Phoenix Suns: The Markieff Morris Saga Gets Even Weirder

The Turning Point

In the seven games leading up to Friday’s win over the New Orleans Pelicans, Keef had played a grand total of seven minutes, racking up six DNPs — one for illness and the other five being DNP-CDs — in the process.

Mirza Teletovic and Jon Leuer were thriving on the offensive end, the ball movement was crisp and everyone watching from the outside silently acknowledged that as soon as Dec. 15 rolled around and recently signed free agents could be traded, the phased-out Morris would be on the move.

But Dec. 15 came and went, and there wasn’t a peep from Yahoo Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski, ESPN’s Marc Stein or Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic. Keef hadn’t been traded. Despite Ryan Anderson of the New Orleans Pelicans and Terrence Jones of the Houston Rockets becoming available, there was nothing to report and the Suns carried on about their business.

Three days later, at the 6:07 mark of the first quarter Friday night, head coach Jeff Hornacek went to Morris as the first power forward off the bench against the Pelicans to replace starter Jon Leuer.

“I told him ahead of time that he was going to be the first sub at the 4-spot,” Hornacek said. “We need to get him back playing for us to have a little strength and toughness in there down low. Whether he makes the post-up moves or not, it still puts pressure on the other team, and we’re able to set our defense a little bit better. It’s big to have him out there.”

Next: Keef's Professionalism