{"id":703648,"date":"2026-04-07T16:34:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T16:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/703648\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T16:34:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T16:34:15","slug":"why-suns-devin-booker-wont-qualify-for-nba-awards-even-with-65-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/703648\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Suns&#8217; Devin Booker won&#8217;t qualify for NBA awards even with 65 games"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/basketball\/nba\/teams\/phoenix-suns\/21\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Phoenix Suns;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Phoenix Suns&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Phoenix Suns<\/a> All-Star guard Devin Booker will fall just short of qualifying for NBA postseason awards based on a minute requirement.<\/p>\n<p>The NBA requires players to play at least 20 minutes in 63 games and 15 to 19 minutes, 59 seconds in two games to total 65.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Any game under 15 minutes doesn\u2019t count towards the 65-game limit.<\/p>\n<p>Booker has played 62 games this season with 60 games of 20 or more minutes that count towards qualifying for award eligibility.<\/p>\n<p>He played under 15 minutes in two games. Booker logged 10 minutes Dec. 1 against the Los Angeles Lakers and nine Feb. 19 versus the San Antonio Spurs.<\/p>\n<p>Booker experienced a right hip injury in a 121-94 loss to the Spurs in Austin and suffered a right groin injury in the first quarter of Phoenix\u2019s 125-108 road win over the Lakers.<\/p>\n<p>So even if he plays 20 minutes in each of Phoenix\u2019s last four games of the 2025-26 regular season to reach 66 games played, he\u2019ll fall one game short of the 65-game requirement because the two games he played under 15 minutes would count against him.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Booker would wind up with 64 qualified games for postseason awards.<\/p>\n<p>A two-time All-NBA selection, Booker is averaging 25.8 points and six assists.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Have opinions about the current state of the Suns? Reach Suns Insider Duane Rankin at <a href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/articles\/mailto:dmrankin@gannett.com\" data-ylk=\"slk:dmrankin@gannett.com;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;dmrankin@gannett.com&quot;}\" class=\"link \" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">dmrankin@gannett.com<\/a> or contact him at 480-810-5518. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, at <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DuaneRankin\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:@DuaneRankin;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;@DuaneRankin&quot;}\" class=\"link \">@DuaneRankin<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Support local journalism: Subscribe to <a href=\"https:\/\/cm.azcentral.com\/specialoffer?gps-source=CPNEWS&amp;utm_medium=onsite&amp;utm_source=TAGLINE&amp;utm_campaign=NEWSROOM&amp;utm_content=JEREMYCLUFF\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:azcentral.com;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;azcentral.com&quot;}\" class=\"link \">azcentral.com<\/a> today.<\/p>\n<p>This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.azcentral.com\/story\/sports\/nba\/suns\/2026\/04\/07\/why-devin-booker-wont-qualify-for-nba-postseason-awards\/89494050007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Why Devin Booker won&#039;t qualify for NBA postseason awards;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Why Devin Booker won&#039;&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Why Devin Booker won&#8217;t qualify for NBA postseason awards<\/a><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Phoenix Suns All-Star guard Devin Booker will fall just short of qualifying for NBA postseason awards based on&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703649,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3791],"tags":[46431,7,2292,150,6,2065,472,4045,86442,474,604],"class_list":{"0":"post-703648","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix-suns","8":"tag-20-minutes","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-devin-booker","11":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","12":"tag-nba","13":"tag-phoenix","14":"tag-phoenix-suns","15":"tag-phoenixsuns","16":"tag-postseason-awards","17":"tag-san-antonio-spurs","18":"tag-suns"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116364396400023050","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703648\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}