The Phoenix Suns entered the 2024-25 regular season with grand ambitions. Phoenix added a high-level facilitator in Tyus Jones and a promising rookie defender in Ryan Dunn to complement its star-studded core of Bradley Beal, Devin Booker, and Kevin Durant. More importantly, it brought in an NBA champion head coach to create the connective tissue.
Unfortunately, after just one season at the helm, Mike Budenholzer learned a lesson that has become impossible to avoid: Structural instability can cost even the best coaches their jobs.
Phoenix finished the 2024-25 season at 36-46, inevitably missing the Playoffs and the Play-In Tournament alike. It was a disastrous season on every level, as the Suns started at 8-1 and still managed to finish 10 games below .500.
The inevitable outcome was announced on Monday, Apr. 14 when Shams Charania of ESPN reported that Phoenix has fired head coach Mike Budenholzer.
BREAKING: The Phoenix Suns have fired head coach Mike Budenholzer after finishing in 11th place with a 36-46 record in his one season, sources tell ESPN. pic.twitter.com/ocySLmWDQI
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) April 14, 2025
Budenholzer has a championship on his résumé, but not even that could save him from what's become one of the least desirable jobs in the NBA.
Phoenix Suns are becoming the team that no one will want to coach
The decision to fire Budenholzer is sadly the continuation of a troubling trend. Phoenix has now fired its head coach in three consecutive seasons, first parting with Monty Williams in 2023 and then dismissing Frank Vogel in 2024.
Budenholzer and Vogel were both fired after just one season as head coach, while Williams was let go after three successful years at the helm.
Each of those decisions has revealed a pattern that lies somewhere in between impulsiveness and undeterred optimism. Phoenix has gone all-in on big names at every turn, trading for Beal and Durant, and hiring two championship-winning head coaches in Budenholzer and Vogel.
At every step, however, the Suns have failed to build a coherent vision for the future—primarily due to the lack of patience and perspective required to do so.
Beal and Durant have battled injuries throughout their respective Suns tenures, but no one was surprised to see that transpire. Beal missed 29 games during each of the past two seasons with Phoenix, and missed at least 22 in the two seasons prior, as well.
Durant, meanwhile, played 75 games in 2023-24 but missed 20 in 2024-25—the fifth time in six seasons that he's missed at least 20 outings.
Furthermore, Budenholzer and Vogel were bought in despite questions about how they fit with the current core. They're proven commodities who have won at every stop, but the Suns impatiently attempted to transition to a flurry of new voices with a roster that hadn't yet learned how to play together.
Now looking to hire a fourth head coach since 2023, it's hard to view the Suns as anything other than an organization that is destined to fall victim to its own impatience and thus become the team that no established coach wants to engage with.
With Durant trade discussions underway, it will be a summer of struggle and change in Phoenix.