Suns Get Little Respect in New NBA Power Rankings

The Phoenix Suns turned into a drastically different team this offseason after a very disappointing 2024-25 season.

After trading away Kevin Durant and buying out Bradley Beal, the Suns know there won't be as much pressure on them compared to the past few seasons, especially in a loaded Western Conference.

NBA.com's John Schuhmann ranked the Suns as the 13th-best team in the West, meaning they would be three games out of a play-in spot, in the NBA's first offseason power rankings released Monday.

Schuhmann gave these numbers to know for Phoenix:

• The Suns were 33-29 with Durant in the lineup and 3-17 without him, with two of those three wins having come against Utah. They were outscored by 8 points per 100 possessions in 1,259 minutes with Devin Booker on the floor without Durant.

• They were outscored by 8.2 points per game in the restricted area, the league’s biggest discrepancy by a huge margin. They took just 19.9% of their shots *on the road in the restricted area, with that being the lowest rate for any team in the 29 seasons for which we have shot-location data. Their 70.9% shooting in the restricted area was the second highest mark for any team in those 29 years.
  * Using only road data to account for shot-location discrepancies from arena to arena.

• Booker (51.9%) was one of four players (Durant was another) who shot better than 50% on at least 200 pull-up 2-pointers. But he shot just 93-for-303 (30.7%), his worst mark in the last six seasons, on pull-up 3-pointers. That was the biggest differential among 62 players who attempted at least 100 pull-up 2s and at least 100 pull-up 3-pointers.

The biggest question Schumman proposed for the Suns was: can Booker and new addition Jalen Green play together? He added on the topic:

"The Suns’ two highest-paid players are an interesting mix, and if the Suns are going to put their best players on the floor, they’ll be playing without a real point guard (which sounds familiar). Will Booker and Green — both of whom can create their own shot — get the Suns some easy baskets in transition? It will be fascinating to see how often they assist each other relative to the league’s other guard combinations.

"It would be good if Green (and the Suns as a whole) could put a little more pressure on the rim than he did last season. In 2024-25, his 11.5 drives per 36 minutes ranked 68th among 375 players who played at least 500 minutes. That wasn’t far ahead of Beal, who ranked 75th at 11 drives per 36.

"Green and (Mark) Williams are still just 23 years old, while Ryan Dunn is 22. There’s a next phase of the Suns coming, and this season could tell us how close those three guys are to their ceiling."

As Schumman pointed out, the Suns are entering a new era around Booker built on youth and defense, which is a complete 180 compared to how they were composed the past couple seasons.

There are a few fits, especially with Green, that seem a little funky as of now, but it will be up to new coach Jordan Ott and the rest of the team to try to assimilate everyone together.

Phoenix controls its own destiny and without much expectations, the Suns have a chance to rewrite the narratives surrounding the team from its past failures beginning this season.