Oh, there was booing. There was plenty of booing.
Only it wasn’t directed toward Knicks forward Amar’e Stoudemire. It was directed toward the Phoenix Suns–their owner and their complete absence of defense.
Stoudemire and the Knicks looked like they were playing pickup ball in a 121-96 rout at U.S. Airways Center. The really sad part for the Suns is that they didn’t need a Herculean effort from Stoudemire to make the Suns look that bad.
It was fitting that Stoudemire’s night ended with 23 points and 9 rebounds. Why? Because those are the exact numbers that
Amar’e averaged in 2009-10 for the Suns–numbers that didn’t seem good enough for a lot of their fans.
So now Stoudemire is in New York, becoming one of the sweethearts in the nation’s largest media market, and becoming a favorite of New York basketball fans who have been forced to watch a substandard team for the last seven seasons.
On the other side, the Suns are stuck with…well, just stuck. The Suns were skewered by their apparent defense allergy after getting lit up by the Philadelphia 76ers for a season-high 123 points back on December 29th. In their last three games, the Suns actually showed a little defensive improvement, giving up an average of 89.3 points in games against the Pistons, Kings and Lakers.
That improvement went out the window on Friday night. Stoudemire had an average night. It was the rest of the Knicks who inflicted the bulk of the damage. Raymond Felton had his first career triple double with 23 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists. Wilson Chandler, Landry Fields, Shawne Williams and Toney Douglas combined for 56 points on 53.7% shooting.
And, the problems aren’t just on the defensive end. For the fourth straight game, the Suns have scored fewer than 100 points and have shot under 50% from the field. In fact the Suns have been under 50% shooting for 8 straight games.
Alvin Gentry is coaching in handcuffs. One of his biggest strengths as a coach during the Suns’ playoff run all the way to the Western Conference Finals in 2010 was that players knew their roles. He had a set starting lineup, and the 2nd unit of Suns usually played with the same efficiency as the starters.
That’s not the case right now. The Suns used their 11th (and smallest) starting lineup of the season on Friday, putting Grant Hill, Mikael Pietrus, Josh Childress, Vince Carter and Steve Nash on the floor to begin the game. Childress hadn’t played in three of the Suns’ last four games. Robin Lopez, who had started the last 10 games for Phoenix, didn’t get on the floor until midway through the fourth quarter when his team was down 31 points. Hakim Warrick is another player struggling to find a role, but got his first game action since the loss to Philadelphia.
And don’t get me started about the rebounding. The Suns were hammered on the boards 59-34 by the Knicks, who rank 18th in the league in that department, and had four players with 9 or more boards. Phoenix has had only player (Marcin Gortat vs. the Lakers) who has grabbed 9 or more boards in a game in their last five contests.
There’s no other way to put it–the Phoenix Suns are a mess right now. Nothing a few more trades can’t solve.
Just kidding.
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