adding Jamal Murray to the mix, and they have a better understanding of who they are too.

They've already won a championship - and although they might be expecting too much of Christian Braun next season - as long as you have Jokic, you have a shot. The Suns might be able to hurt them some offensively thanks to the scoring exploits of Booker and Kevin Durant, the problem is they can't get stops on the other end. The Nuggets have the edge for now, but we'll revisit this one.

4. Milwaukee Bucks

Just like the Nuggets, let's at least have a conversation about this one. Yes they won a championship - beating the Suns in the process - back in 2021, but a lot has changed since then. The Bucks no longer have a likely Hall of Fame point guard in Jrue Holiday, and the Damian Lillard experiment hasn't been great so far.

Khris Middleton continues to struggle with injuries, although there's no doubting he is perhaps the most well established second option in the league when he is on his game. He understands when to defer to Giannis Antetokounmpo, and when to take over the game with awesome scoring stretches.

Then there is "The Greek Freak" himself, who like Jokic has won it all before. The key difference is that injuries have arrived for him at the worst time across the last two seasons, and the Bucks have been a disappointment in the postseason as a result.

Also working against the Bucks is a head coach in Doc Rivers who fans aren't convinced is the right man for the job, while former Bucks leading man Mike Budenholzer is now in Phoenix. We're again going to give this one to the opponent, but this is the slimest margin yet.

3. Oklahoma City Thunder

There can be no doubt about this one, as the Thunder completely overtook the Suns in the Western Conference last season. Not only did they lock up the one seed before eventually falling to the Dallas Mavericks, they look primed to compete for years to come.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is one of the 10 best players in the league, and the embarrassment of riches behind him is to a level the Suns could only dream of. Chet Holmgren, Jalen Williams, Lu Dort and the recently added pair of Hartenstein and Alex Caruso would all be the Suns' fourth best player if they landed in The Valley.

Say it quietly, but they'd also likely trade Bradley Beal straight up for a couple of names on that list, and not just because of his ugly contract. Even Isaiah Joe and Aaron Wiggins are underrated players who would make the Suns better if they were part of their bench unit.

The balance of having a true superstar in "SGA" and young and elite defenders is exactly why the Thunder are better than the Suns both right now and moving forward. They're too good in too many areas, whereas Phoenix has to rely on the superhuman efforts of a Durant or Booker just to stay in a lot of games.

2. Dallas Mavericks

Those pesky, annoying Mavericks. Before last season started nobody would have put the Mavs above the Suns or any other team on this list in the West. Then they went and made the finals, and Luka Doncic took another step towards being one of the best to ever do it.

In a series between the Mavericks and Suns, Doncic is going to be the best player. That's significant, but just as important is the re-introduction of Kyrie Irving into this conversation. There was a time not so long ago when Beal would have been viewed as the better player and smarter investment.

But 2023-24 was a year in which Irving rehabbed his value, and was a driving force in that group making the finals. The Mavericks were also able to do something that has so far eluded the Suns' front office, and it is another key reason they are the better team right now.

Namely nail midseason trades on the fly, which is what they did in adding P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford to their rotation. Those two helped propel the organization to the heights they went on to reach, while Dereck Lively III was a prime example of nailing your lottery pick as well. If the Suns could do any of those things around their own stars, this would be a conversation. Right now, it isn't.

1. Boston Celtics

The gold standard. There's a reason Durant doesn't feel the need to give Jayson Tatum and the Boston Celtics any advice. It's because they don't need any. Obviously as the most recent champion, they're the best team until somebody takes the crown from them or they fail to reach the heights of before.

But looking at this from a bigger picture, and the Celtics have come to embody everything that the Suns are not, and it is the main reason they're the better of the two right now. Whereas the Suns drafted Booker and tried to surround him with star teammates, the Celtics selected both Tatum and Jaylen Brown.

It took some trial and error - including having Irving themselves at one point - but they eventually realized that having two stars and a deeper supporting cast was the way to go. Most other franchises think the same way, and every champion since at least 2019 has been built on a "two stars and the rest" foundation.

The Suns however are stuck in the mode of roster building from over a decade ago, when LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh came together to win championships with the Miami Heat. Until the Suns can sort out the shallow depth on their roster though, the Celtics and plenty of others are going to remain ahead of them.