Western Notes: Watson, Grizzlies, Ishbia, K. Johnson
After missing starters and rotation players for nearly the entire season due to health issues, the Nuggets are inching closer to finally submitting a clean injury report. The team appears hopeful that wing Peyton Watson will be able to return this week from the right hamstring strain that has kept him on the shelf since February 4, tweets Vinny Benedetto of The Denver Gazette.
With the exception of the players who are currently assigned to the club’s G League affiliate, the Grand Rapids Gold, Watson is the only player left on Denver’s injury report.
Watson has been ruled out for Tuesday’s matchup with Philadelphia, and Benedetto suggests he wouldn’t count on the 23-year-old being activated for Wednesday’s game in Memphis. However, it sounds like Friday’s contest vs. Toronto could be a viable return date for Watson, who will be eligible for restricted free agency this offseason.
We have more from around the Western Conference:
- FedEx executive Richard Smith tells Damichael Cole of The Memphis Commercial Appeal that he hired an advisory firm to assess whether Grizzlies owner Robert Pera is looking to sell or relocate the franchise and was told no on both counts. “I don’t think there’s any truth to rumors that he wants to move the team,” said Smith, who added that he and his family would’ve been interested in making a bid for the Grizzlies to keep them in Memphis if Pera were looking to sell. The Grizzlies and the city of Memphis are currently engaged in negotiations about the team’s lease at FedExForum — the current agreement runs through 2028/29.
- The binding mediation process to resolve the legal dispute between Mat Ishbia and a pair of Suns shareholders could result in Ishbia buying out those minority owners and increasing his stake in the team to 96%, writes Baxter Holmes of ESPN. Those owners, Scott Seldin and Andy Kohlberg, are the last remaining holdovers from the Robert Sarver era in Phoenix and currently control about 13% of the franchise, Holmes explains.
- Spurs forward Keldon Johnson was a full-time starter for three seasons from 2020-23, but he transitioned to a sixth man role in 2023/24 and has since embraced the idea of coming off the bench, as Tom Orsborn details for The San Antonio Express-News (subscriber link). While Johnson wasn’t initially thrilled by losing his starting job, he and the Spurs are thriving this season as he makes a case for Sixth Man of the Year honors by averaging 12.7 points and 5.5 rebounds per game with a .529/.377/.789 shooting line. “I feel like when you want to win, you got to remove your ego, especially when we got the team we have,” Johnson said. “We all want to see each other be successful. I had to pull my ego away and say, ‘This is what’s best for the team.’ And if I can maximize my role coming off the bench, as talented as I am and with the things I can bring to the game, I feel like we’ll be in great shape throughout games.”
Suns Notes: Ishbia Lawsuit, Schedule, Raptors Loss, Gillespie
The dispute between Suns owner Mat Ishbia and two minority owners is headed to binding mediation, according to The Athletic’s Mike Vorkunov, citing a document filed Monday in Delaware state court.
The involved parties have asked the judge overseeing their case to approve an order that will allow them to resolve their case via mediation. They have made an agreement “to participate in a confidential binding mediation process, which upon completion will result in the dismissal of the action.”
Andy Kohlberg and Scott Seldin, longtime Suns and Phoenix Mercury minority owners, filed a lawsuit against Ishbia last August, accusing him of lacking transparency in how he ran the organization and of using the franchises as his own “piggy bank.” Ishbia countersued in October, claiming Kohlberg and Seldin were looking to use their legal action to gain a large buyout of their stakes in the teams at an “extortionate” cost.
Here’s more on the Suns:
- With 15 games remaining, Phoenix (39-28) has the third-toughest remaining schedule, Duane Rankin of the Arizona Republic points out. That will complicate its efforts of getting out of the play-in tournament and garnering a top-six seed. The Suns are currently seventh in the West and will complete a rugged six-game road trip with games against Boston, Minnesota and San Antonio over the next four nights. “Every game is super important,”guard Collin Gillespie said. “We’ve got to take it one game at a time. Can’t have mental lapses or the little details slip, and we know we’re fighting for something every game. Every time we step on the floor, it’s an important game. We can’t let these opportunities slip, especially in the West.”
- The Suns did let one slip away on Friday, falling to Toronto. That ended a four-game winning streak. “Last game, we had some slip-ups we can definitely control on the defensive end,” forward Royce O’Neale told Rankin. “Communicate a little better. Feel like our communication got to be on point, especially going into these last couple of games of the road trip.”
- Three games after he scored 24 points against Charlotte, Gillespie laid a goose egg against the Raptors. He only attempted three shots in 26 minutes. He also had just four points in 28 minutes against Indiana on Thursday. Gillespie said he has to keep working at getting open looks. “Find those opportunities, hunting threes,” Gillespie told Rankin. “Being ready to catch-and-shoot knowing that those guys are back. More on-ball stuff might not be available as much, but being ready to catch-and-shoot off the ball.” Gillespie is one of the league’s biggest bargains. He signed a one-year, minimum deal last summer and is averaging 13.2 points per game. He’ll be an unrestricted free agent this summer.
And-Ones: Ishbia, J. Porter, J. Johnson, 65-Game Rule
Appearing on Wednesday’s episode of The Pat McAfee Show, Suns owner Mat Ishbia said he’d be willing to put up $1MM in prize money for the winners of the slam dunk contest and three-point contest on All-Star Saturday, with another $1MM going to charity for each event, according to ESPN’s Brian Windhorst. The goal, as Ishbia explained, would be to bring back more star power to those competitions.
“Let’s get the best guys in,” Ishbia said. “Let’s make it awesome.”
Unfortunately, as Windhorst notes, it wouldn’t be as simple as Ishbia simply putting up that prize money himself. The bonuses for winning those events are negotiated as part of the Collective Bargaining Agreement and require the approval of NBA owners and the players’ union. The current CBA calls for dunk contest winners to receive $105K and three-point contest champions to get $60K.
While Ishbia didn’t consult with the league office before sharing his proposal on The Pat McAfee Show, he’s motivated to find a way to get more stars into those All-Star Saturday competitions, Windhorst writes, so he could reach out to the NBA to explore the idea further.
We have more odds and ends from across the basketball world:
- Banned from the NBA for his participation in an illegal betting scheme, former Raptors forward/center Jontay Porter plans to join the Seattle Superhawks of the United States Basketball League, according to Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic. Porter, who is still awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty to a federal felony charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud in 2024, previously attempted to join Promitheas B.C. in Greece for the 2024/25 season but had that request turned down by a federal judge. The USBL season tips off on March 6.
- Veteran NBA forward James Johnson will join the BIG3 for its upcoming season and play for DMV Trilogy, the team coached by Stephen Jackson, the 3-on-3 league announced on Wednesday (via Twitter). A 16-year NBA veteran, Johnson appeared in 12 games for the Pacers in 2024/25 but hasn’t been in the league at all this season.
- With Nikola Jokic and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander both increasingly in danger of falling shy of the 65-game minimum to qualify for end-of-season awards, Eric Koreen of The Athletic argues that the rule is backfiring and could result in the wrong player being named Most Valuable Player this spring. In his latest MVP check-in, Zach Harper of The Athletic ranks Jokic, Gilgeous-Alexander, and Victor Wembanyama as his top three candidates, but they’ve missed 16, 11, and 14 games respectively. They’d be ineligible for award consideration if that number reaches 18.
Tanking Debate Continues As NBA Weighs Potential Fixes
The NBA had a record-setting trade deadline earlier this month and celebrated its biggest stars at All-Star weekend in Los Angeles this past weekend. However, tanking has been perhaps the most popular subject of discussion during the break in the regular season schedule.
A report 10 days ago indicated that the NBA is increasingly concerned about the issue and discussed it extensively at the most recent meeting of the league’s Competition Committee in January. Three days later, the league hit the Jazz with a $500K fine and docked the Pacers $100K for behavior that “prioritizes draft position over winning.” And two days after that, commissioner Adam Silver told reporters at his annual All-Star press conference that the NBA is considering “every possibly remedy” to reduce the practice of tanking.
As Adam Zagoria writes for Forbes, Silver acknowledged that tanking may be worse this season due to the widespread perception that the 2026 draft class is significant stronger than the ’27 and ’28 classes will be. Still, the league doesn’t seem content to sit back and let the issue sort itself out in the coming years.
According to Joe Vardon of The Athletic, approximately 10 potential solutions were discussed by league officials during All-Star week. Abolishing the draft entirely wasn’t among those possible rule changes, per Vardon, but Sam Amick of The Athletic says the “draft wheel” concept first proposed more than a decade ago by Celtics executive Mike Zarren has reentered the discussion.
Of course, any significant changes would require the approval of the NBA’s owners and likely the players’ union as well, Vardon notes.
Here’s more on the tanking dialogue that has taken off in recent weeks:
- In a pair of lengthy tweets, Mavericks minority owner Mark Cuban offered his thoughts on why it seems like tanking has gotten worse in recent years and makes a case for why the NBA should embrace it – or at least live with it – as a legitimate team-building strategy. By contrast, Suns majority owner Mat Ishbia strongly opposed the idea that tanking is a legitimate strategy, arguing (via Twitter) that it’s “much worse than any prop bet scandal” and that Silver and the NBA should be willing to make “massive changes” to fix the issue.
- ESPN’s Tim Bontemps is in favor of tweaking the lottery system so that after a certain point in the season – perhaps at the trade deadline, the All-Star break, or after a set number of games – wins would essentially count as losses for the sake of determining a club’s lottery record. For instance, if the cutoff were 50 games and a team opened the season by going 22-28, then tanked late in the year and went 4-28 down the stretch, that team’s record for lottery purposes would be 50-32, with those late-season losses added to the win column. The logic, Bontemps explains, would be to penalize – rather than reward – teams that are aggressively trying to lose during the last couple months of the season.
- Sam Quinn of CBS Sports breaks down several of the hypothetical tanking solutions that have been floated by fans and pundits, breaking down the positives and the negatives of each suggestion.
Suns Notes: Highsmith, Ishbia, Brooks, 2027 All-Star Game
The Suns have long been fans of Haywood Highsmith, according to Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic, who hears from sources that the team has been eyeing the veteran forward for two years. Highsmith plans to sign a multiyear deal with Phoenix.
Rankin writes that the Suns view Highsmith as a strong fit due his “competitiveness and toughness.” Although Phoenix has a standard roster opening the team can use to sign Highsmith, the Suns are also expected to waive guard Cole Anthony, Rankin confirms.
Here’s more on the Suns:
- The Suns have already exceeded external expectations this season — they were only projected to win 31.5 games, and they’re currently 32-23, the No. 7 seed in the West and just three games out of the No. 3 spot. As Sam Amick of The Athletic writes, Mat Ishbia was widely criticized around the league for leaning into his Michigan State ties in his first couple years as owner, but instead of going away from those connections, he doubled down and went all the way in last offseason. Ishbia promoted Brian Gregory, his former assistant coach with the Spartans, to be the Suns’ new general manager, and worked with Gregory and CEO Josh Bartelstein to establish the team’s hardworking culture. “When people wanted to blame me last time, I wasn’t actually doing it my way,” Ishbia told The Athletic. “Now, I am, and there’s no question about it.”
- According to Amick, while James Jones was technically still Phoenix’s head of basketball operations last February, it was actually Bartelstein who spearheaded communications with rival teams interested in trading for Kevin Durant. League sources tell Amick the Rockets made a late pitch for Durant prior to last year’s deadline, offering a package that included Jalen Green and Jabari Smith Jr., but the Suns wanted Dillon Brooks in the deal and decided to wait until the summer to revisit trade talks. A Rockets source denies Smith was ever included in the offer, Amick adds.
- As impressive as Phoenix’s turnaround has been this season, the team still finds itself at an asset deficit after trading away so many draft picks and swaps to acquire Durant and Bradley Beal in the first place, Amick notes. The Suns will also carry Beal’s dead-money cap hit on their books for several more seasons, limiting their financial flexibility going forward.
- Speaking to the media on Saturday, All-Star guard Devin Booker says he has enjoyed playing with Brooks this season, as Rankin of The Arizona Republic relays (Twitter video link). “Dillon is a hardworking man. He’s someone to rally behind. He’s a fierce competitor. I wouldn’t want it any other way. I’d rather too competitive than to be the other way. It’s been a pleasure playing with him,” Booker said.
- Commissioner Adam Silver discussed the 2027 All-Star game, which Phoenix will host, at his Saturday press conference, per Rankin (Twitter video link).
Trade Rumors: Young, LaVine, Brooks, Deadline, AD, More
Sam Amick and Josh Robbins of The Athletic have confirmed Shams Charania’s report that the Hawks are working with Trae Young and his representatives to find the 27-year-old point guard a new team.
As Amick reported last week, Atlanta has been increasingly willing to discuss Young trades for weeks or even months after the Hawks showed no interest in pursuing an extension, but the market for the four-time All-Star seems to be limited. According to Amick and Robbins, Young is searching for a new deal “commensurate with a star player.”
To illustrate the point about teams being wary of acquiring the diminutive point guard, Amick and Robbins cite a team source who says the Kings — long viewed as a potential landing spot for last season’s assists leader — have “no interest” in trading for Young. Zach LaVine, whose contract is very similar to Young’s, is “known” to have interest in joining the Hawks, the authors add.
Regarding Marc Stein’s report about the Hawks discussing a trade that would potentially send Young to Washington and CJ McCollum to Atlanta, Amick and Robbins note that Young doesn’t fit the archetype favored by the Wizards‘ top front office executives, and speculate that Washington might want either draft compensation or a young player to take on his contract, which includes a $49MM player option for next season.
Young missed his fifth straight game Monday due to a right quad contusion.
Here are a few more trade-related rumors and notes from around the NBA:
- Don’t expect Suns small forward Dillon Brooks to be on the move in the next month. Gerald Bourguet of Suns After Dark reported (via Twitter) on Monday that Phoenix isn’t interested in moving the veteran wing due to both his on- and off-court contributions. Suns owner Mat Ishbia essentially confirmed as much just a few minutes later. On FanDuel TV’s Run It Back show (Twitter video link), former NBA big man DeMarcus Cousins said he if were running the Lakers, he would trade Austin Reaves for Brooks “in a heartbeat.” Ishbia’s response? “Don’t bother calling… Suns aren’t interested. Dillon’s not going anywhere,” he wrote (Twitter link).
- Amick, Josh Robbins and John Hollinger of The Athletic discuss the biggest storylines and questions ahead of the February 5 trade deadline, noting that Giannis Antetokounmpo‘s situation with the Bucks is the one that holds the most intrigue around the league. All three think Antetokounmpo is more likely than not to stay put during the season, though that would depend on whether the two-time MVP requests a trade. Other topics include whether Anthony Davis will be traded by the Mavericks and role players who could appeal to contending teams. Hollinger lists Wizards forward Justin Champagnie as an example of a player on a team-friendly contract who could be a valuable in-season addition.
- Speaking of Davis, he and Kyrie Irving wanted to play together for years before it finally came to fruition last February, writes Christian Clark of The Athletic. However, the Mavericks duo only played two-and-a-half quarters together prior to Davis suffering a left adductor strain. Less than a month later, Irving tore his ACL, and there’s no timeline for his return. Whether they’ll be able to team up again before the season ends is an open question with Dallas expected to listen to offers for Davis, Clark adds.
Western Notes: Powell, Beringer, Two-Ways, Booker, Suns
Mavericks minority owner Mark Cuban shot down a report indicating that big man Dwight Powell will likely retire at the end of this season, tweeting that it’s “not true.”
Powell, 34, no longer plays a significant role in Dallas, but has been with the Mavericks for over a decade and has appeared in 20 of the club’s 25 games so far this season, averaging 10.9 minutes per night.
Powell is on a $4MM expiring contract in 2025/26, so if he does intend to extend his career beyond this season, he’ll need to sign a new deal. In all likelihood, he’ll be a minimum-salary player going forward.
We have more from around the Western Conference:
- The Timberwolves assigned rookie center Joan Beringer to the G League for the first time this season on Tuesday, per the team (Twitter link). Beringer has played limited minutes at the NBA level so far this fall, so he’ll get an opportunity to take on a more significant role for the Iowa Wolves when they face the Motor City Cruise this Friday.
- Two-way contracts recently signed by LJ Cryer (Warriors), Malevy Leons (Warriors), and Tyler Smith (Rockets) are all for two years, Hoops Rumors has learned. That means Golden State and Houston will have the option of retaining those players on their two-way deals through the 2026/27 season. However, it’s somewhat rare for a player to play out a full two-year, two-way contract, as most are either promoted or waived before the deal expires.
- After Suns head coach Jordan Ott indicated over the weekend that Devin Booker has a chance to return to action on Wednesday from his groin injury, the team officially upgraded the star guard to questionable for its NBA Cup showdown with Oklahoma City, tweets Justin Martinez of The Oklahoman.
- ESPN’s Baxter Holmes shares the latest details on the legal battle between Suns owner Mat Ishbia and a pair of minority shareholders, Scott Seldin and Andy Kohlberg. While attorneys for Seldin and Kohlberg are taking aim at Ishbia’s majority control of the franchise, a spokesperson for Ishbia dismissed the claims in the lawsuit as “ridiculous,” according to Holmes. “Unwilling to take responsibility and invest in the team, these guys are resorting to threats and publicity stunts to get Mat to buy them out just so they make more money,” that spokesperson said.
Suns Minority Owners Accuse Ishbia Of Using Team As ‘Personal Piggy Bank’
In a legal filing in Delaware State Court, Suns minority owners Andy Kohlberg and Scott Seldin allege that majority owner Mat Ishbia is using the team as his “personal piggy bank” and is hiding details about his spending, according to reports from Doug Haller and Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic and Baxter Holmes of ESPN.
It’s the latest development in a legal battle between the various Suns shareholders. Kohlberg and Seldin sued the Suns and Ishbia in August, with Ishbia filing a countersuit against the pair of minority owners in October. This legal filing is a response to Ishbia’s countersuit.
“Ishbia does not own the Suns to make money for the company but he does operate it as a personal fiefdom for his own personal gain and for the benefit of his other businesses, including his mortgage company United Wholesale Mortgage,” the latest filing states. “The reality is that Ishbia is using the Suns as his personal piggy bank, including through a lengthy list of conflicted transactions — only some of which the minority owners are aware of.”
As The Athletic and ESPN relay, the allegations Kohlberg and Seldin make against Ishbia in the filing include:
- Extending a loan to the Suns at an interest rate that was far above the going market rate.
- Selling naming rights to the Suns’ arena to his own mortgage company without disclosing the details.
- Leasing the Phoenix Mercury’s practice facility from himself without disclosing the details.
- Establishing an entity called the “Player 15 Group” that allegedly holds assets which should rightfully belong to the Suns.
- Turning the Suns and Mercury into money-losing teams while profiting through United Wholesale Mortgage.
Kohlberg and Seldin also specifically cite a pair of capital calls that took place in June and July of 2025, contending that Ishbia set up those capital calls in the hopes of diluting their shares in the team, which could have happened if they didn’t pay within a 10-day window. The two minority owners contributed the necessary capital in each case, but they say Ishbia didn’t pay his own shares by the deadline and attempted to hide it by using a debt-to-equity conversion to make up the difference.
According to Kohlberg and Seldin, they should have been given the opportunity to buy the shares Ishbia didn’t fund himself, which would have allowed them to take control of a larger stake in the franchise.
“In other words,” the filing states, “Ishbia blundered into the very trap he set for the minority owners and faced a devastating dilution of his ownership interest if his failure was discovered — a failure that would wipe off his net worth and put his continued status as an NBA team owner and governor in jeopardy.”
Ishbia, who has bought out the rest of the Suns’ minority owners since assuming majority control of the team in 2023, denied the allegations through a spokesperson.
“This isn’t a lawsuit; it’s a shameless shakedown dressed up as legal process,” Ishbia’s spokesperson said in a statement. “From day one, Mat Ishbia was transparent that he was going to do things differently. Contrary to how the team was previously managed, Mat made it very clear he would invest significantly into the Suns and Mercury. He told all the investors that they could step up with him or sell their stake and step aside. Kohlberg and Seldin stayed in and now they’re trying to freeload off the value Mat created.
“Kohlberg and Seldin want to drag the organization backward, and they openly admit in this filing that investing in the team and its fans ‘makes no business sense.’ They are advocating neglect. They are free to sell their shares in the open market and if they don’t, they should be prepared to lose this lawsuit and participate in Mat’s continued investments in the teams and community.”
Ishbia and his representatives have previously argued that his investments in the team have helped bump the value of the Suns from $4 billion to $6 billion since he took over as the majority owner. Ishbia said in the latest episode of The Draymond Green Show that Kohlberg and Seldin “can sell if they want” and should appreciate the fact that the franchise valuation is on the rise.
“I told them, ‘Instead of suing me, why don’t you just write me a letter and say thank you? Your investment is worth more,'” Ishbia said (Twitter video link).
Suns Notes: Ishbia, Ott, Nash, Williams, More
In the months leading up to the 2025/26 campaign, owner Mat Ishbia talked repeatedly about a desire to turn the Suns into a tough, physical team that consistently plays hard and with aggression on both ends of the court. Ishbia was encouraged by the way the team took on that new identity during the preseason, but acknowledges there’s still work to be done, as Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic relays.
“It’s not all the way there yet,” Ishbia said. “Am I surprised? I’m really happy with where we’re at, but at the same time, we have a long way to go. Doing the things we’ve been talking about, an identity we’ve been talking about, we’re going to do it, but doing it for 48 minutes and then doing it for 48 minutes for 82 games, there’s still a process.”
Here’s more on the Suns:
- First-year head coach Jordan Ott has helped foster the team’s emphasis on toughness and defense through competitive practices and a steadfast work ethic, writes Doug Haller of The Athletic. While there will undoubtedly be bumps along the way, Wednesday’s season-opening comeback win against Sacramento was reflective of Ott’s own resiliency, according to Haller.
- Ishbia announced last month that Steve Nash has returned to the Suns as a senior advisor while also being an analyst for Amazon Prime Video. Nash recently explained what his advisory role with the Suns entails, referring to himself as a “sounding board” who can provide a big-picture perspective the team might lack at times during a long season. “I’m there as a resource, to share my experiences,” Nash said, per Rankin. “We have a rookie coach, a rookie GM (Brian Gregory). An organization that’s trying to reset. Someone that got a chance to play in the league for 17 years, got to coach in the league, I think there’s an opportunity just to be able to share my experiences, my thoughts around the game.”
- Offseason acquisition Mark Williams made his Suns debut on Wednesday, recording six points and 11 rebounds in 24 minutes off the bench, with a game-high plus/minus (+15). “It meant a lot,” Williams said (story via Rankin). “It felt good. The energy in the arena was great. Teammates had my back. Good to be out there.” Williams, who will be a restricted free agent next summer, is on a minutes restriction for the time being, Rankin adds.
- In a press release, the Valley Suns — Phoenix’s G League affiliate — officially announced the team’s coaching staff, tweets Rankin.
Suns Notes: Ishbia, Lawsuits, Williams, Centers, Butler, Jones
A pair of Suns minority owners dismissed their lawsuit against majority owner Mat Ishbia and the team on Friday, but intend to file a new suit over what their lawyer refers to as Ishbia’s “mismanagement” of the franchise, reports Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic.
It’s the latest development in a legal battle within the Suns’ ownership group. Andy Kohlberg (Kisco WC Sports) and Scott Seldin (Kent Circle Investments) sued the Suns and Ishbia in August, alleging that they weren’t being permitted to view records and financial information that would help them understand how the team was being run and how much their shares are worth. Ishbia filed a countersuit earlier this week, arguing that the initial suit was part of a negative PR campaign against him as those minority owners sought a buyout at an “extortionate” cost.
“Our clients succeeded in their books and records action in obtaining information we were seeking and have discontinued that case,” Michael Carlinsky, an attorney representing Kohlberg and Seldin, said in a statement, per Vorkunov. “We are now focused on the critical phase in our litigation, which will involve our clients’ assertion of claims for mismanagement and other misconduct and look forward to their day in court.”
Ishbia and the Suns remain confident that nothing will come of the new suit.
“This is more of the same from litigious limited partners who are using the courts to try to leverage a buyout,” Suns spokesperson Stacey Mitch said. “They dropped their books and records complaint because the organization is and has been fully transparent about its operations and success. We are confident that we will prevail in court.”
We have more on the Suns:
- After taking part in a competitive scrimmage on Saturday, Suns center Mark Williams is on track to be available for the team when the regular season tips off on Wednesday, writes Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic. “This was the most minutes he’s seen in a scrimmage that we’ve played,” head coach Jordan Ott said. “Mark is big. You can see his size out there, both ends. Offensively, puts pressure on the rim. Defensively, when someone is driving in there, you have to make the decision.” Phoenix has taken a cautious approach with Williams this fall due to his extensive injury history — he has played just 106 of 246 possible regular season games during his first three years in the NBA.
- While Williams is expected to start at center, Ott said the rotation in the middle will be “fluid” early in the season, per Rankin. Oso Ighodaro, Nick Richards, and rookie Khaman Maluach will also be in the mix. “On a night-to-night basis, we’ll have a plan going into it, but we have to be a little fluid as coaches and kind of read the games and see exactly who is impacting winning out there on the court on a night-to-night basis,” Ott explained.
- According to Rankin, Ott called it a “really tough” decision to cut Jared Butler, who had a big preseason with the Suns while on a non-guaranteed Exhibit 9 contract. Butler averaged 15.5 points, 4.2 assists, 3.2 rebounds, and 1.8 steals in 20.9 minutes per game across four preseason outings, but was waived because Phoenix is operating slightly over the tax line and apparently doesn’t plan to fill its 15th roster spot for now. “He was part of us for multiple months,” Ott said of Butler. “He really helped our group. Helped his teammates. Helped our intensity of camp. … Hopefully at the end of it, JB knows that we tried to do the best we could. Hopefully, we helped him.”
- Former Suns general manager James Jones said on Thursday that his time in Phoenix was “phenomenal” and spoke about his new role in the NBA’s league office. Rankin has the highlights in a story for The Arizona Republic.