Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I admire how A’s fans are still dedicated to chanting “sell the team” no matter what ballpark the team is playing in.
In today’s SI:AM:
🤘 Texas shuts down TCU
🐺 UConn dispatches USC
⚾ MLB’s Sacramento debut
The sun is setting on Phoenix
Has any team in the NBA been as disappointing this season as the Phoenix Suns? Alright, sure, maybe the Dallas Mavericks. But at least the Mavs are still in position to make the play-in tournament. The Suns, on the other hand, are going to need a miracle if they are to play postseason basketball.
Phoenix is currently 35–40, one game behind the Sacramento Kings for 10th place in the Western Conference, and the team’s slim hopes of making the playoffs were dealt a serious blow on Monday when Kevin Durant was ruled out for at least a week with an ankle injury.
The injury comes at the worst possible time for the Suns, who are set to begin a difficult three-game road trip on Tuesday against the Milwaukee Bucks before playing the Boston Celtics on Friday and New York Knicks on Sunday. The Suns are 2–11 without Durant this season and now face the prospect of a make-or-break road trip against three of the best teams in the East without their star player. Things won’t get much easier once they return home next week, with games looming against the Oklahoma City Thunder and Golden State Warriors.
Even if the Suns are able to sneak into the play-in tournament, it’s difficult to envision them making any sort of noise in the playoffs. The big swings by new owner Mat Ishbia and general manager James Jones to build a star-laden roster centered around Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal have backfired spectacularly. Phoenix went 49–33 last season, good for sixth in the West, but got swept in the first round of the playoffs by the Minnesota Timberwolves, prompting the franchise to fire coach Frank Vogel after just one season and replace him with Mike Budenholzer.
Things haven’t gone any better under Budenholzer. With seven games left this season and a record of five games under .500, the Suns will need a miracle to avoid breaking their streak of four straight winning seasons. Durant and Booker have been reliable scorers, ranking sixth and ninth in the league in points per game, respectively, and have been the biggest reason why the Suns have one of the best offenses in the league (ranked seventh in points per possession). It’s the defense that is the reason why Phoenix has been so mediocre this season, ranking 27th in the league in points allowed per possession, but that’s to be expected when you build your team around Beal, who has been a subpar defender throughout his career, and a 36-year-old Durant.
To make matters worse, the Suns can’t bank on their current misfortune improving their future outlook. Every one of their first-round picks between now and 2031 is owed to someone else, either through a trade or a pick swap. That makes improving on their current roster really difficult, especially with Durant, Booker and Beal all still under contract through at least the end of next season at salaries in excess of $50 million. Trading all those assets to acquire Durant and Beal was a risk, and it hasn’t paid off. It’s probably going to get a lot worse for the Suns before it gets better.
The best of Sports Illustrated
- Texas punched its ticket to the women’s Final Four with a dominant win over TCU. Michael Rosenberg has more on how the Longhorns’ defense was the key to reaching their first Final Four in more than two decades.
- Rosenberg also wrote about the end of TCU guard Hailey Van Lith’s college career and how her time with the Horned Frogs reinvigorated her after a difficult time at LSU.
- In the other Elite Eight game, UConn dispatched a depleted USC team to keep its hopes of a national championship alive. It’s been nine years since the Huskies last won a title, but Emma Baccellieri believes this is the best roster Geno Auriemma has had in a long time.
- Greg Bishop attended the Athletics’ first game in Sacramento, where outside the stadium it was tough to tell that a big league game was going to be played but inside fans buzzed with excitement—at least until the Cubs won 18–3.
- An 18-game NFL schedule seems inevitable, but Matt Verderame spoke with a few coaches about the dangers of asking players to play another game on top of the already grueling schedule.
- Jurickson Profar, the Braves’ biggest offseason addition, has been suspended 80 games for a PED violation.
- With the Pelicans eliminated from playoff contention, the team has decided to shut down Zion Williamson and CJ McCollum for the rest of the season.
The top five…
… things I saw last night:
This article was originally published on www.si.com as SI:AM | Kevin Durant’s Injury Likely Spells the End of Suns’ Doomed Season.
