Suns have put one of their most promising young players in position to fail

The Phoenix Suns have begun the new NBA season 1-2 - and although fans are happy to have a roster that is once again defending as a unit and hustling each night - already we have seen how the lack of real quality will be their undoing this season. If we're making the case that fourth choice center Nick Richards deserves a chance, then this group can only be so good.

One such player who has been given plenty of opportunity already this campaign is second year big man Oso Ighodaro. With rookie Khaman Maluach not being trusted to play big minutes yet by head coach Jordan Ott - and with Mark Williams not playing back-to-backs to manage his body - Ighodaro has started every game.

Ighodaro is going to fail if he keeps being used at center.

Through those three contests so far Ighodaro hasn't been particularly good, although that is not necessarily his fault either. In fact playing him as the starting center is going to be his undoing in The Valley if it continues, and worryingly from his perspective the coaching staff seem content to let him continue in this role.

Ighodaro might have a ton of athleticism and verticality, but he was drafted as a power forward. The idea was always that he could play the five in certain lineups and on certain nights, but the fact he's starting over Williams, Maluach and Richards is ridiculous. Particularly given the coach Ott strategy of playing veterans bigger minutes only worked in their opening night win over the Sacramento Kings.

Having a single rebound in the defeat at the hands of the Nuggets is bad enough, but the fact he was being asked to match up against an all-time great in Nikola Jokic is exactly the problem here. Obviously Maluach and Richards would also have been destroyed by the Serbian, but if nothing else they have bigger frames and are more used to battling against centers each night.

The problem Ighodaro is going to have moving forward is that once Jalen Green returns from injury, he is going to exit the starting lineup. The Suns will have to try and fit Grayson Allen into the puzzle as well, while Dillon Brooks isn't going to get dropped. Ighodaro would make more sense at the four next to Williams or Maluach - plus Green and Devin Booker - but this doesn't seem likely to happen.

Given how much he has struggled to begin the season, who knows what his role in Phoenix would be once his time with the starters is up. Not dominant enough to play the position the Suns want him to, while he's not skilled enough offensively to be a power forward who can bring any kind of consistent scoring, which is what this group needs. The Suns have set Oso Ighodaro up to fail.