Are The Phoenix Suns Better Than Their Record?

The Phoenix Suns have lost three straight games and have a 7-8 record, but are they a better team than their early season record would indicate?

The Phoenix Suns have lost three games in a row, falling to under .500 for just the second time all season. Two losses have come against the New Orleans Pelicans, a team that could be competing with the Suns for one of the final playoff spots in the Western Conference; the defense is falling apart; the turnovers have been excessive; and overall, it feels like these inconsistent Suns are still a far cry from the 48-win Sunderellas of 2013-14.

To be fair, the Suns’ last five losses have come against the Oklahoma City Thunder, Chicago Bulls, Pelicans and San Antonio Spurs — all good teams. The last time Phoenix fell below .500 they won four of their next five games, and even with a 7-8 record, the Suns still sit at seventh in the conference standings.

Other than home atrocities against the Dallas Mavericks on opening night and Detroit Pistons in Marcus Morris‘ return, none of their losses have been “bad,” per se.

Still, with the Helter Skelter Suns searching for consistency — even with their highly vaunted backcourt duo of Eric Bledsoe and Brandon Knight — it’s been hard to figure out this team’s true identity. Wednesday’s loss to the Pellies revealed the stark contrast between the Suns at their best and the Suns at their worst, with Phoenix capable of reaching both extremes within the course of one 48-minute game.

”We’re getting back into some of our old ways of late,” forward P.J. Tucker said. “Not finishing games, giving teams easy baskets, bad communication, just not doing what we’re supposed to do. It didn’t come from nothing, it’s not like it just so happened that we’re losing tough, close games. This didn’t have to be a close game, we let it be.”

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Tucker’s concerns about reverting back to old habits are valid and raise questions. Are the Suns the team that’s been dominant against lesser opponents? Are they the team that’s completely disappeared at times against stronger competition? Or are they just good enough to beat inferior competition but not quite great enough to earn wins over their tougher opponents?

We’ve seen them all over the map through the season’s first 15 games. We’ve seen Knight put up a monster 30-15-10 triple-double against the lowly Los Angeles Lakers and set a new career high with 37 points against the shorthanded Los Angeles Clippers, but his recent performances against the Denver Nuggets and Pelicans were a fair barometer for this team’s unpredictable play.

Against the Nuggets, Knight re-set his career high to 38 points, with 28 of them coming in the second half. The Suns were half-asleep to start the game, falling behind by as many as 17 points early in the first half. But then Knight came to life and Phoenix earned the road win against an inferior opponent.

At home against the Pellies Wednesday night, the story was the exact inverse, almost to a tee: the Suns built a 17-point lead in the first half, watching Knight go bananas for 20 first quarter points in what seemed like an easy win in the making, before everything went wrong.

The Suns gave up a 10-2 run to close the first half, allowing the Pelicans to make it a two-point game by halftime. Phoenix wound up losing a game that should never have been close, with Knight only scoring nine points after his first quarter explosion. The contrast between the two halves was jarring and eye-opening about how good this team can be…and how quickly it can unravel.

“In this league, you can never relax,” head coach Jeff Hornacek said after the game. “I don’t care if you’re up by 25 in the first half. It’s easy to come back — well, not ‘easy,’ but it does happen quite a bit. I thought our guys just relaxed and we gave them the confidence.”

For a team that was beaten at or near the buzzer five times last season, Phoenix has admittedly had some bounces not go their way over the last year or so. Everyone seems to save their best game for the Suns, with Ish Smith being the latest success story (20 points, 11 assists, five rebounds, 9-for-16 shooting).

Revenge is an Ish best served cold, but from Tucker’s point of view, the bad luck that always seems to plague the Suns is not the problem.

“I think it has to change, but we’ve got to change it,” he said. “We can’t sit around and wait for luck. Tonight we beat ourselves. It’s not luck, we beat ourselves. We had a big lead early. They played a great game, but we let them do what they wanted. We beat ourselves.”

A look at the stat sheet also shows the juxtaposition of what the Suns are doing well in order to win games and where they’re really shooting themselves in the foot.

On the bright side, Phoenix has a +2.1 point differential — the fourth best mark in the entire Western Conference. The Suns rank third in three-point percentage (39.3 percent) on the seventh most attempts per game, which is a great sign after they were the worst long range shooting team in the NBA following the trade deadline last year.

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The addition of Tyson Chandler has given Alex Len a mentor, but his arrival means the Suns are taking care of the glass as a whole as well, averaging the fifth most rebounds per game. They’re also pushing the tempo, posting the third most fast break points per game in the NBA.

And yet, for all their success when it comes to point differential, three-point shooting, rebounding and tempo — four tell-tale signs of a good team in this modern pace and space era — the Suns have a losing record. How has this happened?

Maybe it’s just a simple matter of looking to the team’s two best players in Knight and Bledsoe. After all, there’s a pretty vast difference in their combined production in wins vs. losses:

• Bledsoe & Knight in wins:  50.0 PPG, 11.0 APG, 9.3 RPG, 4.4 SPG, 52.7 FG%, 46.3 3P%
• Bledsoe & Knight in losses:  40.0 PPG, 12.1 APG, 7.1 RPG, 2.5 SPG, 38.9 FG%, 35.0 3p%

But the inconsistencies don’t stop there. The Suns are currently a middling team in offensive rating (14th) AND defensive rating (18th) right now, which is particularly disappointing when you consider Phoenix has the personnel to be a top-10 defense in this league.

“I think that we’ve given the effort,” Hornacek said when asked what the next step toward consistency is. “We’ve told the guys, ‘We can’t fault the effort, you guys are playing extremely hard.’ I think the next step is we’ve got to play a little smarter. In terms of knowing exactly who your personnel is.”

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Valley of the Suns

He’s not lying about playing smarter, since the Suns are averaging 17.3 turnovers per game and coughing the ball up more than every team in the league but one — the Philadelphia 76ers. Phoenix is only 5-4 at home, with the undefeated Golden State Warriors visiting Friday after three days of rest…before the Suns then embark on a tough six-game road trip.

The Suns have the second worst assist-to-turnover ratio (1.15) in the league, and their fast break attack has nearly been cancelled out by their poor transition defense, which is surrendering 16.0 points per game on the break — the fourth highest mark in the association.

On offense, 49 percent of their made field goals have been unassisted (third highest mark in the league) and they’re giving up the fifth highest field goal percentage to opponents (46.2 percent). The Suns are doing the right things from downtown and on the glass, but their turnovers and defense — particularly in transition — still needs work.

Summing this team’s strengths and flaws up into one succinct statement is impossible, since it seems to morph on a nightly basis.

There are solid foundations to feel good about in Phoenix, and the new pieces need more time to gel. Markieff Morris has found his game again, rookie Devin Booker looks promising, T.J. Warren has become a nightly double-digit scorer and stretch-4s Mirza Teletovic and Jon Leuer have been pleasant surprises.

Next: NBA Power Rankings: Week 5

But until that consistency comes and an improved record follows with it, it doesn’t feel like there’s as much to be thankful for in the Valley of the Sun just yet.