Suns Quarter-Season Grades

[Shabazz]

The 20 game mark seems to be a benchmark that many agree is a good place to judge the team, so I figured I'll take a stab at it. Here are my grades for the players so far. Feel free to add your own:

Steve Nash: A-
Doesn't get an A because of the time he missed and a rough, turnover-filled first few games, but the guy has been a stud. 18.2 PPG, 10.4 APG, 3.5 RPG, 10th in the L in PER. Great numbers and he's doing an amazing job integrating many new pieces and turning a journeyman like Hakim Warrick into a solid contributor. I don't like that he's banged up this early in the season, because his injuries tend to linger and they've taken a toll on his long range shooting (.9 per game, many open looks passed up).

Jason Richardson: A-
Maximizing his potential and playing an extremely efficient offensive game, Richardson leads the league in 3 point makes. He's hit countless clutch shots for us. He's still prone to defensive lapses and has trouble guarding quicker 2s, but his effort is there and he's been able to punish those quick 2s with his post-up game on the other end of the court.

Grant Hill: B+
Hill is in a word "solid." He's been our best perimeter defender (although he's taken a step back from his playoff defense), is 2nd on the team in RPG (not saying much) and always seems to provide exactly what we're missing on a given night. We're lucky to have Hill on the team even though we have 4 small forwards behind him on the depth chart waiting for him to slow down so they can have their turn.

Channing Frye: B+
Loses points for a brutal offensive start, but was still contributing on D when his shots weren't falling. He doesn't get enough credit for the job he's done on the defensive end. He's been a solid help defender (1.4 BPG) and a very good one-on-one defender. Channing's stats (12.6 PER) definitely don't reflect his full impact, but his rebounding really needs to pick up. His rebound rate is the worst of his career.

Hakim Warrick: B
Warrick has exceeded all expectations been a perfect fit as a backup 4 on offense, giving both Dragic and Nash a really effective "roll" man. He's shown an Amare-like ability to both finish inside and get to the line. However, his flaws are evident. He gets beat up inside by bigger 4s, isn't nearly the rebounder he should be, contributes nothing in the assist, block and steal cats and you don't know what you're going to get from him game-to-game. His game log is like a yo-yo. All in all, he's been a pretty deft free agent signing.

Goran Dragic: B-
Gogi's been up and down so far. He started out the season on a roll, went through a little slump as he got hurt, did a decent job filling in for an injured Nash, slumped again and has played pretty well the last few games. He's had two major issues plaguing him all season. The biggest is his propensity to turn the ball over. He averages 2.45 TOs per game - awful for playing only 17 MPG and is 3rd to last among all PGs in TO rate. His second issue is his free throw shooting. There should be no reason a shooter as talented as Goran should hit only half his FTs. He's also been hurt by the lack of a defined role (he's now splitting play-making duties with Hedo) and the fact that he only sees the floor when Nash is out. His PER is actually lower than last years, but it should go up if he starts hitting his FTs and controlling his turnovers.

Josh Childress: C
It's hard to judge Childress as he's playing with a broken finger that's clearly limiting his range and effectiveness. He's been pretty average so far. Another player that you don't know what you're going to get game to game, but also a guy who doesn't know how many minutes he'll see game to game. He's shown a knack for getting offensive rebounds, making good cuts and being in the right place at the right time, but he hasn't really stood out or shown why he'll justify the significant investment the team made in him.

Earl Clark: C
He's been solid in the minutes he's been given, which have been paltry so far. While he's still a little scatter-brained on offense and occasionally lost on offense, Earl's effort has been there this year and his mid-range shot is going in with a little more consistency (47% FG this year, 37% last year). I maintain that he needs to be given a shot in the rotation to see what we have, because he provides exactly what we need (his rebound rate is 2nd on the team after Barron), but it's a struggle to find him minutes after we spend $20M/year on tweeners this summer.

Jared Dudley: C-
He's struggled pretty much the entire season, finally showing some signs the last few games. Jared's obviously been negatively impacted by the depth at his position. He spent the summer working on his one-dribble and two-dribble pull-ups but so far that work hasn't translated well in real games as he's struggled to create and hit shots off the dribble. He's finally getting back to what worked for him last year: taking open 3s, making smart cuts to the basket and sneaking in for offensive rebounds. He's also recently picked up his activity on D.

Earl Barron: C-
Hard to give a guy who's hitting a quarter of his shots and has a PER of 3.1 a better grade, but Barron's rebounding, D and energy have been a much-needed shot in the arm. I think his shooting will come around too as he's been missing wide open looks under the basket because he's rushing things. If he can bring his FG% up to 50% he could be a real asset.

Hedo Turkoglu: C-
Doing nothing to prove everybody but Robert Sarver and Lon Babby wrong, Hedo has been at best OK, and provided us with absolutely nothing we didn't already have or couldn't have addressed at a fraction of the cost this Summer. His tenure as a starting PF was an obvious failure and now we're paying $10M annually for a backup tweener who takes the ball out of Goran's hands on offense. As for the positives, Hedo's attitude and effort have been there all season, as has his 3 point shooting (including a few timely makes), his positioning on man-to-man D has been solid and he's been very aggressive driving the ball lately. Unfortunately, he hasn't really clicked with his teammates at any point this year. "I told you so" never felt so bad.

Robin Lopez: D
The biggest disappointment of the season. Prior to the injury he was contributing nothing on either end of the floor and regressing to his rookie-season problems despite apparently being healthy. On D he wasn't providing a deterrent for penetration or getting rebounds with any consistency. On offense he struggled to catch simple passes or finish under the basket. He played 9 games and gave us one good one.

Garret Siler: D-
Some people may see something here. I'm not one of them.

Alvin Gentry: B+
Gentry had a tough task and he's managed to get us to 2 games above .500 despite the toughest schedule in the league. You can argue with some of his rotation moves, but he's done about as well as he could to get players to buy in to their ever-changing roles. He's given out playing time without giving thought to how much players were making (a good thing) and rewarded those who brought energy to the floor. I don't know that another coach could have gotten more lemonade out of this lemon.

[Aztec_Sunsfan]

The team's performance has been a true rollercoaster, and except for Grant Hill, you can't tell what effort or efectiveness are going to get from any player, not even Nash or JRich can't be left out of this.

Hard to evaluate this, but as long as we remain at .500, we can't dish out A grades to nobody. This roster is flawed, but still better than this.

[sunsdotcom]

Grades:

Jrich A
Grant Hill A-
Steve Nash B
Hakim Warrick B+
Channing Frye B
Goran Dragic B-
Jared Dudley B-
Hedo Turkoglu B-
Josh Childress B-
Earl Clark C+
Earl Barron B
Robin Lopez C+
Garrett Siler C-

[INFORMER]

Matt Janning: A++++

[JustWinBaby]

Pretty simple

We need to fix:

Defensive Rebounding and opponents FG% - if we can get just to the middle of the pack in these two areas we will be very dangerous. If we continue to allow 50% shooting while getting dominated on the boards (good signs in this area the past couple of games) we will struggle to win games.

As long as Nash stays healthy we will be competitive. If he goes down, lottery here we come.

[OrlandoGardener]

Oh man. I totally thought the Suns were going to grade us in this thread. I'm a little relieved, because I don't think I've done that well.

[Ring_Wanted]

Nash: A-. His total numbers are pretty good but he started the season losing the ball too much and his 3pt% is not on par with his career averages. I have no doubt that we will see the turn overs down and the 3s up. Still making the most of an unbalanced roster. I doubt any other PG in the L could do that.

JRich: A-. He is a scoring machine this season, following what he did in the playoffs. Very efficient and working extremely well in our system. He can rebound more, but there is nothing to complain overall.

Hill: A. It's amazing what he does being the third oldest player in the league.

Warrick: B. He is doing exactly what he was signed for. He is a very good finisher and is going to the line a lot. He is helping the team, something that can't be said of every new Sun this season. He should be starting along with Frye.

Frye: B+. He is underrated in my opinion. He plays pretty good team defense and rarely makes mistakes on offense. Streaky as hell, but even when his shot is not falling, he can help. On the boards he has the same problem as Warrick. He is too skinny to win position against heavier and bulkier PF/Cs but at least he tries.

Hedo: D. He has needed just 20 games to show everybody why he was an expensive mistake. At least you can say he is trying hard and putting effort. It's just that he is not very good anymore and certainly not in a system which already has a primary ballhandler both in the starting five and off the bench. On the good side, he is hitting his 3s, but little else. That doesn't warrant a pass given how much he makes and for so many years.

Dragic: C. He is a step down from his play in the second half of last season. It doesn't show in the stat line but it's there, in my opinion. He is not confortable with Hedo and that's a concern if they are going to lead the second unit. By the way, have you seen his FTs this year? 50% over 50 shots?!? Really?!?

Childress: C+. He seems to have a couple of moments almost every game. One offensive rebound, a defense, a penetration, something else, but he doesn't put it together. In my opinion he is the kind of player who needs big minutes to impact the game, because what he provides is a bunch of little things. Too bad since our perimeter positions were more than well covered. That's the main reason why I don't like Childress here. He is underused and overpaid. Still, the problem comes from the FO, not the player. He has not done bad in the time he has had. By the way, I don't think the finger is really bothering him. It's not like he lived and died with the outside shot.

Dudley: C-. He has had a rough start but is slowly improving. Still a lot of energy and IQ but he needs to make his threes, period. He has lost weight and is trying to do things he didn't dare last season. That's good but only as long as he still does what made him such a great role player last season, and that's only happening on defense most nights.

Lopez: D. Before the injury his play was extremely poor. There is little good you can say about him this season. He has looked slow, even more mechanical and his hands have become concrete blocks again. I hope it was all because of his back. Still don't see the potential others around here do.

Gentry: A. He is making a mess of a roster work and has not lost us any game so far. There was a time you couldn't say that from the Suns coach. He has had the guts to bench Hedo before it was too late. I think he is really underrated league wide.

[DarkHorse]

Too early for grades. Nash gets an A+ just for trying to make this collection of players gel. Let's see if the new focus on defense lasts through this week. That would be a step in the right direction.

[Mori_Chu]

Here are my grades:

Saver: F. F as in F*CK YOU, ROBERT SARVER.

Babby: F. F as in F*CK YOU, FOR MAKING US SIGN YOUR SHI*TY ASS FREE AGENTS, LON BABBY.

Blanks: F. F as in FORGETTABLE; what have you done? Anything?

Hedo: F-----. F as in F*CK YOU, FAT ASS TURKOGLU. GET OFF MY TEAM.

Childress: D-. D as in DON'T NEED YOU; GO AWAY.

Nash/Hill/JRich: A. The only reason to still watch.

That is all.

[Wormwood]

Nash: A. His PER and net +/- per 48 are as good or better than his 2 MVP seasons. 3rd best PER amongst PGs.

JRich: A. Stepped up his scoring, and his perimeter D doesn't look as awful as it did before.

Hill: A-. A+ for effort and with the curve. He's just solid every night, and no one his age has played this well at 38 that I can remember.

Frye: B+. 2nd on the team in net +/- per 48, despite being moved out of position to center all the time, and missing a low post presence on offense. Solid team guy, smart player with really solid fundamentals. Looking like our best signing of the offseason, although that's not saying much.

Warrick: B-. His play has been erratic, and his minutes have suffered as a result. People are way too forgiving of his D and rebounding because of his highlight reel dunks. Still, he can be a usefull contributor at times on offense, especially on the P&R with Nash.

Dudley: C+. You can see he's really worked on his physique and his game, but he's had a slow start and should perhaps stick with what he does best first.

Earl Clark: C+. He's been much better in limited minutes, but not nearly enough to consider this grade very "soft".

Josh Childress: D+. Does not meet expectations. Barely getting minutes. Prime trade bait, along with Dudley.

Earl Barron: D-. Doesn't earn an F for the simple fact that he did the absolute minimum by playing better than Lopez on defense and on the boards. Worst offensive center I have ever seen, and I remember Yinka Dare.

Hedo Turkoglu: F. Not contributing at either end, he costs us a mint, his contract seems to go on forever, and his PER is the lowest of his career. It looks like we're stuck with this cap eating turkey for the next 4 years as he rapidly turns into a 9 million $ Matt Carrol.

Lopez: F. All he had to do was keep playing the P&R with Nash, stay healthy, play some D, and stop fumbling rebounds all the time. Epic fail on all fronts.

[Uncle_Gene]

Sarver: FAIL I'll never forgive him for letting Stoudemire walk. I would've re-signed him before the July 1st free agent period began and the "knee issues" are irrelevant because he's been an All-Star and All-NBA ever since. You need a big to compete.

Babby: Incomplete Yeah he brought in his old players he used to represent, but I'll give him more time to get things right.

Blanks: Incomplete Same as Babby, I'll give him time.

Nash: A+ Age ain't nothing but a number for this guy.

Hill:B+ Playing well, can't complain.

Turkoblu: C This grade might be a little nice, but as I've said before he needs to play next to a post scorer so his skills can shine.

Richardson: A- Should be an All-Star this year, but more popular names amonst guards might win out.

Lopez: D-Took a step backwards so far. We'll see what happens when he returns though.

Warrick: B- He plays well or he doesn't. Borderline nominee for early "6th Man Of The Year" some nights. He's had some good games so far.

Childress: C He plays okay, could (& maybe should) be traded.

Dragic: C+ He's on the level. Sometimes plays well, sometimes not.

Dudley: C Started off super slow, now playing just a tad bit better.

Frye: B Needs to score in the post more, be more of an inside presence offensively instead to just chuckin' up 3's.

[OrlandoGardener]

Al McCoy: A++ I've been listening to him a lot this year, and he's announcing with fire.

[LazarusLong]

I’ll rate on individual potential, not just on numbers in a vacuum.
Nash: B+, still solid offensively, good shooter. Still a defensive liability
Hill: A+, MVP so far. No complaints
Richardson: B+, sometimes just brilliant, other times just breathing. When he has a bad night, he develops a mental block the size of Jupiter.
Turkoglu: C+, he’s getting better and Gentry is figuring out the best way to deploy him.
Frye: B, I think the effort is there most nights, although the execution sometimes isn’t.
Warrick: B-/C+, sort of Cedrick Ceballos without long range. He can get buckets in the paint and hit free throws. Defensively, he’s overmatched, though.
Dragic: C, I think he would play well in combination with Turk and Hill. He’s not the floor general Nash is (who is?) so if he had more opportunity to free lance, he’d play better. What happened to his free-throw shooting?
Childress: B-, hustles, plays gambling D, very opportunistic. I’m not understanding the dislike. For those who don’t like him, let me smash the end of your index finger with a hammer and see how well you function … Geez… His shot will come back.
Dudley: C+, Shot deserted him in the early months, but it is coming back. The surfeit of perimeter players has cut into his minutes and game.
Lopez: D, I was very happy with his improvement last year and happy to eat my words of criticism when he was drafted. But he’s a different guy this season, and that’s not a compliment. WTF?
Clark: Inc., I think he needs to go where he can play 20-25 minutes a game to see if he’s an NBA player. It’s not going to happen here. I’m being charitable.
Barron: Audit, I like what I see. He’s a journeyman, so expectations are not high. But he is contributing.
Siler: D, He’s big and he’s mobile and he has no idea offensively. The hands of a third-degree Mason. Once Lopez gets back, Siler could be a goner.

As for the mediocre record, I think it is a product of new players and too many perimeter players. The mix is taking awhile to work.

[Superbone]

Childress: B-, hustles, plays gambling D, very opportunistic. I’m not understanding the dislike. For those who don’t like him, let me smash the end of your index finger with a hammer and see how well you function … Geez… His shot will come back.

Word!

[Ring_Wanted]

It's not that Childress is useless. He has a lot to offer to a team, but we have more than enough wing players. Between Hill and Dudley we have what Childress does and then some. Add Hedo and it's crazy we are paying Josh $30M+ to play less than 20mpg when there are two glaring needs he can't help fix.

[LazarusLong]

Agree thoroughly.

[OrlandoGardener]

I think (hope) that Childress will be a very good role player for us when Hill retires. But I honestly can't believe how good Hill is this season.

[Shabazz]

It's not that Childress is useless. He has a lot to offer to a team, but we have more than enough wing players. Between Hill and Dudley we have what Childress does and then some. Add Hedo and it's crazy we are paying Josh $30M+ to play less than 20mpg when there are two glaring needs he can't help fix.

It's funny that one of the main reasons we traded Barbs was that his role no longer justified his salary, yet this season we've got a $10M, a $6M and a $4M per year player all playing the Barbosa role of 15-25 mpg and variable production off the bench.

[OrlandoGardener]

And Earl Barron starting.

[Ring_Wanted]

It's funny that one of the main reasons we traded Barbs was that his role no longer justified his salary, yet this season we've got a $10M, a $6M and a $4M per year player all playing the Barbosa role of 15-25 mpg and variable production off the bench.

Somebody in the mold of Warrick was needed. Nash has to have a finisher.

Hedo and Childress, certainly not, even if they were making the vets min. Under their current contracts they are an abomination for the Suns and the living proof that Sarver has no clue. He has put the Suns in a situation maybe not even Nash and Gentry can overcome.

The worst part is that they were incapable of getting a 1stR from the Raptors. It had 'lottery, top10, top5, top3, top1, no protection' written all over it. What a shame.

[phnart]

And Earl Barron starting.

this says it all.

[Vladimir_Taltos]

If we couldn't get a first round out of Toronto to take on Hedo's contract, that is just shameful. If that doesn't show how backasswards the team is being managed, I don't know what does. Sarver blows...period.

[Dr.Jones]

Hedo's contract is an issue. I like the effort I see, and he is the best clutch shooter on our team.

I just don't like seeing him on the floor with Goran. And Nash needs the ball also.

I think Hedo's value will be higher in a year.

C