Phoenix Suns fans probably don’t need more reasons to dislike former team owner Robert Sarver, but a fan favorite threw more gasoline on those dwindling embers on a recent podcast.
Goran Dragić played in six total seasons for the Suns across two different stints with the franchise, becoming a playoff cult hero after scoring a ridiculous 23 points in the fourth quarter of Game 3 of the Western Conference Semifinals on the road against the rival San Antonio Spurs back in 2010.
Just an NBA sophomore at the time, Dragic endeared himself further to the fan base and flashed the potential of the All-Star player he’d become during that playoff run.
Speaking on his own “Gogis Garage” podcast with guest Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks, Dragić pulled the curtain back on what the team’s former owner told him after he missed out on All-Star recognition.
Giannis Antetokounmpo said Goran Dragic deserved to be an All-Star
Giannis got the conversation going by recalling, “I said, man, ‘You should be an All-Star. They messed up.’”
While it’s not made clear when this conversation occurred, it’s logical to assume Antetokounmpo is referencing the 2013-14 season when Dragić won the league’s Most Improved Player Award and was named to the All-NBA Third Team despite being omitted from the All-Star team that year. The 2013-14 season was Antetokounmpo’s rookie year in the NBA.
“Yeah, let me tell you a story,” Dragić said. He explained that he had a bonus written into his contract that he’d earn an additional $1 million for making the All-Star Game. He was ultimately not selected to play in the game but was a contestant in that year’s Skills Challenge.
“After the All-Star, I was at a practice and the owner of Phoenix Suns approached me, he said, ‘I’m so happy you didn’t make the All-Star, so I don’t have to pay you $1 million dollars.’ I was so pissed, man,” Dragić said.
During his time as majority owner of the Suns, Sarver garnered an earned reputation of being cheap. The Suns as an organization made a number of blatant money-saving trades that in hindsight (and many at the time as well) did not make sense from a pure basketball standpoint.
For an owner to tell one of his players, according to Dragić, that he was “happy” he wouldn’t have to pay him a performance bonus should anger every Suns fan. As an owner, you’d no doubt want the players on your team to perform at a high level. Apparently that wasn’t the case for Sarver assuming a bonus payout was involved.
Unfortunately for Suns fans, Dragić might still hold ill will toward the Suns organization stemming from that conversation, because he went on to give Giannis a Miami Heat recruiting pitch.
Fans in The Valley would obviously rather see the MVP from Greece in a Suns uniform. But in fairness to Dragić, he played the majority of his career games for Miami, so that’s where his loyalty now lies.
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