Is Booker already the 3rd best player in the history of the Suns?

[Flying Colors]

Here is an interesting scenario, if Suns win a chip this year and Paul opts out of his contract and goes to New York or retires, does he go into the Ring of Honor? What if he won the Finals MVP?

[bwgood77]

Here is an interesting scenario, if Suns win a chip this year and Paul opts out of his contract and goes to New York or retires, does he go into the Ring of Honor? What if he won the Finals MVP?

My first instinct is no, but if he clearly was the key to leading us, which I guess you can say he has been this year taking us from a lotto team to the 2nd best record and at least the 2nd round, then being the guy to get us our first trophy seems like it would have to be considered.

[cberry78]

Here is an interesting scenario, if Suns win a chip this year and Paul opts out of his contract and goes to New York or retires, does he go into the Ring of Honor? What if he won the Finals MVP?

My first instinct is no, but if he clearly was the key to leading us, which I guess you can say he has been this year taking us from a lotto team to the 2nd best record and at least the 2nd round, then being the guy to get us our first trophy seems like it would have to be considered.

If CP3 leads the Suns to their first title, Sarver will bend over backwards to make absolutely sure that he retires a Sun. And then, after 3 more years, yes, he would be in the ring of honor.

Sent from my SM-N960U using RealGM mobile app

[bwgood77]

Here is an interesting scenario, if Suns win a chip this year and Paul opts out of his contract and goes to New York or retires, does he go into the Ring of Honor? What if he won the Finals MVP?

My first instinct is no, but if he clearly was the key to leading us, which I guess you can say he has been this year taking us from a lotto team to the 2nd best record and at least the 2nd round, then being the guy to get us our first trophy seems like it would have to be considered.

If CP3 leads the Suns to their first title, Sarver will bend over backwards to make absolutely sure that he retires a Sun. And then, after 3 more years, yes, he would be in the ring of honor.

Sent from my SM-N960U using RealGM mobile app

Well I agree, but was addressing his exact scenario. I think we knew the answer to that.

[bwgood77]

I was thinking of CP3 took us from where were were to a championship, while mentoring and making pretty much everyone on our team better...it's not just his individual play but teaching everyone to play as a team.

Where does he rank? That's hard. That's like greater than anything Nash did here....and he took a team that had a losing record last year at 34-39 and 19 wins the year before to a championship. I mean that is crazy.

I guess it depends on people's criteria. He may be the best player outside of Barkley to play for us all things considered (Nash may have been as good individually but as for helping develop players to grow outside of increasing their stats coming over and playing in D'Antoni's system).

10x all star..probably a bunch of all NBA teams.

Especially if he led us to more than one finals and at least one championship, maybe 2.

[Barkley6]

I was thinking of CP3 took us from where were were to a championship, while mentoring and making pretty much everyone on our team better...it's not just his individual play but teaching everyone to play as a team.

Where does he rank? That's hard. That's like greater than anything Nash did here....and he took a team that had a losing record last year at 34-39 and 19 wins the year before to a championship. I mean that is crazy.

I guess it depends on people's criteria. He may be the best player outside of Barkley to play for us all things considered (Nash may have been as good individually but as for helping develop players to grow outside of increasing their stats coming over and playing in D'Antoni's system).

10x all star..probably a bunch of all NBA teams.

Especially if he led us to more than one finals and at least one championship, maybe 2.

If Chris Paul leads us to a championship, build him a statue. We'd have done the same for Charles if they'd won it his first year here (but Charles came into a team that was already very good). And the same for Nash if they'd won it in 04-05.

Chris Paul strikes me as a loyal dude. I doubt he'd leave after one season, and I doubt that especially with the way he talks about Monty Williams and this group.

I also think that when you hear him talk about everyone saying he was done, or couldn't do it anymore, Phoenix believed in him. They gave up a bunch of younger players, and picks to make CP3 our floor general. That belief is going to count for something with Chris.

[ATTL]

Booker and paul jump into top 3 when they win this year.

[cberry78]

Micheal Jordan was pretty good, but he wouldn't be able to hang in todays NBA. LeBron would shut him down. He'd be a good player, but not the greatest.

MJ today would be a homeless man's Demar Derozan

What about a clean Richard Dumas perhaps?

Watch on YouTube

MJ would be almost as good as a clean Richard Dumas, obviously.

[bwgood77]

Now that I think about it, I don't think Finals MVP would change the conversation. Yes there would be some talk about how CP3, the Finals MVP was the key blah blah but ultimately CP3 won't have the games played for the Suns to take that shine off of Book. Booker already has 420 games played as a Suns, he was drafted and developed by the Suns and he'll have that "homegrown" narrative that would be far bigger than the CP3/Finals MVP argument.

Booker would be Tier 1 - drafted by the Suns, brought a championship to the desert
Nash/Barkley woul be Tier 2 - both guys who became a star with another team first and were MVP level players but didn't win a chip
Amare/Matrix/KJ etc would be Tier 3 as Suns greats

I think you may underestimate just how important CP3 is to this team and how far we go and also how most everyone in the rotation is very important. Those other guys were multiple all star, all nba and the main guys leading their teams.

For example, I don't think anyone would think MItchell passes up Malone or Stockton if Utah won the championship.

Now if Trae Young led the Hawks to a championship in his 3rd year? He could jump to #1. The only other guy I can think of that might be there is Dominique but don't know their history well.

[lilfishi22]

Now that I think about it, I don't think Finals MVP would change the conversation. Yes there would be some talk about how CP3, the Finals MVP was the key blah blah but ultimately CP3 won't have the games played for the Suns to take that shine off of Book. Booker already has 420 games played as a Suns, he was drafted and developed by the Suns and he'll have that "homegrown" narrative that would be far bigger than the CP3/Finals MVP argument.

Booker would be Tier 1 - drafted by the Suns, brought a championship to the desert
Nash/Barkley woul be Tier 2 - both guys who became a star with another team first and were MVP level players but didn't win a chip
Amare/Matrix/KJ etc would be Tier 3 as Suns greats

I think you may underestimate just how important CP3 is to this team and how far we go and also how most everyone in the rotation is very important. Those other guys were multiple all star, all nba and the main guys leading their teams.

For example, I don't think anyone would think MItchell passes up Malone or Stockton if Utah won the championship.

Now if Trae Young led the Hawks to a championship in his 3rd year? He could jump to #1. The only other guy I can think of that might be there is Dominique but don't know their history well.

I don't underestimate CP3's importance at all. I know we're probably a play-in team if we kept the Bubble Suns instead of taking the gamble of trading for CP3. He's vitally important, every Suns fan knows that.

I'm just saying in terms of Suns royalty, Booker's done something no other NBA great or Suns great has done in the past. He also wasn't one-and-done like Kawhi which would hurt his stock as the #1 in Suns history. The other factor which is clearly still up in the air is that Booker is still a young guy and I expect he would be with the team for a long time should he win or even gets close to a title here so he could very well spend a decade in Phoenix as the #1 guy and that would already put him among Sun's greats. What would elevate him is that title, even if he had CP3's help. Nobody wins by themselves.

To me the biggest factors adding to Booker's stock are
1. Championship
2. Drafted/developed by the Suns
3. A top 20 player
4. Already #16 in games played for the Suns and in two seasons he would break top 10

[bwgood77]

Now that I think about it, I don't think Finals MVP would change the conversation. Yes there would be some talk about how CP3, the Finals MVP was the key blah blah but ultimately CP3 won't have the games played for the Suns to take that shine off of Book. Booker already has 420 games played as a Suns, he was drafted and developed by the Suns and he'll have that "homegrown" narrative that would be far bigger than the CP3/Finals MVP argument.

Booker would be Tier 1 - drafted by the Suns, brought a championship to the desert
Nash/Barkley woul be Tier 2 - both guys who became a star with another team first and were MVP level players but didn't win a chip
Amare/Matrix/KJ etc would be Tier 3 as Suns greats

I think you may underestimate just how important CP3 is to this team and how far we go and also how most everyone in the rotation is very important. Those other guys were multiple all star, all nba and the main guys leading their teams.

For example, I don't think anyone would think MItchell passes up Malone or Stockton if Utah won the championship.

Now if Trae Young led the Hawks to a championship in his 3rd year? He could jump to #1. The only other guy I can think of that might be there is Dominique but don't know their history well.

I don't underestimate CP3's importance at all. I know we're probably a play-in team if we kept the Bubble Suns instead of taking the gamble of trading for CP3. He's vitally important, every Suns fan knows that.

I'm just saying in terms of Suns royalty, Booker's done something no other NBA great or Suns great has done in the past. He also wasn't one-and-done like Kawhi which would hurt his stock as the #1 in Suns history. The other factor which is clearly still up in the air is that Booker is still a young guy and I expect he would be with the team for a long time should he win or even gets close to a title here so he could very well spend a decade in Phoenix as the #1 guy and that would already put him among Sun's greats. What would elevate him is that title, even if he had CP3's help. Nobody wins by themselves.

To me the biggest factors adding to Booker's stock are
1. Championship
2. Drafted/developed by the Suns
3. A top 20 player
4. Already #16 in games played for the Suns and in two seasons he would break top 10

I think Booker has a good chance of getting to 3, or even to 1. But I guess it just depends on the assessment and when you are talking about. If you are talking a few years from now or at the end of his career that is different than now.

The other factors are stuff like how great the player actually is/was, and as The Bobster pointed out in his post, listing all the the times various Suns were on the All NBA first team or second team...or 3rd team, but that wasn't even added until about 89.

Kawhi is different because the Raptors history is short and they never had any franchise players before. The closest guy would be Lowry. But Kawhi is clearly the best player ever to have played there.

It's hard to compare Booker to players from the pre-KJ era, at least for me, because I didn't watch them much, but I know they were enormously popular and on multiple all nba teams and a guy like Westphal (and Adams) got to the finals.

Others had multiple playoff runs like 4 or 5 or more deep into the playoffs putting teams on their back and huge numbers.

So one playoff run where CP3 is the catalyst is very hard to compare to guys that were the main guys on teams that went deep into the playoffs many years but maybe went up against some of the greats like Magic, Kareem and other great teams throughout the decades.

I know many have a short history on the Suns so I can understand the thinking, and I know the current thinking for how good a player is values rings over no rings without evaluating much else, but that's not something I've ever really agreed with.

The Raptors signed Kawhi who was already a finals MVP, won the championship, then he left. It's somewhat similar to what CP3 is doing however the Raptors pre Kawhi were a lot better than the Suns pre Paul, so you could argue Paul is making an even bigger impact.

But there are all sorts of arguments. Many could argue Barkley only played 4 years, didn't win anything and we won just as many games the 4 years before him as after and got to more conference finals the previous 4 years than his 4 years.

Nash nearly did what Kawhi did..and who knows what happens if JJ doesn't break his face...he obviously had Amare and Marion, who were more seasoned dominating players than Ayton/Bridges, so there is just a lot to look at.

It's just hard to really have conversations about it when many haven't been Suns fans for that long and there are a number of fans here who have been here from the beginning. Clearly if you are just looking at the last 15-16 years he's high, or even the last 25-27.

And very hard to compare to guys like Marion and Amare.

[lilfishi22]

I think you may underestimate just how important CP3 is to this team and how far we go and also how most everyone in the rotation is very important. Those other guys were multiple all star, all nba and the main guys leading their teams.

For example, I don't think anyone would think MItchell passes up Malone or Stockton if Utah won the championship.

Now if Trae Young led the Hawks to a championship in his 3rd year? He could jump to #1. The only other guy I can think of that might be there is Dominique but don't know their history well.

I don't underestimate CP3's importance at all. I know we're probably a play-in team if we kept the Bubble Suns instead of taking the gamble of trading for CP3. He's vitally important, every Suns fan knows that.

I'm just saying in terms of Suns royalty, Booker's done something no other NBA great or Suns great has done in the past. He also wasn't one-and-done like Kawhi which would hurt his stock as the #1 in Suns history. The other factor which is clearly still up in the air is that Booker is still a young guy and I expect he would be with the team for a long time should he win or even gets close to a title here so he could very well spend a decade in Phoenix as the #1 guy and that would already put him among Sun's greats. What would elevate him is that title, even if he had CP3's help. Nobody wins by themselves.

To me the biggest factors adding to Booker's stock are
1. Championship
2. Drafted/developed by the Suns
3. A top 20 player
4. Already #16 in games played for the Suns and in two seasons he would break top 10

I think Booker has a good chance of getting to 3, or even to 1. But I guess it just depends on the assessment and when you are talking about. If you are talking a few years from now or at the end of his career that is different than now.

The other factors are stuff like how great the player actually is/was, and as The Bobster pointed out in his post, listing all the the times various Suns were on the All NBA first team or second team...or 3rd team, but that wasn't even added until about 89.

Kawhi is different because the Raptors history is short and they never had any franchise players before. The closest guy would be Lowry. But Kawhi is clearly the best player ever to have played there.

It's hard to compare Booker to players from the pre-KJ era, at least for me, because I didn't watch them much, but I know they were enormously popular and on multiple all nba teams and a guy like Westphal (and Adams) got to the finals.

Others had multiple playoff runs like 4 or 5 or more deep into the playoffs putting teams on their back and huge numbers.

So one playoff run where CP3 is the catalyst is very hard to compare to guys that were the main guys on teams that went deep into the playoffs many years but maybe went up against some of the greats like Magic, Kareem and other great teams throughout the decades.

I know many have a short history on the Suns so I can understand the thinking, and I know the current thinking for how good a player is values rings over no rings without evaluating much else, but that's not something I've ever really agreed with.

The Raptors signed Kawhi who was already a finals MVP, won the championship, then he left. It's somewhat similar to what CP3 is doing however the Raptors pre Kawhi were a lot better than the Suns pre Paul, so you could argue Paul is making an even bigger impact.

But there are all sorts of arguments. Many could argue Barkley only played 4 years, didn't win anything and we won just as many games the 4 years before him as after and got to more conference finals the previous 4 years than his 4 years.

Nash nearly did what Kawhi did..and who knows what happens if JJ doesn't break his face...he obviously had Amare and Marion, who were more seasoned dominating players than Ayton/Bridges, so there is just a lot to look at.

It's just hard to really have conversations about it when many haven't been Suns fans for that long and there are a number of fans here who have been here from the beginning. Clearly if you are just looking at the last 15-16 years he's high, or even the last 25-27.

And very hard to compare to guys like Marion and Amare.

I wasn't around for the pre-KJ era so I can't really speak on the lore around guys like Chambers, Westphal and such but clearly they were very popular and elite players. You're right about the Raptors having a much shorter franchise history so they don't have the Barkley's or Nash's or even KJ's to compare to but they had Bosh, they had Lowry and they had VC. Not the same level but it would be their equivalent.

To me, the championship is what puts him above those other players like Nash and Barkley even though individually and on a league level, those guys are MVP's. Just viewing it from a purely Sun's perspective and what they've done for the Suns specifically, I think Book with the title is a heavy favourite for #1 in the franchise. Perhaps I was a little rushed to crown him #1 so maybe I'll put him at #2 but to me, he just needs to play a decade (he's already at year 6) for the Suns, perhaps make a few more all-stat teams and maybe an all-NBA team and that would be enough to solidify him at #1 imo.

Nash is a #1 for me, because it was more my era, he revolutionised the game, won 2 MVPs and we had a number of great playoff runs which if not for bad luck, we likely would've won it all.

[handsome salary]

Better than KJ. Still behind CB and and Nash. In two weeks who know.

[bwgood77]

Not even close. Maybe if the Suns accomplish something of significance with him as the franchise player but there’s a long way to go,

This. I love Devin and am 100% behind the man. But he’s got a lot of great memories to give us before I put him on par with the 10 greatest Suns.

Definitely two huge games in this postseason so climbing...and the favorites right now at the title which is crazy.

[bwgood77]

I was thinking of CP3 took us from where were were to a championship, while mentoring and making pretty much everyone on our team better...it's not just his individual play but teaching everyone to play as a team.

Where does he rank? That's hard. That's like greater than anything Nash did here....and he took a team that had a losing record last year at 34-39 and 19 wins the year before to a championship. I mean that is crazy.

I guess it depends on people's criteria. He may be the best player outside of Barkley to play for us all things considered (Nash may have been as good individually but as for helping develop players to grow outside of increasing their stats coming over and playing in D'Antoni's system).

10x all star..probably a bunch of all NBA teams.

Especially if he led us to more than one finals and at least one championship, maybe 2.

If Chris Paul leads us to a championship, build him a statue. We'd have done the same for Charles if they'd won it his first year here (but Charles came into a team that was already very good). And the same for Nash if they'd won it in 04-05.

Chris Paul strikes me as a loyal dude. I doubt he'd leave after one season, and I doubt that especially with the way he talks about Monty Williams and this group.

I also think that when you hear him talk about everyone saying he was done, or couldn't do it anymore, Phoenix believed in him. They gave up a bunch of younger players, and picks to make CP3 our floor general. That belief is going to count for something with Chris.

That is true. If Paul led us to a championship and was here for 3 years, there can't be THAT much difference between him and Barkley. As a matter of fact, he could rank ahead.

Barkley was 11x all star and 11x all nba. Paul is 11x all star and 10x all nba. He was also 9x all defense (7x 1st team defense). Barkley never had that.

Then his leadership. Why Barkley ahead? He really only did much in his first 3 years here and his 4th I don't think we even made the playoffs...I do know we were near 500.

[alamin330]

Better than KJ. Still behind CB and and Nash. In two weeks who know.

Honest question

What makes Nash better than KJ?

I would say KJ was more skilled and just as good a playmaker. Showed up big time in game 7s. Helped Barkley bring suns to the finals.
Nash won 2 mvps but that’s a popularity contest. He also never got the suns to the finals.

[handsome salary]

Better than KJ. Still behind CB and and Nash. In two weeks who know.

Honest question

What makes Nash better than KJ?

I would say KJ was more skilled and just as good a playmaker. Showed up big time in game 7s. Helped Barkley bring suns to the finals.
Nash won 2 mvps but that’s a popularity contest. He also never got the suns to the finals.

KJ never led the Suns to the finals without CB and during that finals run he was not as good as Booker is playing right now.

I remember watching KJ led teams before Barkley and don't recall a single triple double.

Like I said if the Suns flame out before the finals than yeah I'd put them on the same tier. Let's see in two weeks.

Nash was a touch better because he dictated the offense way more especially with getting the whole team involved. KJ was great but just as great.

[bwgood77]

Better than KJ. Still behind CB and and Nash. In two weeks who know.

Honest question

What makes Nash better than KJ?

I would say KJ was more skilled and just as good a playmaker. Showed up big time in game 7s. Helped Barkley bring suns to the finals.
Nash won 2 mvps but that’s a popularity contest. He also never got the suns to the finals.

Personally I think KJ was the all around better player at his peak, and Nash's stats inflated with D'Antoni, but it's very very close. Nash is ahead though because he was more healthy for longer.

KJ did make the playoffs every year though, was All NBA 5x (same as Nash), made the WCF 3x (twice before Barkley), finals once, and had tons of monster games in the playoffs. Nash had the MVPs but never would have had he played the same time as Magic, Bird, MJ, etc, like KJ did.

There are a ton more Nash fans though because more fans come on as time goes, and some penalize KJ's basketball accomplishments for his off the court stuff, which I think if we are assessing players' careers, we shoud leave out.

About Book, that had to be the best WCF debut by a Sun ever. I looked up KJ's, who was only in his second year, and he did have 27 pts and 18 assists on 65.4% TS% so he had a pretty amazing one too.

[bwgood77]

Better than KJ. Still behind CB and and Nash. In two weeks who know.

Honest question

What makes Nash better than KJ?

I would say KJ was more skilled and just as good a playmaker. Showed up big time in game 7s. Helped Barkley bring suns to the finals.
Nash won 2 mvps but that’s a popularity contest. He also never got the suns to the finals.

KJ never led the Suns to the finals without CB and during that finals run he was not as good as Booker is playing right now.

I remember watching KJ led teams before Barkley and don't recall a single triple double.

Like I said if the Suns flame out before the finals than yeah I'd put them on the same tier. Let's see in two weeks.

Nash was a touch better because he dictated the offense way more especially with getting the whole team involved. KJ was great but just as great.

You don't remember or don't think KJ had a triple double in his career before Barkley or in the playoffs? He was only 6'1 so rebounds were harder to come by, but he didn't in the playoffs. I'm sure he did in some regular season games.

In his 105 playoff games, he never did, though he had a few double doubles with 9 rebounds. He had a ton of games with between like 12 and 18 assists though. His value was getting others going but could take over when needed. He's really better to compare to Nash or Paul.

All playoff games. https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/j/johnske02/gamelog-playoffs/

It's pretty amazing how good he was in his first playoff games, all in his 2nd year. Debuted with 26 and 9 and then in second game had 34 and 14 and in 3rd had 32 and 16.

[handsome salary]

KJ was great and I loved watching play but as of right now if any player named Luka or Durant or Harden or Lebron or Trae or Embid or Giannis had a triple double in their first ever or next western conference finals game one the national media would be licking their butt hole for the next week.