The Phoenix Suns Have A New Look On Both Offense And Defense But Is It Sustainable?

The Phoenix Suns Have A New Look On Both Offense And Defense But Is It Sustainable?

On today’s show, it’s a John Voida Tuesday. I will test my Jaylen Green to the bench theory with him as well as how did he think the Suns did in their first preseason game. Plus, we add some more thoughts. We talk about what we want to see in the next game. And we do it all now. You are Locked On Suns, your daily Phoenix Suns podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network. Your team every day. Welcome into Locked On Phoenix Suns. My name is Benjamin Garcia, host of the Ben Garcia Show. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays on YouTube at 7 a.m. and a credentialed Phoenix Suns media member. Thank you for making Locked Ons your first listen here on this beautiful what is it? Tuesday night, Wednesday morning, however you may be listening, wherever you may be listening, thank you so much for making us a part of your day. Don’t forget to like, share, subscribe, follow, follow myself and all social media platforms at Bengarcia show. And as well as before we get to our John Voya Tuesday, we do have a presenting sponsor of the show, FanDuel. Today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers bet $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use across the app. Head to fanduel.com to get started. What is up my guy Darth Voida? Did you just change that in the chat? John, my guy John Voida. I didn’t change that. Host of the Suns Jam Session podcast, managing editor for Bright Side of the Sun. Um I know you’re saying the like we’re in the thick of the burrs. We’re in October at this point. Um, I would say the vi the vi the vibes the vibes aren’t great in Arizona sports land and the are being and the Suns are being asked to absolutely carry this or this this sports Arizona space. Um, how are you doing man? Well, I just think that’s very symbolic of Arizona sports that, you know, it feels like at times we’re just running down the field towards a touchdown and before we enter the end zone, we just drop the ball. That’s literally the personification of Arizona sports. And, you know, I’m doing good. Like you said, we’re in the thick of the burrs. Uh it’s about to really start feeling like fall here in Arizona this upcoming weekend. Gonna head out to Schneps Farms and go look at pumpkins and such. It’s uh tis the season, man. This is the best time of year, right? It’s the one. Yeah, Queen Creek. You’re a Oh, yeah. Okay. I knew that. You’re a schnep’s farm kind of guy. I’ll go that farm. I I’ll check it out. You know, one year I’ll go for Christmas and then like the next year I’ll go for Halloween. So, this is the year we go for Halloween. You hop on the train ride there and they got the chainsaws coming after you and it’s awesome. Oh, okay. All right. That took a that took a wild turn. Yeah. Not not a big schneps farm guy. More of a uh are the Suns playing today guy? And on Friday they have a game in China. They are already 4 a.m. I Oh my gosh. Is Is it at 5 or 4 am? I thought it was at 5 a.m. 4 a.m. The one on Friday or on I’m sorry, Sunday is at 5:00 a.m. So like London game, just get up an hour and a half earlier and watch the Suns play the Brooklyn Nets. Game two. I got to tell the wife I have to be up at 3:50 in the morning on Friday. There you go. That’s what What a life I live being able to watch and cover this team. With that being said, man, let’s get your initial thoughts in that first preseason game. It’s kind of sad cuz last year I would text Brendan all my hot takes. You know, we’re doing the show together. Like, I feel like, you know, I just ran them off with all my crazy takes. I like to overreact as the game is going on. And you got your your your full dosage of that on Friday night when you’re probably just It’s a Friday night. There’s no shows. Well, I guess you did do a show after the game, but you’re you know, you’re trying to relax. You’re trying to No, no, no, no. Do you know how I watched the game? How did you watch the game? I watched the game cuz I I got it up on a TV screen. All right. And I’m taking notes for the Suns Jam Session podcast, which goes live after every game. So, I’m taking notes there. I’m writing the recap for Bright Side of the Sun. And part of doing the show notes for Sun’s Jam Session is we have a segment called the subreddit stakeout where we monitor the opposing team’s subreddit to hear what they have to say about our team, you know, because we’re used to looking at the Suns through our lens. Let’s hear how the opposing team does it. So, I’m bouncing between Reddit and the game and writing and notes. And then I’m getting some amazing takes coming through the old cell phone from one Ben Garcia about how Grayson Allen, you’ve seen it. We’ve Grayson Allen should be starting starting. You’ve seen enough. Jaylen Green to the bench. And I was just like, let it breathe, bro. Let it breathe. What were your overreactions to Friday’s game? And then we’ll get into maybe some more, you know, overreactions. I I guess I’ll no alcoholic beverages. The my my number one overreaction from the game is dang, we’re going to be competitive this year. I could just see it and feel it. And I am so here for the Dylan Brooks ride that we’re about to embark upon. You know, again, it’s the preseason and we all have to take a moment to take a breath. And even in my recap, I wrote like, I’m so back for this with a little asterisk. And I was like, I know, I know it’s just the preseason. But my overreaction was the fact that this team constantly and consistently hustled. And if that’s something that we will see this year, and it’s what we’ve been promised since the closing press conference of last season when Matt Ishbia said, “Hey, we didn’t do right by you, the fans. Whatever we build moving forward, it’s going to be something you’re going to be proud of. We might not win all the games, but you’re going to be proud of.” And after that game, I was like, “Yeah, you know what? I am proud. I am proud of the way that this Phoenix Suns team came out as a cohesive unit. were constantly communicating. They were chattering and Brooks diving all over the court uh and doing some really unique things off ball. That’s what I probably was most excited for uh in this game. I don’t know if it’s an overreaction, but to see him guard weak side perimeter and then dip into the paint as DA is trying to come around a screen and just t he, you know, he’d tug at his elbow and it was just enough to disrupt him on his path of going out to set a screen and then Dylan Brooks would just run back to his who he was defending. And I was like, watching Dylan Brooks off ball is going to be so much fun this year. That’s an overreaction. That’s a proper reaction. Here’s here’s not an overreaction, but it’s just something that stuck with me when you said it. It was so great in real time to see Los Angeles Lakers fans react to the DeAndre experience. I loved it. I know I’m petty. I loved it. Oh god, it was so funny. I saw someone that was like, he he doesn’t have Luca or or LeBron James in the game. I’m not going to overreact to this or get too angry. And I quote tweeted it and said, “Wait until they find out it gets worse when those two guys are Exactly. I’m sorry that that’s a that’s a little side a side tangent to it that I thought was just a great little caveat for the preseason that Lakers fans are learning that this guy is just wasted potential on their team.” And uh all talk, no walk. There’s the effort thing with Jackson Hayes that you will get but not a lot of the talent that DA has and I think Lakers fans are really going to miss that. Uh uh the give a bleep if you will while playing while playing basketball. Here’s the other thing man. Here’s why I overreacted and I will say I overreacted like all of us did. And you know what? I don’t care. I’m gonna overreact to preseason if outside of Devin Booker. I’m going to overreact on everyone. Yeah, we’ve been sitting around waiting for months to overreact. Gosh darn it. Don’t get out. Don’t get in on in our way. We’re going to overreact. Darn it. Well, I thought this was interesting, man. Um the reasoning why I bought into overreacting is because it wasn’t a Suns win where they where they, you know, hit 25 three-pointers, they shot, you know, 45% from three. uh they were just, you know, an offensive juggernaut. It wasn’t the way they won and it wasn’t it wasn’t the way that they won in the fact of that’s what we were or that’s what we weren’t expecting them to be. Because if the Suns won this game and they just shot lights out from three and they want to shoot out of a basketball game, we’d all say, “Well, it it’s great that it happened. It’s fun. It’s good.” But like that that’s not the Suns exactly why it was so great is because they won this game in the as advertised way. Meaning it’s going to be we’re going to muck it up. We’re going to push dudes around. We’re going to try really really hard and we’re still only going to be able to score 103 points. But the opposing teams going to shoot what was it 30% from the field on a team that can we just be clear had NBA players on it. Ruby Alchemor is a real player. Austin Reeves is a real player. I heard all offseason how great Jake uh Lariva and um and DeAndre were going to be for this team. Jared Vanderbilt, if I’m not mistaken, led the NBA in three-point percentage last year. Like, yeah, were they the Were they the team that they were last year? No, they’re missing the two best players. But the Suns suffocated a real NBA team like a BOA constrictor and didn’t have to drop 120 points to win a game. That preseason game is what a lot of Suns games are going to look like whether they win or whether they lose. That was my take on it. And and I and it’s 100% true. And again, that’s what made this as you walk away feeling proud and going, you know what? Yes, the vision and the alignment that the we’ve been force-fed this entire summer took place on the court. And yeah, I mean, we were without two of our starters. Now granted, like Jaylen Green and Mark Williams aren’t Luca Donuch and LeBron James, but it’s attitude, it’s effort. Those are the things that you can’t teach. And those are things that were so severely missed last year. And we saw them on the court time and again the that Lakers team. And it it was just fun to watch. And I’ll say this to fun to any Suns fan who’s watching or listening to this and you’re doing the eye roll and you’re saying, “Yeah, it’s just preseason.” Would you rather the result have been the inverse? Would you rather the Suns only scored 81 points, couldn’t shoot, and then allowed the opposing team to inflict their will? Because the challenge with the Suns team consistently, not just last year, throughout the entire history of the franchise, is we’ve never had teams that know how to truly impose their will. You think back to 7 seconds or less, we got the Spurs will imposed upon us. And on Friday night, this was a team that showcased that they could impose their will. So, I’d much rather see that than have a conversation with you right now talking about how the Suns came out, floundered away, and tried to make excuses for why they sucked. Yeah, it’s a game that doesn’t count, but doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter. 155% yes. Um, let’s move over to some more tangible and maybe a little outlandish things, but what I like to do when I bring you on is you are the audience. You yell at me and tell me I’m an idiot. And that’s okay. I wanna I want to throw my Grayson Allen over Jaylen Green starter conversation at you, idiot. And let’s do it next. Today’s show is brought to you by our friends over at Mon over at Monarch Money. Um, as we get it right here, most people can’t name all their financial accounts or even what they’re worth, whether it’s 401ks, properties, or investments. And when you don’t have the full picture, you could end up leaving money on the table. That’s why there is Monarch Money. It’s an all-in-one personal finance tool that brings your entire financial life together in one easy to use interface on your laptop or on your phone. Monarch is built for people with busy lives. If you’re if you’ve put off organizing your finances, Monarch is for you. Monarch does the heavy lifting for you. You can link all your accounts in minutes, see clear data visuals, get smart categorization of your spending, and finally feel in control of your money without ever touching a spreadsheet. Um, you know, one of the reasons why, you know, Monarch Money could have helped me a long time ago is I told you guys, money’s getting tighter because we’re moving into a into a house and uh uh, you know, it costs more than the apartment. We got to trim the fat a little bit. Listen, my wife’s telling me that she’s got a Discovery Plus account that we had no idea that she was paying for. We were paying for two Spotify accounts at one point. Had I been using Monarch Money earlier, could have saved a lot of money there and cut some unnecessary spending. So, don’t let financial opportunity slip through the crack. Use code locked on NBAmoney.com in your browser for half off your first year. That’s 50% off your first year at monarchmoney.com with code locked on NBA. All right, let’s continue with this. I thought Grayson Allen was really freaking good on Friday. And I think there’s an and I think there’s an argument to be made that he fits better with Devin Booker than Jaylen Green does. I wish I would have tweeted this out first. Uh, you know, my guy Sam Cooper, who I’ve done some work with in the past over at Fox Sports910, tweeted out, I think more tongue-in-cheek than maybe I’m being because, you know, he’s not as crazy as I am, is that Grayson Allen is gunning for the starting shooting guard spot. And I had said he kind of fits better with Devin Booker. So, I know it’s kind of the Bradley Beal argument from last year of like, you can’t send it to the bench. He makes $50 million a year. And my point was, that’s idiotic. I don’t care how much money he makes. What is the best version of the Phoenix Suns? Jaylen Green might just be a better volume scoreer coming off the bench playing the Malik Monk role where he just comes off and microwaves 15 to 20 points a night where he has to worry about efficiency a little bit less because he’s running the floor with guys like Nigel Hayes and Royce O’Neal and Nick Richards where he can be a primary score. I will concede to everyone listening that I get that you want to throw Green and Booker out there right away and figure out what you have for the first 20 to 25 games. My point is Grayson Allen is not a bad succession plan. Your thoughts? I’ll start by saying this is something that I was exploring in previous seasons when Bradley Beal was still on the team and I had written an article for Bright Side of the Sun long before the decision was ever made to move Bradley Beal to the second team unit regardless of money as you stated because I thought it was in the best interest of the team and when it ultimately happened for those first few games it looked like it was the right move. Now, al ultimately that was the easiest part of the Suns scheduled last year, so it was kind of false hope. So, it’s definitely something that I’ve explored. But the way that I look at this right now is we’ve yet to see Devin Booker with Jaylen Green. So, while Grayson Allen looks like he could be a a quality fit in, you know, what 20 shared minutes in a preseason game, we still have yet to see what Jaylen Green and Devin Booker can do together. Devin Booker and Grayson Allen have shared the court now for two seasons. They have chemistry. They’ve worked on it in some capacity. And even if it’s not something you would define as chemistry, it is familiarity. Whereas Jaylen Green, we simply don’t know. And if we’re talking about upside talent, Jaylen Green is the one currently with the upside talent. So this might be a conversation that we explore as the season progresses. if the Devin Booker Jaylen Green experiment does not work or the team is really floundering in the way that it functions as an offense because man that ball it was zipping around. It looked good. It looked good out there against the Lakers on Friday night. But until we know exactly what we have and allow ample amount of time for that oncourt relationship to flourish, Grayson Allen’s best serve coming off the bench. You have to see what you have. That is one of the primary objectives this season is to truly understand with three years left on his deal what you have in Jaylen Green and what he could be and you’re not going to find that out having him serve a Malink Monk role if this is a situation where this team is designed to be competitive and win now you’re going to pull out all the stops but we’re not in that mode right now we’re in an exploratory mode that is the whole direction of this season whether it’s Jaylen Green your rookies and their rotation What is Nigel Hayes Davis and how does he fit back into the league at age 30? These are all questions that need to be answered and you can’t be impatient in trying to find the answers to these questions. Ben, I think it’s a very valid point. Someone else commented that. I forgot who it was and they had mentioned kind of the same thing as you was like we we know what Deon Booker and Grace Nen are. I just would argue I I don’t know if we know what Grace Nile and Devin Booker are around this cast, but I’ll put it to bed for now because I do think along with you, let’s find out what we have in those two guys first because if they’re awesome, the Suns go immediately back into not contending, but being one of the teams over the next couple years that are a player maybe two away from being legitimate title contenders again. So, so I’ll be willing to to concede that. Here is my other thing. I know last year the offense was stagnant and I do think Mike Benhen Holtzer deserves judgment from the basketball gods for crimes against basketball humanity. But the one thing that I’ll give Mike Benholtzer was, by the way, side side note, one time I was in the elevator criticizing Mike Benholtzer with another media member. I don’t know if they want me to say their name, so I’m not going to say their name. But I was criticizing Mike Benholtzer like I normally do. His family there. Yeah, he’s like his like 92-year-old father was in the elevator all the way in from Hullbrook. Yeah, dude. And this is like he was he was being pushed by someone. I’m assuming another relative. And I’m like, “Okay, if you’re gonna ride the elevator with the media now, I’m just I I’m shifting blame to them when it is literally all on me.” You should have been standing there. Can we wear Can we wear like a like a big necklace that says family? It says They got the family passes. Well, I didn’t see it cuz you know when you’re walking through the back and you see all the I keep my mouth shut cuz I’m like this is family. like let’s let’s leave basketball on the court. Catching strays just walking by just like sucks. His poor fall. No, I did I don’t say bunter sucks. I was critiquing his basketball acumen if you really want to know which was a little concerning but anyways again off topic but that did happen. Um but offensively he killed the team. But offensively he kind of killed the team. And I wonder if a side note of that is it was just way too much hero ball last year. I wonder if there is some now there’s not a lot of addition by subtraction for a top 10 basketball player of all time, but there is but some addition by subtraction by not having the the the offense be so stagnant and so much hero ball where it was okay, your turn, my turn, your turn, my turn. Well, Bill hasn’t touched it in a couple of minutes. It felt like the offense was too forceful last year where in one game, one game, one game, it looked very fluid and I don’t think we saw that once last year. No, I agree. And I think that there’s a couple different things at play here. One, you’re 100% correct and this is, you know, one of the questions that I asked recently is, is Devin Booker ready to become an alpha again? because he looked like an alpha on Friday night just because he was focused on his game and operating in his space and not running to his space like oh Kevin Durant’s here let me let me turn around and walk away or oh it’s time for Bradley Beal to get the ball just as you mentioned the the taking turns so the gravity that those players uh demanded plus the usage that they demanded really created for a clunky offense take into account as well the schemes of Mike Boonhoer who on day one of training camp had boxes taped on the floor on where people should stand in the offense. And that offense simply became that. You run to your spot and you stay there and Devin Booker or Kevin Durant, they’re going to dictate when and where you get the ball. Well, what happens when that occurs? Stagnation. Players stop cutting. Players stop moving. Players stop being cohesive in the way the the art of basketball. And that was one thing that you noticed uh on the the game on Friday. Colin Gillespie coming off a screen. Uh Ryan Dunn only had four points, but both of them came on one was a back cut and one was a cut into the lane. And you saw this movement from the basketball team that it felt somewhat foreign because it didn’t it it wasn’t existent last year. And when it was in those brief moments, it it’s highly enjoyable. And we’re like, well, why don’t we see more of that? It’s just not how the the the team operated. So you had gravity of certain players combined with uh a system in Mike Boonhozer that just equated to stagnation. And again, it’s one game. It’s one game. It’s one game. But we saw fluidity in this offense that we hadn’t seen for the majority of last year. And again, it’s another reason to get excited, albeit about one game. Um I I I had so much fun watching the Suns on Friday. I did too. I had someone I had so much fun and I had to keep reminding myself, dude, this is the preseason. They could be terrible in the regular season. But it was a lot of fun. But you know what was fun about watching part of that was the offense. The fun was that the offense was fluid. The hustle was there. But normally in the preseason by like the third quarter, you just stop caring, right? You know, you’re like, “Okay, I’ve seen what I need to see. Let me go back to write my recap.” But because we have so much youth on this team, you’re watching to see Come on Mala watch. We’re watching she Rashir Fleming who Rashir Fleming looked lost on offense but defensively he’s like a condor flying at at Dalton connect in the corner making him take the second guest of his decisions and whether or not he should shoot it and I mean his closeouts are fierce. So that’s what’s going to be fun about you know the remaining three games of this preseason and probably the majority of this year you know in some capacity is there’s levels to the enjoyment you can have with this team which didn’t exist last year. I um I’m so excited to watch another game on Friday. And you know what? Let’s preview that game on Friday. Let’s find out what John is looking for and let’s do it next. Today’s show is brought to you by our friends over at FanDuel. The NFL season is here and FanDuel has an offer you do not want to miss. Right now, new customers can bet just $5 and you get $300 in bonus bets if you win. That’s right. Pick a bet, put $5 down. If it hits, you’ll get you’ll unlock $300 in bonus bets to use across the app. Listen, you want some good betting advice? I don’t think I’ve gotten one wrong over the past couple of weeks. Uh, week one, I was not right. I missed it by half a point. We’ve been betting on the Cardinals every single week. Plus 6 and a half against the Indianapolis Colts. This sounds crazy, but I actually feel kind of good about the Cardinals chances to cover six and a half. This is a kitchen sink game. This is a do or die game. Am I going to take them to win? Hell freaking no. But six and a half, I mean, that feels like for a team that is desperate for a win and will throw everything at the Indianapolis Colts to stay afloat, I kind of expect them to cover that. But if you want to be care, you know, be careful about it, maybe you just take the Colts minus 300. That’s probably the safer bet out of the two and just take them on the money line. So, what are you waiting for? Visit fanul.com to download the FanDuel app today and get started. All right, let’s close it out here on a John Voida Tuesday. People always make fun of me in the in the in the comment section about like, “Hey, buddy, it’s not Wednesday yet, it’s Tuesday.” I’m like, “Do you want content earlier? Do you want content earlier, you YouTube audience?” So, they bullied me into saying both. Um, what are you what are you looking for on Saturday? Um, Friday. Biggest thing. Friday. It might as well be Saturday. I know. It’s early Friday. Might as well be Thursday. So, it’s closer to Thursday. Dude, my life My wife is going to flip out when I tell her I have to be up at 4:50 in the morning on Sunday. Golly. Yeah, I might just spark notes. That’s a joke. I’m going to watch the game. Anyways, continue. What are you looking for? I don’t know really what to look for in these games because again, they’re happening in Macau, China. They’re 17 hours ahead of us, you know. Uh it’s one of those situations where because of travel and the fact that the Suns like you mentioned the Sunday game, right? They play at 5:00 a.m. on Sunday. They then play in Phoenix Tuesday night. So it’s like we kind of the starters are definitely not playing in one of those games. Exactly. Like there’s no way just so we’re clear like there’s no way Booker Brooks done like this. There’s no way the starting five plays in both games in China. There’s no way. There’s no way. There’s no way they play in the in the Lakers game. Uh next Maybe maybe the Maybe the NBA says, “Hey, man, play the Stars, please, for the first five minutes. Come on, help the league. Play them for the first five minutes, then you can rip them out.” Like, let the Chinese people see it. The way that I I see it is the first game, like you said, there’s going to be a a very limited amount of starter minutes. I think the second game they’ll throw a lot more out there. And then from a Suns fans perspective, don’t expect anything on Tuesday against the Lakers. It’s we’re traveling back all that stuff. They’re like, you’re done. And it’s and it’s unfortunate because the Suns are one of the few teams that we only have four preseason games, right? The Lakers have six, you know, we get four because of this trip to China, which is an initiative by Adam Silver to globalize the game. It’s the first time that any teams back. Yeah. Well, nothing makes anything cheaper anymore. uh the price of meat, man. I went to go buy steaks today, dude. Like, dude, I didn’t buy the steaks. I can’t afford this, man. You know, but it’s it’s the first time that they’ve had NBA basketball in China since Daryl my in 2019. So, you know, there’s there’s definitely, you know, uh some goodwill going on. Now, granted, we’re playing against the Nets, uh the youngest team in the NBA, a team that drafted five first round draft picks last year, which nobody thought they were going to do. They had five first round draft picks, and they actually used them all. They didn’t trade out of any of them. So, if you want to talk about a team that’s, you know, in dire straits or young and and inexperienced, that’s the team. So, from a a pure basketball perspective, I truly don’t know what to expect. I just want to enjoy the games and see how they unfold and see again, as we mentioned before, if that grittiness, that toughness, that hustle, and that imposition of will is something that just continues to translate even when the starters aren’t playing because that’s the true definition of a culture, right? You know, it’s like the St. Louis Cardinals in baseball. Anytime one of those guys comes up from their farm system, he they plays the exact same way as the guys who are currently up at the big league level. And so that’s what you’re looking for is just signs of that. It’s like, hey, we don’t have Booker. We don’t have Dunn. We don’t have Green. We don’t have, you know, Dylan Brooks. How does this team play? Oh, they’re still gritty and they hustle their butts off. That’s what you want to see. So, that’s what I’ll be looking for. again that foundation of culture a as it pertains to everybody up and down the lineup which is going to be tough because you have like the Jared Butlers out there you know who are trying to make the team so they focus more on me than we. So how does that translate to this game? We shall see. You think uh do you think there’ll be anyone more famous in China than Devin Booker on Friday? No, I don’t think there will be. No. Imagine being like just like just think about this for a second. You’re an international star. You’ve never been to China. You’re surprised that any of them I mean I would be. I I’m not Booker, but like you’re just be surprised if some of them know who you are and they’re all going to be tripping over themselves to get a picture of you. Isn’t that crazy? It’s happened to Booker before, man. Paris Olympics. Now granted, he was around a lot more famous players, but he was in every picture. Yeah. Well, my point is like he was around LeBron Steph. Like even if they were playing the Lakers, like LeBron dwarfs Devin Booker in the in the Supremacy, they’re playing the Nets. Like I a lot of those junior That’s their best guy, dude. The guy who the guy who once got DeAndre in a max extension. You know what? That’s where we should end it there. Talking about Michael Porter Jr. With that being said, that is John Voida, managing editor of Bright Side of the Sun. also DarthVoida on Twitter. Follow him on there. Good work. We’re both going after the organizations, all of them. Well, not this guy. He’s a Dodgers fan. So, for now, he’s having a good time. We’ll see if that bullpen can continue to hold still. But, um, tomorrow night for now. For now, having a good time. Yeah. Well, all right. With that being said, for John, myself, everyone tuning in in the comments section and tuning in locked on Phoenix Suns Nightly, I will talk to you guys tomorrow with host of Hoops Tonight’s Jason Tims. He’ll be on the show. We’ll have a good time and uh dive into what he thinks the diagnostics and how to fix the Phoenix Suns will be this year. But until then, I’ll talk to you guys tomorrow. I’m Benjamin Garcia. It’s been locked on Phoenix Suns. I hate the Cardinals alignment.

Are the Phoenix Suns ready for the regular season? Their preseason opener against the Lakers showed promise.

Benjamin Garcia and John Voita break down the Suns’ defensive hustle, improved ball movement, and Dylan Brooks’ impact. They debate starting Grayson Allen over Jalen Green and analyze the team’s new offensive style under Mike Budenholzer. The upcoming China games pose challenges, but could boost Devin Booker’s international stardom.

Tune in for insider takes on the Suns’ evolving identity and how it might shape their championship aspirations.

0:00 Intro: John Voita Tuesday and Suns preseason
4:59 Overreactions to Suns’ first preseason game
9:30 Suns’ defensive effort and imposing their will
13:26 Debating Grayson Allen vs Jalen Green starting
19:55 Offense fluidity and player movement improvements
24:47 Preview of upcoming Suns games in China
28:15 Devin Booker’s potential fame in China

📲 Follow Locked On Suns on TikTok
Locked On Suns https://www.tiktok.com/@lockedonphxsuns?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc

📲 Follow Locked On Suns on Instagram
Locked On Suns https://www.instagram.com/lockedonphxsuns/

📲 Follow Locked On Suns on X
Locked On Suns https://x.com/LockedOnPHXSuns
Ben Garcia https://x.com/BenGarciaShow

Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms…
🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOSuns?sid=YouTube

Locked On NBA League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Draft, WNBA & More
🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnNBA

📢 Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!

Quo
See why over 90,000 businesses trust Quo, formerly OpenPhone. Get started free and get 20% off your first 6 months at https://www.Quo.com/LOCKEDONNBA.

PrizePicks
Download the PrizePicks app today and use code LOCKEDONNFL to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup.
Click Here: https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/LOCKEDONNBA

Peloton
Let yourself run, lift, flex, and push forward. Explore the new Peloton Cross Training Tread+ today at https://www.onepeloton.com.

Monarch Money
Take control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONNBA at https://monarchmoney.com/lockedonnba for 50% off your first year

FanDuel
Right now, new customers can bet just FIVE dollars and if your bet wins—you’ll get THREE HUNDRED dollars in bonus bets to use across the app. Download the FanDuel app now by visiting https://FanDuel.com to get started

FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)