Analyst Slams Suns After Regular Season Ends

The Phoenix Suns season has come to an end, and it's much sooner than the team expected.

After winning zero playoff games a year ago, the Suns have suffered the same fate once again, but this time, they aren't even sniffing the Play-In Tournament, missing the postseason entirely for the first time since 2020.

Bleacher Report writer Dan Favale handed out report card grades to all 30 teams and the Suns were the worst with an "F-".

"Finishing outside the West's top 10 while having zero control over your own first-rounders through 2031 is failure of the highest order. It is, somehow, made even worse knowing what's to come," Favale writes.

"Kevin Durant is good as gone. Bradley Beal still has a no-trade clause. Head coach Mike Budenholzer seems like a one-and-done candidate relative to how this season played out, particularly on the defensive end, and as it pertains to the under-utilization of rookies Ryan Dunn and Oso Ighodaro.

"Suns team governor Mat Ishbia is determined to win and seems unfazed by second-apron expenses and restrictions. This is sort of admirable, until you realize it's the same mindset that led Phoenix here, to basketball purgatory—its own special kind of hell that may force the team to move on from Booker himself."

The Suns face a troubling future because they want to win, but the roster that they have is currently unable to do that. They can make changes, but their lack of assets limits them to only being able to make marginal moves that won't make the team better.

In order for the Suns to move forward, they must take at least one step back. That could result in trading Durant and hoping that the haul they get back for him can reshape the roster, but the Suns might have to face the uncomfortable reality of possibly having to blow everything up.