2014 Official FA Thread

[Ryu]

If Suns are gonna win a championship, I want Dragic and Bledsoe leading the team to it.

This. And man, I`d cry tears of joy if that happen.

Seriously, Dragic, Bledsoe and Love would, hands down, make the most entertaining team in the NBA. Make it happen, McD!

[Jdiddy701]

And I guarantee you the Suns will go hard on Lebron this offseason. They will promise him things. Just wait people. Lebron will have to say yes.

I see Lebron leaving Miami ONLY IF Miami loses this year. This is why we need pacers to beat them. If they lose, he's gone and Phoenix will be on his list. Don't say I didn't tell ya so.

[Jdiddy701]

There's a plan to everything. This word PLAN will be used a lot this offseason.

Just what I think anyway

[Dr Manute]

And I guarantee you the Suns will go hard on Lebron this offseason. They will promise him things. Just wait people. Lebron will have to say yes.

I see Lebron leaving Miami ONLY IF Miami loses this year. This is why we need pacers to beat them. If they lose, he's gone and Phoenix will be on his list. Don't say I didn't tell ya so.

My thoughts as well. Go Pacers!!

[DirtyDez]

If Suns are gonna win a championship, I want Dragic and Bledsoe leading the team to it.

I don't care who it is as long as they bring a chip to the desert! Clear central avenue!!

[sunsbum]

And I guarantee you the Suns will go hard on Lebron this offseason. They will promise him things. Just wait people. Lebron will have to say yes.

I see Lebron leaving Miami ONLY IF Miami loses this year. This is why we need pacers to beat them. If they lose, he's gone and Phoenix will be on his list. Don't say I didn't tell ya so.

lol. I'd like to live in your world for a day.

[bigfoot]

We're not going to sign LeBron, so it's not even worth talking about. Signing Deng, Ariza or Hayward would be much more likely. I'm partial to Ariza because of his cost and he's a good defender. We still would have about $12m in cap space. Maybe getting a guy like Greg Monroe and using the vets min or mini-MLE for Steve Blake? Going in with a roster of

PG - Eric Bledsoe, Steve Blake, Ish Smith
SG - Kevin Martin, Gerald Green, Archie Goodwin
SF - Trevor Ariza, Marcus Morris
PF - Kevin Love, Markieff Morris
C - Greg Monroe, Miles Plumlee

That team is a contender and close to a championship team.

This is the type of stuff that drives me crazy. Complete roster makeovers. Have we not learned any lessons about the importance of team chemistry? Every year Nash played we had a revolving door of players. Every year we got progressively worse. If we are going to sign a FA or make a trade why blow-up the entire team?? Get one high quality player to add to the current mix of players. Hell with 3 incoming rookies that will be enough change in itself. Re-sign Bledsoe and then sign one big name free agent this summer. It a simple change that should give us three all-star quality players (Dragic, Bledsoe, and one-of-Bosh/Deng/Melo/LeBron/Dirk). Our big three and the current group of role players will compete for a championship.

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Tucker/Marcus/Rookie
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Bosh/Plumlee/Len

or

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Melo/Tucker/Marcus
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Plumlee/Len/Rookie

or ... fill in Lebron, Dirk, or Deng

[SunsFanSSOL]

We're not going to sign LeBron, so it's not even worth talking about. Signing Deng, Ariza or Hayward would be much more likely. I'm partial to Ariza because of his cost and he's a good defender. We still would have about $12m in cap space. Maybe getting a guy like Greg Monroe and using the vets min or mini-MLE for Steve Blake? Going in with a roster of

PG - Eric Bledsoe, Steve Blake, Ish Smith
SG - Kevin Martin, Gerald Green, Archie Goodwin
SF - Trevor Ariza, Marcus Morris
PF - Kevin Love, Markieff Morris
C - Greg Monroe, Miles Plumlee

That team is a contender and close to a championship team.

This is the type of stuff that drives me crazy. Complete roster makeovers. Have we not learned any lessons about the importance of team chemistry? Every year Nash played we had a revolving door of players. Every year we got progressively worse. If we are going to sign a FA or make a trade why blow-up the entire team?? Get one high quality player to add to the current mix of players. Hell with 3 incoming rookies that will be enough change in itself. Re-sign Bledsoe and then sign one big name free agent this summer. It a simple change that should give us three all-star quality players (Dragic, Bledsoe, and one-of-Bosh/Deng/Melo/LeBron/Dirk). Our big three and the current group of role players will compete for a championship.

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Tucker/Marcus/Rookie
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Bosh/Plumlee/Len

or

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Melo/Tucker/Marcus
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Plumlee/Len/Rookie

or ... fill in Lebron, Dirk, or Deng

Bosh and Melo aren't coming here and even if they did, those teams are still nowhere near contending.

[sunsbum]

We're not going to sign LeBron, so it's not even worth talking about. Signing Deng, Ariza or Hayward would be much more likely. I'm partial to Ariza because of his cost and he's a good defender. We still would have about $12m in cap space. Maybe getting a guy like Greg Monroe and using the vets min or mini-MLE for Steve Blake? Going in with a roster of

PG - Eric Bledsoe, Steve Blake, Ish Smith
SG - Kevin Martin, Gerald Green, Archie Goodwin
SF - Trevor Ariza, Marcus Morris
PF - Kevin Love, Markieff Morris
C - Greg Monroe, Miles Plumlee

That team is a contender and close to a championship team.

This is the type of stuff that drives me crazy. Complete roster makeovers. Have we not learned any lessons about the importance of team chemistry? Every year Nash played we had a revolving door of players. Every year we got progressively worse. If we are going to sign a FA or make a trade why blow-up the entire team?? Get one high quality player to add to the current mix of players. Hell with 3 incoming rookies that will be enough change in itself. Re-sign Bledsoe and then sign one big name free agent this summer. It a simple change that should give us three all-star quality players (Dragic, Bledsoe, and one-of-Bosh/Deng/Melo/LeBron/Dirk). Our big three and the current group of role players will compete for a championship.

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Tucker/Marcus/Rookie
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Bosh/Plumlee/Len

or

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Melo/Tucker/Marcus
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Plumlee/Len/Rookie

or ... fill in Lebron, Dirk, or Deng

Bosh and Melo aren't coming here and even if they did, those teams are still nowhere near contending.

I love how you make up this crazy ass fantasy roster that has 0 chance of ever coming together and then you turn around and chastise him about 2 guys that in reality could potentially have new homes next year. I think both of your ideas aren't happening but at least bigfoot is being somewhat realistic about it.

[SunsFanSSOL]

This is the type of stuff that drives me crazy. Complete roster makeovers. Have we not learned any lessons about the importance of team chemistry? Every year Nash played we had a revolving door of players. Every year we got progressively worse. If we are going to sign a FA or make a trade why blow-up the entire team?? Get one high quality player to add to the current mix of players. Hell with 3 incoming rookies that will be enough change in itself. Re-sign Bledsoe and then sign one big name free agent this summer. It a simple change that should give us three all-star quality players (Dragic, Bledsoe, and one-of-Bosh/Deng/Melo/LeBron/Dirk). Our big three and the current group of role players will compete for a championship.

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Tucker/Marcus/Rookie
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Bosh/Plumlee/Len

or

Dragic/Goodwin/Ish
Bledsoe/Green/Rookie
Melo/Tucker/Marcus
Frye/Kief/Rookie
Plumlee/Len/Rookie

or ... fill in Lebron, Dirk, or Deng

Bosh and Melo aren't coming here and even if they did, those teams are still nowhere near contending.

I love how you make up this crazy ass fantasy roster that has 0 chance of ever coming together and then you turn around and chastise him about 2 guys that in reality could potentially have new homes next year. I think both of your ideas aren't happening but at least bigfoot is being somewhat realistic about it.

My idea was through a trade which I think is the more likely medium through which we will acquire a star, as opposed to FA. Suns aren't going to be a landing spot for the Melo's and Lebron's in the league, we're not the Lakers, the Knicks, the Bulls, or the Heat. If Dallas struggles signing top tier FA's the Suns are going to have a much harder time. My idea was to trade for Love, and leave us with enough room to sign a good FA. Greg Monroe was just an example, but he is a guy I can see coming here, Melo and Bosh have no chance of coming here. Melo wants the bright lights, his wife wants the bright lights, he's going to either stick in NY or go to Chicago or LA. Bosh is in a great situation in Miami, he has a great owner with Micky Arison, great FO with Pat Riley, great city with Miami. No way he leaves a 2x championship team when he's hitting 30 to join Bledsoe, Dragic and a group of rag tag role players.

[thamadkant]

- Chris Bosh
- Carmelo Anthony
- Rudy Gay
- Lebron James

etc
are ALL Free agents or eligible to leave their current teams.

Whether its a "dream" to have them on the Suns or "unrealistic"... or even if fans want them at all, are kind of irrelevant from business point of view... from Suns FO eyes, these players are "targets" nonetheless... since they can be offered contracts.

[bigfoot]

Bosh and Melo aren't coming here and even if they did, those teams are still nowhere near contending.

I love how you make up this crazy ass fantasy roster that has 0 chance of ever coming together and then you turn around and chastise him about 2 guys that in reality could potentially have new homes next year. I think both of your ideas aren't happening but at least bigfoot is being somewhat realistic about it.

My idea was through a trade which I think is the more likely medium through which we will acquire a star, as opposed to FA. Suns aren't going to be a landing spot for the Melo's and Lebron's in the league, we're not the Lakers, the Knicks, the Bulls, or the Heat. If Dallas struggles signing top tier FA's the Suns are going to have a much harder time. My idea was to trade for Love, and leave us with enough room to sign a good FA. Greg Monroe was just an example, but he is a guy I can see coming here, Melo and Bosh have no chance of coming here. Melo wants the bright lights, his wife wants the bright lights, he's going to either stick in NY or go to Chicago or LA. Bosh is in a great situation in Miami, he has a great owner with Micky Arison, great FO with Pat Riley, great city with Miami. No way he leaves a 2x championship team when he's hitting 30 to join Bledsoe, Dragic and a group of rag tag role players.

Great. So we sell the farm for one year rental of Love because what your saying is no big name free agent is going to want to come to or stick around in Phoenix.

[SunsFanSSOL]

I love how you make up this crazy ass fantasy roster that has 0 chance of ever coming together and then you turn around and chastise him about 2 guys that in reality could potentially have new homes next year. I think both of your ideas aren't happening but at least bigfoot is being somewhat realistic about it.

My idea was through a trade which I think is the more likely medium through which we will acquire a star, as opposed to FA. Suns aren't going to be a landing spot for the Melo's and Lebron's in the league, we're not the Lakers, the Knicks, the Bulls, or the Heat. If Dallas struggles signing top tier FA's the Suns are going to have a much harder time. My idea was to trade for Love, and leave us with enough room to sign a good FA. Greg Monroe was just an example, but he is a guy I can see coming here, Melo and Bosh have no chance of coming here. Melo wants the bright lights, his wife wants the bright lights, he's going to either stick in NY or go to Chicago or LA. Bosh is in a great situation in Miami, he has a great owner with Micky Arison, great FO with Pat Riley, great city with Miami. No way he leaves a 2x championship team when he's hitting 30 to join Bledsoe, Dragic and a group of rag tag role players.

Great. So we sell the farm for one year rental of Love because what your saying is no big name free agent is going to want to come to or stick around in Phoenix.

Not necessarily Love, but it probably would need to be through a trade. Who was the last top tier free agent we signed? Steve Nash? He was solid starter and all-star in Dallas but wasn't the caliber of Melo or LeBron, not until he got to Phoenix at least. I would say the last top tier guy we signed was Penny Hardaway and even he wasn't 100% the same guy he once was after coming off of injury. I mean piecing together a team of Gordon Hayward, Greg Monroe, Eric Gordon types etc. isn't going to deliver us a championship, and those are the type of guys who are realistic options. For teams not in Chicago, LA, NY or Miami, you need to get your stars through good trading and drafts.

[DirtyDez]

Melo/Bosh max is 24m a year, that's 40% of the salary cap. Only guy worthy of that is Lebron...

IMO Love nor Lebron is signing a longterm deal unless they're joining a star like each other or someone else (not considering Dragic or Bledsoe in that class). Making the playoffs would be huge in the recruitment process and McD learned from the original GOAT of team transformation. Teams like OKC, HOU and LAC have more talent and they're not going anywhere for the foreseeable future.

[thamadkant]

Melo/Bosh max is 24m a year, that's 40% of the salary cap. Only guy worthy of that is Lebron...

IMO Love nor Lebron is signing a longterm deal unless they're joining a star like each other or someone else (not considering Dragic or Bledsoe in that class). Making the playoffs would be huge in the recruitment process and McD learned from the original GOAT of team transformation. Teams like OKC, HOU and LAC have more talent and they're not going anywhere for the foreseeable future.

Hence I can actually see McD still trade for a top 5 pick...

Suns is going for LONG TERM build.. not 2-3 years...

If they KNOW they will have little upgrades next season.. they STUDY to trade for a potential stud draft and build for 2015+

[JDLAW]

Bosh and Melo aren't coming here and even if they did, those teams are still nowhere near contending.

I love how you make up this crazy ass fantasy roster that has 0 chance of ever coming together and then you turn around and chastise him about 2 guys that in reality could potentially have new homes next year. I think both of your ideas aren't happening but at least bigfoot is being somewhat realistic about it.

My idea was through a trade which I think is the more likely medium through which we will acquire a star, as opposed to FA. Suns aren't going to be a landing spot for the Melo's and Lebron's in the league, we're not the Lakers, the Knicks, the Bulls, or the Heat. If Dallas struggles signing top tier FA's the Suns are going to have a much harder time. My idea was to trade for Love, and leave us with enough room to sign a good FA. Greg Monroe was just an example, but he is a guy I can see coming here, Melo and Bosh have no chance of coming here. Melo wants the bright lights, his wife wants the bright lights, he's going to either stick in NY or go to Chicago or LA. Bosh is in a great situation in Miami, he has a great owner with Micky Arison, great FO with Pat Riley, great city with Miami. No way he leaves a 2x championship team when he's hitting 30 to join Bledsoe, Dragic and a group of rag tag role players.

It is very rare that the major superstar free agents change teams in free agency - Lebron and Shaq are the ones the come to mind. But the fact is that top tier players (multi time all stars) do change teams in free agency and do so for a variety of reasons. To beat the defeatist drum that none of these guys would consider Phoenix presumes you have knowledge of why players change teams. Phoenix has previously been a destination for free agents and is likely to become one again. When you look down from the mountain as Lebron would, all players are role players in comparison to him. Nevertheless, he has taken notice of what is happening in Phoenix, has a good friend in Bledsoe on this team and he sees deterioration in the Heat roster. I am not saying he is coming to Phoenix, but he will no be as dismissive as you or you assume he would be when listening to pitches. I suspect there are at least a couple of other top tier free agents who will give the Suns an audience in the free agent market whereas before they would not.

You also repeat the tired notions of everyone wanting the bright lights of NYC, Chicago or LA, but the only two team in this group that are not a complete mess are the Clips and the Bulls. This Clips are unlikely players in the free agent market because the near completeness of its roster and its lack of cap space. It does not mean that LeBron could not force his way onto that roster if he truly wanted, but the rest of them (Melo, Bosh, etc) would have a hard time not seeing a no-vacancy sign. If Melo truly wanted to develop a basketball legacy, he would choose between the Bulls and the Suns for his next team (assuming these teams want him). Both teams have rosters that are ready to take the next step to contending and Melo would have a supporting cast like he never has before. I am not advocating the Suns sign him, just pointing out that this would be one of the best places for him if he wants to potentially win a championship.

Phoenix offers one thing that Chicago and NYC cannot offer - the weather. Regular season NBA basketball is played between Nov and May and the weather in Chicago, NYC, Bos and the midwestern cities can be brutal during this time. Players are keenly aware of how nice the weather is in Phoenix in the winter and are known to enjoy it. They can drive their expensive sports cars with the tops down during the season instead of storing them. The wives and kids can have outdoor activities and there is something to say about being able to go outside on Christmas day in a pair of shorts and a tee.

Believe it or not, Bosh and LeBron both signed with Miami, a smaller market than Phoenix and both eschewed the big city franchises NYC and Chi.

If the desired player's goal is to win a championship, trades are not always the best way to acquire the player. Some of the proposed Kevin Love trades have been so preposterously lopsided that the cupboard is bare in terms of adjusting the make-up of the team so that it can compete. Players do take notice of who a team is giving up and what is left when trades are proposed. Trading 6 draft choices and 3 players for Love would almost certainly cause him to pause about re-signing with the Suns.

The bottom line is that free agent players will look at the opportunities the team and the community present when they are evaluating places to play. Phoenix was out of the market for some time because of team issues, but that might be in the rearview mirror. It will be a destination for free agents and who knows who might come here.

[MilotheSlayer]

What about signing Okafor back this coming season. He might come cheap and let Plumdog be our backup and let him grow another year.

[JDLAW]

What about signing Okafor back this coming season. He might come cheap and let Plumdog be our backup and let him grow another year.

He is already under contract with the Suns. They do not need to resign him. He is neither cheap, nor is he coming back because of his neck injury.

[JDLAW]

Melo/Bosh max is 24m a year, that's 40% of the salary cap. Only guy worthy of that is Lebron...

IMO Love nor Lebron is signing a longterm deal unless they're joining a star like each other or someone else (not considering Dragic or Bledsoe in that class). Making the playoffs would be huge in the recruitment process and McD learned from the original GOAT of team transformation. Teams like OKC, HOU and LAC have more talent and they're not going anywhere for the foreseeable future.

When do you consider Dragic and Bledsoe "stars"? If Dragic is selected to one of the "all-pro" teams after the season is ended, would you consider him a star. The fact that LeBron has already stated that Dragic should have been on an all-star team also qualifies him as a worthy star and running mate. He has also noticed Bledsoe's breakout season - cut short by the injury - but nevertheless if you asked him, I think LeBron would consider both of them to be "stars". I look at things objectively and do not live in the past with undeserved labels. If you added Lebron as a free agent to the Suns' roster (not saying it is going to occur or that there is even a probability) and use the draft choices prudently, this team could very well be on the same plane as OKC, Houston, and LAC in terms of competing for a championship.

[NaturalBuns]

With the way frye contribution has died off I hope he does opt out.
Though he's always been streaky