Suns 2005 season

I am totally excited for the 2004-2005 NBA playoffs. My Phoenix Suns have the best record in the league and are rolling into the playoffs at full strength. I still can't believe they went 62-20 in the regular season. Though at one point in the season I was hoping they'll win 70+ games :-). ESPN's Marc Stein sold me on that idea. Of course soon thereafter Steve Nash got injured and missed a few games and the Suns lost all those games including the last game before and the first game after his injury "break". Stevie Wonder was great this season and I hope the league doesn't rob him of his MVP trophy. But that break established him as a legitimate MVP candidate. Nobody (including myself) really understood his true impact until he missed a few games. During that time, the Suns looked totally lost. Their scoring average per game dropped to ridiculous depths and they kept setting the record for season-low points almost every game. Leandro Barbosa is cool and all, but he's no Nash and I was shocked when he went an entire game without an assist. This after Nash has routinely dished out 12 or 14 dimes every game. It was shocking to see the contrast and it felt like a year and half though I am sure Nash didn't miss more than a week and a half.

He got back and everybody knew the first game back was going to be tough since it was at home against Timmy and the Spurs on national TV. Nash and the Suns were back to their usual self in that game, but they clearly ran out of gas in the fourth quarter. The Spurs tied it up and won in overtime behind a ridiculous performance by Manu Ginobli. He took over the game with Timmy just watching and Tony Parker actually in the bench. Even though the Suns lost, from my perspective, they were back playing Suns basketball and Nash was back in form. The rest of the season was mostly good. Nash and the boys kept rollin' though some doubters were throwing all sorts of theories. We heard it all from, "oh their bench is not good enough" to, "Nash will breakdown towards the end of the season" to, "the whole team can't keep up this pace" to, "the rest of the league will figure it out and adjust in the second half". None of this happened. The rest of the league probably figured it all out in week 1, but they just do not have a way to stop it! When you have talented athletes flying at full speed like that with the ball in the hands of a decision maker likeStevie Wonder, there's nothing that can be done to effectively stop them.

Mike D'Antoni just made sure they ran all the time. Not surprising, considering the fact that he ran last season with much inferior talent even when he had 50+ losses. This season he made sure they ran off of turnovers, off blocked shots, off defensive rebounds and off of made baskets! The last thing is something this league has not seen in a long time. They just ran and ran and when the opponent got tired, they ran some more. Nash plays the most controlled, organized, skillful NBA ball, but all at street-ball pace. This unique talent is a treat to watch and he is the MVP of this regular season without a doubt.

The experts are looking at what Shaq has done in Miami and what has happened to the Lakers and are comparing it to the Dallas Mavericks without Nash. Their argument is that, while the addition of Shaq and Nash has completely transformed their respective teams, their subtraction from their old teams has had very different results. The Lakers are struggling without Shaq, but the Mavs are doing just fine without Nash. I think this argument is deeply flawed to say the least. So now we are not only comparing apples to oranges but apples to eggplants and the blue sky! The Mavericks are a loaded team. They have always had 7 or 8 guys who can score 20 or more points. That's Don Nelson's style and Mark Cuban has opened his checkbook to pay all those players. So removing one important piece from it didn't destroy the whole thing. Actually I have to agree that even I was a little surprised that they were doing this well without Nash, but not shocked. Mavs also made more trades with some of their 7 guys who can score 20+ and ended up with a team where 9 guys can now do the same! Nash was a free agent and he moved to Phoenix. This probably gave Cuban even more financial flexibility to acquire some contracts like Jason Terry and Jerry Stackhouse.

The Lakers are completely different. They had a team that was completely built around Shaq and Kobe. They had nothing else. Shaq was taking up a huge percentage of their salary cap and he forced a trade. They had to take up some garbage like Brian Grant in return just to make sure they got some talent in return and also make the deal work from a cap perspective. They lost Payton and Malone on top of that and they lost Phil Jackson's coaching. The Mavs had thesame coaching staff and system in place. This was clearly a rebuilding year for the Lakers and they entered the season with Shaq-sized question marks. Granted, they did have Rudy T and a superstar in Kobe, but Rudy T quit midway through the season, Kobe was injured and things turned real bad real fast after a decent start in LA. Don Nelson quit too, but that was an "upgrade" in his own words since he felt the team played better under Avery Johnson. Simply put, the Mavs improved their team in every way they can, except in losing Nash. The Lakers on the other hand lost Shaq, and compounded that with a lot of other negative events. So this comparison is absurd and the experts should just shut up and hand over the MVP trophy to Steve Nash.

The bottom-line is that Steve Nash led the Suns to 62-20. They had nothing to play for on the last day of the season and they rested Nash and Marion for most of the game. Otherwise, they would have won a Suns franchise record 63 games. That's amazing for a team that went 27-55 last year! In fact, I could argue that Shaq just improved a team that was already in the second round of the playoffs last year, but lets not go there. Suns lost so few games, I am going to list them all here. It's time to focus on the playoffs now.

Houston (twice)
San Antonio (twice)
Sacramento (twice - early and the last game of the season)
Memphis (twice)
Golden State (twice - whats up with that)
Dallas
Cleveland (OT - huge comback for the Cavs early in the season)
Minnesota (at home early in the season)
Detroit
Washington
Indiana
Boston (at home - OT)
Utah
Seattle
Miami