Tim Legler Calls Devin Booker A CLEAR-CUT ALPHA After Phoenix Suns HOT Start

Tim Legler Calls Devin Booker A CLEAR-CUT ALPHA After Phoenix Suns HOT Start

The Phoenix Suns have been on fire. No better person to talk to than Tim Leggler, of course, of ESPN and the AllNBA podcast. Tim, I got to ask you, what have been your overall reactions to the Suns hot start this season? First of all, happy because um they have some guys on that team I really like watching play and what I saw the last couple of years really was an underachieving team and if it would frustrate you watching them um because there was a lot of talent there and it clearly it wasn’t connecting. it wasn’t going to come together. They go in a different direction with this team. This team’s been fun to watch, man. And it’s it’s good to have another team that’s like competitive every night in the Western Conference. Uh you know, they’re sitting here at 8 and five and seventh place. You’re eight and five in the East, you’re tied for fourth. So that’s part of the difference of like, you know, the two conferences like and there’s so many good teams in the West right now that they’re not a little bit higher. But to me, they’ve been a surprise. Um, and I guess from the standpoint I needed to see it before I knew what it was, but just going in based on the last few years. You know, my my expectations were somewhat tempered and I’ve been really happy with what I’m seeing on both ends. Tim, u, of course, one of the most synonymous names and now faces with the Phoenix Suns franchise is the one and only Devin Booker. Um, he’s been off to a hot start out the gate after the first half of that first game. I’m curious for you, what stood out about his game and approach to it this season as far as his contention and that kind of MVP um tier of players and with his playmaking. How have you seen him continue to add layers to that to be at the helm of this offense? I think what you’re seeing now is what really is the formula that works in this league in terms of a clearcut pecking order offensively on your team. a clear-cut alpha, clear-cut top of the food chain is what I call guys like that. That’s what Devin Booker is now. And remember, as that, this is a team that went to the finals with him in that role. It’s been a little bit murkier, you know, when they go out and they add Bradley Beal, they add Kevin Durant, it just was different. Um, where at times there was a difference because there had to be a difference to other guys. Now, it’s very clear this is the alpha. It’s his game. It’s it’s and and you can trust him to make great decisions as a scorer, playmaker. Uh he’s got one thing on his mind and that’s eat and attack. That like every time he gets it, that’s what he wants to do. Not necessarily shoot, but to set the table to force the defense to react as opposed to sharing that burden with somebody. This is what a normal successful offense looks like in the NBA. Um, even when you have other multiple teams have multiple guys that are all-star caliber players, there’s a pecking order on those teams, all of those teams, and this should be no different. And now you got him, and now you’ve got a cast of guys around him that on any given night, it could be them. Um, but it’s clearly Devin Booker’s show. And and that’s why I think you’re seeing him get a lot more recognition than he has the last couple of years when he was blending in with this talent base. Now it’s his show. Go do your thing. Let everybody else figure out how to play off of you. And that’s one of the reasons they’ve gotten off to this eight and five start. He’s been incredible. Well, you mentioned he’s been playing incredible, the Suns 8 and five start. What does he have to do to be in the MVP conversation? He has to, I guess, somehow uh sabotage um you know, the tires on Nicola Joic’s car or Jay Gilis Alexander because let’s be honest here, okay? Look, Devin Booker has catapulted himself into a place now where depending on team success and how this plays out and continues over time. You know, is he in the all league conversation again? Yeah, he could be. But when you start talking about MVP and with what those two guys are doing right now, you have a guy in Denver um with on a team that’s the biggest challenge to Oklahoma City clearly to me. That’s the second best team right now in the NBA and I think they actually narrowed the gap with them from a year ago. Nicole Yokic is leading the league in rebounding assist, averaging almost 30 a game, and he’s shooting almost 80% from the field on two-point shots. All right, so it’s it’s the the kind of numbers that are really kind of hard to wrap your head around. Shay Gil just Alexander is scoring at exactly the same rate on a team that if they didn’t blow a 20-point lead at Portland, they’re undefeated uh three weeks into the season and potentially on pace to win 70 plus games, maybe even challenge the NBA record of 73 wins depending on, you know, how the season plays out, what they have to go for, resting guys, all that kind of thing. Those two guys are so much ahead of like everybody else. You’ve had great years out of Giannis, Kate Cunningham, Devin Booker U deserves to be in that conversation as well. But for me, there’s there’s there’s two guys and it’s going to be a two-man race if they stay healthy, I think, all season. Well, let’s take a look at the team as a whole. Uh the Suns are ninth in half court offense, eighth in half court defense per clean the G glass, and they’re one of three teams with OKC and Miami to rank in the top 10 in both. What have you seen schematically from Jordan and the team as a whole that’s helped them be one of three teams to be in the top 10 on both sides of the ball? Well, I want to say one thing just that jumps out to me when I watch them just visually as a fan. It is obvious to me that they play harder for more stretches of the game than the teams that I watched the last probably three seasons where if the shots weren’t falling in the past, it absolutely affected their concentration level, their trust in each other, you know, their commitment to be there for the next guy defensively and it’d be total breakdowns all over the place and they would at times appear like a soft team. this team doesn’t play like a soft team. And even on nights like if you go back and look at the Dallas game, I watched that game like the first quarter of that game, they were pretty poorest defensively, particularly the first like four or five minutes. It it was like they were kind of sleepwalking. If that were the last two teams, the last two seasons, that would have probably continued throughout the game, right? And it would have maybe even affected their ability to now play offensively together because they would they it was amazing how quickly they would just sort of tap out on given nights, right? This team’s not going to tap out. And some of it’s the personality types you brought in. You bring in Dylan Brooks, he’s probably not going to let that happen. Um so that night even they recovered the next three quarters. They were different. And so just for me, let’s start with that formula. the first formula u thing you need for a formula for success in this league consistently show up and compete. We can overcome deficiencies if you just show up and play hard and have a lot of want to. So I think for me that’s been probably the number one thing. I think the other thing you talk about schematically it’s it’s kind of back to the first question you asked me. It’s the fact that there is a clear um organizational chart offensively and how they’re going to go through their checklist possession by possession. And it it just has a much better flow to it than your turn, my turn, and then everybody else on the roster kind of spot up and wait. You got guys now empowered to play offensively when they catch the basketball. Even if Devin had run something initially, it’s ball gets swung to Grayson. He can go put it down and go make a play. Same thing with with Dylan Brooks. The role players on this team are more empowered than they have been in the past to go play basketball because there’s more there to those guys and they’re showing that. And I think Jordan Knots brought out a lot of that. Well, to the to that point that you’re bringing up, we only saw it for an abbreviated moment, but Jaylen Green, it’s clear that when he’s healthy and available, he’s a piece that adds to the foundation that seemingly already been set for this team on the offensive end. Saw him used in a ton of different ways. uh in the the one game that he was fully available. What do you kind of see from the Suns in terms of their potential as a team should Jaylen Green sustain his health and add that kind of youthful exuberance to the mix? Yeah, look, first it’s a shame uh what happened to him, you know, to wait that long to finally, you know, make your debut, play incredible in your first game and then have that and he’s going to be out a while it looks like. Um so it’s very unfortunate. Fortunately, you will get him back for, you know, hopefully a large chunk of the season and you got a little taste of what he looks like. He is an explosive offensive player. No one doubted that in Houston. The problem he ran into in Houston was they didn’t have great decision making at the end of games. Their defense was incredible. You had him, you had Shenon, you had other guys like more like role player types. I mean, Thompson was starting to come into his own a little bit in that regard, but they didn’t know what to do at the end of games. That’s why they that’s why they went out got Kevin Durant. Okay, now we have a solution. There’s no answer for Kevin Durant. That’s where we go initially. And then you got these other guys that could play off of him. So for Jaylen Green to be in this spot as the clear number two offensive weapon, that’s where he should be. And what you saw in that one game he played, the fact that he can stretch the floor as a catch and shoot. Now, he was hot that night. He’s a little streaky. There’s going to be other nights you guys are going to have to live with. You know, it’s not going to go in because it’s not like he’s a pure shooter from out there. is not going to shoot 45% from the three-point line, but he’s enough of a threat when he does get hot, it creates spacing issues for opposing teams. And then if Devin Booker is out of the game now, you can put the ball in Jaylen Green’s hands as a high ball screen initiator because he did a ton of that in Houston. But he doesn’t have to close games as the primary decision maker. That’s what I think he struggled with a little bit in Houston. He’s a weapon. He’s explosive. And when you finally get him back, I saw four to six weeks. I don’t know if they’ve updated that. Um, if it is that long, you eventually you’ll get him back, let’s say after the first of the year, whenever that may be. Uh, you’re gonna have a guy that, you know, out there for 40 plus games that’s going to be very explosive every night. Jaylen Green, obviously. Go ahead. Go ahead, Stephen. To that point with Jaylen real quick, Tim, you look at him last year with the Rockets, it felt like he didn’t have as much space to navigate just because of the personnel and them playing a lot slower. Do you feel like the Suns context and them playing faster, but also having not just spacing, but dynamic spacing, you feel like that plays right into his hand as a scorer, the type that he is? Oh, there’s no question. When you look at the way teams played Houston a year ago, man, everybody knew was load up the lane, force kickouts, and then, you know, close out at mediocre or below three-point shooters. They were an anemic three-point shooting team. It was a major problem for them. They counted actually heavily on the miss and then going to get it off the glass. the number one offensive rebounding team in the league a year ago and again this year. Like that’s was their formula. Well, that doesn’t lend itself to a guy that can, you know, you can give a ball to and at 30 feet get a screen and with if the floor’s spaced out, man, look out because if you go under, he can stop and shoot that. If you go over, he’s he’s quick enough to turn the corner on a big or split that get downhill. And now those guys that are gu spaced out guarding Royce O’Neal and guarding Dylan Brooks and guarding Grayson Allen, that’s a different decision for weak side defenders than he faced a year ago in Houston. So to your point, the spacing on this team is going to lend itself to a more efficient Jaylen Green and I think simplify the game for him in a lot of ways in decision-m. Obviously Jaylen, one of the big acquisitions over the summer, Tim, but also Mark Williams was maybe a little bit more of a surprise for Suns fans. obviously trading for him on draft night. He’s been a revelation here in Phoenix. What have been your takeaways from the former Charlotte Hornet now just about 12 games through the season? Yeah, and I think what he would be what he’s doing would be a surprise to to to any fans that, you know, weren’t watching him in Charlotte because like no one was watching Charlotte. There was no reason to. Um, you know, of course, the trade went down with the Lakers. It was rescended. He goes back to Charlotte. Um, Lakers end up getting DeAndre Aton this year. Mark Williams is a guy, if you look at what he’s doing, this is kind of what he does. I mean, he converts at a 70% rate. Anything he touches around the rim, he’s going to try to dunk. Um, and he converts at a really high rate. And he is a he’s a nice talented big that’s a perfect guy to put in the middle of the floor on screen rolls. He’s also a guy you don’t have to run anything for to get production. You know, on some nights that’s going to lead to 20 point games for them and really make that decision tough when they run those ball screens of Book and Jaylen Green to top of the key. What do you do if he gets it going and he’s hurting you with these dive runs? Now what? Now you pinch the lane. Okay, good. Now here comes the three-point shooting to bury you behind that. So he’s a really good fit because of the his ability to convert anything on the short roll or the lob. And he’s a great fit because you don’t even have enough guys on this team that like to touch the ball and shoot the ball. He doesn’t need all that attention, but he’s still going to be very effective. So hopefully the Suns fans are are really liking what they’re seeing out of him. But this to me is exactly what he was in Charlotte. He just was on a team that nobody was really paying attention to. Tim, we appreciate your time always. Got one last one to kind of round things out for you. Yep. Um with the Suns being on this hot streak the last couple of weeks now. Uh, and also taking into account the slow start that they got out to, how sustainable is what we’ve seen recently in comparison to what we saw to start the season for this team. You’re going to find out between now and December 31st because I looked it up because I was curious. So sometimes, and this is not to listen, I’m not trying to rain on anybody’s parade. I know you don’t get a lot of rain in Phoenix, but there’s a little bit of rain I’m going to give you right now. Okay? We got to be we got to be real about some of this stuff cuz some of the context around playing well and winning streaks in this league is who you’re playing. It it does matter when you look at certain segments of the schedule. Now, the good news is they’re beating the teams are supposed to. But the truth of the matter is this. If you look at what they’ve won, seven out of eight, Utah, bottom feeder team in this league. Good win against San Antonio. Uh lose to Golden State, which is a team that’s clearly going to be in the mix in the West. two wins back toback against the Clippers who have talent aren’t as bad as the record says I don’t believe but still struggling right now and Kawhi Leonard out then New Orleans Dallas Indiana. So you have they’re beating who they’re supposed to and that’s you got to start somewhere. Now, here’s why I said between now and December 31st, they have 13 games between now and December 31st against teams that I expect to be in the top six of each conference. So, these aren’t teams that are like in that, you know, 7 through 11 range in my opinion that are like more like the playin type teams like that’s what Phoenix is where you’re looking these teams out. These are teams that I expect to be in the top six, some of them potentially contending for a title. So that’s going to give you the answer you need and and that’s why the data points will be much greater once you see them go through this slate of teams over the next month plus. You’ll have a much better indicator at that time where ultimately are they going to end up if they stay healthy at the end of the year. Tim, thank you so much for joining us. Of course, you can turn on the TV, find him on ESPN just about every single night doing incredible in his new role over there. And of course, you can find him at the AllNBA podcast with Adam Mahrez. And you know, you can just get great ball talk over there from the entire league. They’ll cover the Suns, they’ll cover everybody as well. Tim, thank you so much for taking some time out of your day to talk to PHNX Suns. You got it. Appreciate you guys. Nice.

The Phoenix Suns are one of the hottest teams in the NBA, led by Devin Booker and his all-NBA level talent.

How realistic is this start from him and the team? What should you be on the lookout for as they trek forward to the quarter mark of the season?

Erik Ruby and Stephen PridGeon-Garner are joined by Tim Legler to speak in detail about this start to the season for the Suns.

Follow Erik at @erikruby, Stephen at @StephenPG3, producer Aryton at @freckledmamba, and the show at @PHNX_Suns.