Clippers Exec Fires Shots at Suns Following Beal Signing

The Bradley Beal era officially ended for the Phoenix Suns after buying him out, and the three-time All-Star agreed to a deal with the Los Angeles Clippers shortly after. Except, Beal's departure, of course, came with its fair share of drama.

Clippers president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank opened up to The Athletic about signing Beal and took shots at the Suns in the process.

“Brad had a number of choices, and we feel blessed that we built an organization that’s now a destination organization,” Frank told Law Murray. “In the last 14 years, we’ve won the second-most games in the NBA. Obviously, we haven’t won championships, which is always the goal. But one of the biggest things for Brad was the opportunity to win and to win big. And we feel very fortunate that he chose to be a Clipper."

Murray continued on about Beal's underperformance in Phoenix and why Frank expects him to be even better with the Clippers:

"Beal is an efficient play finisher, making 49.7 percent of his field goals last season and 38.6 percent of his 3s, but his prowess as a scorer has declined. Beal had only one 30-point game all season last year, and it came in a blowout loss at the Toronto Raptors with Booker and Durant playing. In 37 games with Booker and Durant playing, Beal averaged only 15.8 points last season. In 16 games last season with either Booker or Durant out, Beal averaged 19.9 points but did not reach the 30-point mark once. In comparison, Powell averaged 24.8 points in the 33 games he played with either Harden or Leonard out, reaching the 30-point mark in 27.2 percent of those games. Beal reached only 30 points in a game seven times in 110 games with the Suns, including none in four playoff games.

"The biggest drop-off for Beal as a scorer, especially compared to Powell, is with his free-throw attempts. While Powell averaged 4.4 free-throw attempts last season, Beal averaged only 2.6 in two seasons in Phoenix. And while Beal averaged an eight-year low 61.0 touches last season, according to Second Spectrum, Powell averaged only 42.8 touches last season with the Clippers, including only 33.3 touches per game after the All-Star break. Beal should expect more touches than Powell got last season, but Beal likely will be hard-pressed to match his touch volume from last season, going from Booker and Durant and underwhelming interior and bench options in Phoenix to Harden and Leonard and multiple interior and bench options in LA.

“'Not to take any sort of slight at Phoenix, but playing with James is a whole lot different than what their situation was,'” Frank said Saturday. “'Brad had great success playing with John Wall. He actually had great success playing with Russ.'”

Only time will tell just how good Beal will be out of Phoenix. But for now, Suns fans can at least relish in the fact that this disastrous era is finally over and they can turn their heads towards a rebuild.

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