Welcome to Inside the Suns, your weekly deep-down analysis of the current Phoenix Suns team. Each week, the Fantable — a round table of Bright Siders — gives their takes on the Suns’ latest issues and news.
Fantable Questions of the Week
Q1: The Suns finished last season 10th in defensive rating. Do you believe they will be better, worse, or about the same defensively in 2026-27?
GuarGuar: I think overall we will be around the same defensively, maybe slightly better overall with our rating. 10th is pretty good overall, so it’s not really a big problem if we finish the same. However, we were really streaky defensively last year, and I’d rather we be consistently around 10 all year than 6 for half the season and 18ish for the other half…as was the case last season. More minutes for Fleming and Maluach should help us defensively, and I expect Ott to play fewer small-ball lineups this season.
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zenzino: I knew this set of questions was coming when grey_hound asked, “What happened to defense? All the answers seemed focused on offense,” and Keratosis concurred, saying many were guilty of that. In another part, Rod said he’d been going easy on us. I said, “Bring it!” And it’s been brought.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but my lineup ideas took defense into account. The reason it “seems” like the focus is on offense is that I’m not worried about defense. The grit and tenacity that last season’s Suns built their reputation on were largely about playing defense for 48 minutes. The foundation this coaching staff preaches is getting more offensive possessions on the defensive side of the ball.
I believe the Suns will be a little better on defense this year. Whether that translates to them moving up in the ranking or not depends on other teams.
Because of injuries and other factors, the Suns slid a little in the second half of the season. If they stay healthy, I don’t see that slide happening again.
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This is also where the continuity comes in. Team defense, way more than offense, takes time and chemistry to develop. This is why (in addition to players wanting to show out) you don’t see any team defense in All-Star games and not much in Summer League. It takes time to learn those defensive schemes and learn the strengths and habits (good and bad) of your teammates.
I don’t think the Bridges trade necessarily made them better on defense, but it didn’t make them worse, either. Sheer and Man Man getting more experience will give them additional defensive length as well.
So, yeah…I definitely expect them to be in the top 10 and maybe move closer to 5 than 10.
Ashton: Well, shame on me for not realizing that the Suns finished 10th out of thirty teams. That isn’t bad. Also, I am just not a huge fan of defensive metrics, but a few commentators got up in arms about the lack of defense articles. So, what does Rod do? Dump the whole thing on the Fantable.
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To me, defensive ratings are complicated and not the first stat I run to after the game. This is the formula.
Defensive Player Rating = (Players Steals*Blocks) + Opponents Differential= 1/5 of possessions – Times blown by + Deflections * OAPDW (Official Adjusted Players Defensive Withstand)
Yeah, screw that. That formula has been in place for over 20 years! I am not doing the math on that, as other factors come in. Such as, is the player a defensive pest? Can they smash-talk while switching? Are they going to get T’ed up and spend time on the bench? We know Brooks will take a seat. Booker will whine at the refs and take a seat. My guess is Bridges will be an enforcer based on his past history and probably have to take a seat. And I am not running the numbers on what losing RO and GA meant for the defense, but GA was decent. Also, I like watching defense based on the eye-test metric, but I can only watch one side of the court at a time. I would also add if the player stayed at a Holiday Inn the night before as a metric.
Another weird item is that I randomly ran into articles taking a skeptical view of both NBA and PFF (Pro Football Focus) analytic metrics over the course of putting this response together. Do not get me started on AI; it is a glorified data scraper that doesn’t like to play nicely in the “sandbox”. PFF was created by some British guy (shout-out to British Suns Fan) to better understand the game using hand-charted stats, and it was revolutionary for its time. But I tended to be on the side with the skeptical point of view. If the analytics were spot on, then we would all be rich on player prop bets or “Kashi market predictions”. Use the eye test and realize that analytics are helpful but not the end-all, be-all for capturing the nuances of mindset and play.
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I still have to answer this question, and I think ranked 10th in defensive metrics is a pretty high bar to clear. Credit to Coach Ott, but I think the Suns regress from the mean. Call it closer to 15th in the league.
Rod: Overall, I see the Suns being at least as good, and likely better, defensively in 2026-27. A lot of that will depend on Ott, his lineups, and his player rotation schemes. I believe many of the Suns’ best defensive players will likely start games on the bench, and the more court time they get, the better the team’s overall defensive rating will be. There’s so much depth on this team; Ott needs to be the anti-D’Antoni coach and use that depth instead of running his starters ragged. I hope to see none of our starters playing more than 30-32 minutes a night because of that depth.
Q2: Which players would you put on the court as your Suns “All-Defensive Team” in 2026-27?
GuarGuar: My All D team for this season would be:
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Goodwin
Brooks
Dunn
Fleming
Maluach
All those guys are dawgs on defense and get after it.
zenzino: Ok, let’s go.
Starting with the backcourt: Booker and Goodwin.
Yeah, I said Book. Deal with it. He’s a big, strong guard who doesn’t shy away from physicality. Olympic Book was a defensive stopper and he brings some of that to his NBA game. Is he always the best defender? No. Defense takes a lot of energy and he’s asked to do a lot of different things on this team. But, when he needs to be, he’s the best defensive guard on this team (yeah, I said that, too).
Goodie is a pest. He’s active, tenacious, and physical with good size and strength. His defensive rebounding ends opposing teams’ offensive plays.
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Frontcourt starting with small forward: has to be Dillon Brooks.
He sets the tone. Physical and annoying, he gets under players’ skin. I really don’t think there’s any better option at SF.
The power forward position is the toughest one for me. The obvious answer is Miles Bridges. And while I can’t say I am well-versed in the ins and outs of his game, scouting reports say he is an able defender who often loses interest in defense. This could be my ignorance, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say Rasheer Fleming.
The question says ’26-’27 and not ‘to start 26-27’. So I am projecting that, for next season as a whole, Sheer will be the best defender at the power forward position. As I said in the SL Fantable, while Fleming didn’t show out, he quietly showed improvement in footwork and positioning, and the ability to guard 1-5.
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Center is a tough one. I could do the same thing I did with the power forward position and project out but, I don’t think I’m going to do that. Man Man showed great improvement in SL, but he still has defensive areas that need significant improvement. While Oso can do certain things better than the other two (ball-handling, passing) I still have to give the edge to Mark Williams in rim protection and overall defense.
I think it’s interesting that so many people think MW is disposable at this point. His injury was a key reason the Suns’ defense declined towards the end of the season. Obviously, his health is always an issue. But he’s only 24 and will also get better if he can stay mostly healthy. He’s been in the league twice as long as Oso but has only played 26 more games.
So, to sum up, my All-Defensive Suns team is:
Booker
Goodwin
Brooks
Fleming
Williams
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Ashton: If you made it through my rant on Q1 on analytics, I am still ready to rant. Analytics do not predict the future. But we only have current analytics from the 2025 and 2026 seasons to answer this question. What remains are at least three players. Booker, Brooks, and CG. Okay, pencil them in. Oh yeah, you have to pencil in Oso as well. Now, what to do with the forward position? I know! Let’s play everyone’s favorite subject. Small Ball!
CG (PG)
Booker (SG)
Dunn (SF)
Brooks (PF)
Oso (C)
I still think Brooks and Dunn are interchangeable at the forward position. Dunn needs to be brought in for what he was meant to be, a defensive wizard.
Rod: First off, I’m not considering offense as part of this equation. I’m looking at this strictly from the point of view of who put on the court if all you’re concerned with is getting a defensive stop and getting the ball out of the opponent’s hands. With that in mind…
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We’ve got to have Goodie on this team. All hustle, all the time, and 13th in steals last season make him a no-brainer choice here.
After Goodie, the choices become a little more subjective as I think there are more than just 4 other players you could select for this team. Depending upon the matchups with the opponent’s lineup, you could tailor the defense to them specifically…but for now I’ll just go with a kind of “generic best” that I think would defend well in almost any situation.
At SG and SF, who do I choose? Brooks comes to mind first in this group, but then we’ve also got Highsmith and Dunn…plus Fleming at SF if we really want to go big on D. Oh, isn’t it good to have so many choices!?!
For the PF slot, we’ve got Fleming and perhaps Oso to consider. Fleming has the better physical tools, but Oso’s BBIQ and versatility can’t be dismissed easily.
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And at center, Williams or Maluach? Mark actually had the best defensive rating on the team last year, but I love the way Khaman challenges people at the rim. Intimidation also plays a part in defense, and if Khaman develops a rep as a shot-blocker early on, that could push him into the top center spot for this team.
It’s certainly still mostly pure guesswork on this question, but, for now, my All-Defensive lineup would be Goodie, Dunn, Brooks, Fleming, and Maluach.
Q3: Which Suns player do you believe has the best mix of offensive and defensive talent?
GuarGuar: I’d probably say Dillon has the best mix of offensive and defensive talent. He’s really improved these past couple of seasons offensively, and we know the impact on D he brings on a nightly basis. He might be slightly overrated as a defender, but his energy on that end is very much real and contagious.
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zenzino: I’m sure there’s going to be a lot of disagreement on this from the Book haters, but Devin Booker is the best two-way player on the team.
Obviously, he’s the best offensive player on the team with his ability to create shots for himself and for his teammates. His mid-range is money, he can drive to the basket, and while he shouldn’t be a volume 3-point shooter, he can hit them at a decent clip when he’s allowed to pick & choose when he shoots them. He has a lot of gravity and is top 10 in the league at getting blitzed for a reason: everyone in the league respects his ability to score. In his ‘down’ year last season, he still averaged almost 26 points and 6 assists per game.
Granted, he’s not the best defender on the team. But he’s much better than most give him credit for on BrightSide. As I said in the last question, as a guard, he plays with size and physicality. We saw him be a lockdown defender during the Olympics. We’ve seen it in key moments for the Suns.
Some might say, Dillon Brooks. While Brooks is a better defender and his offense was huge for the Suns last season, we don’t know if he can keep that up now that opposing teams know that side of his game. He can create his own shot, but he went to the ‘Kobe Bryant School of Passing,’ so we know when he wants to score, he’ll take the shot whether he should or not, and is not good at setting up his teammates. His 3-point percentage also went down from 39% to 34% last season because his strength is catch-and-shoot 3s.
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Yup, I’m pretty comfortable saying Booker is the best two-way player on the team.
Ashton: It is clearly Booker with the best offensive and defensive skill set. All the metrics align, and he is the one I would want on the court in any crunch.
Rod: I pretty much have to go with Brooks on this one. He plays hard on both ends, keeps the rest of the teams pumped up to play D, and, in general, gets under the opposing teams’ skin. He doesn’t always make the best decisions on the court, but he has the confidence to make one and go with it rather than hesitate. On D, he also doesn’t back down from anyone. The Suns have a few better offensive and defensive players, but I don’t believe any other player on the roster has a better two-way skill set than Brooks.
As always, many thanks to our Fantable members for all their extra effort this week!
Suns Trivia/History
On August 5, 1999, the Suns traded Pat Garrity, Danny Manning, a 2001 1st-round draft pick, and a 2002 1st-round draft pick to the Orlando Magic for Anfernee Hardaway. Two years later, as part of a three-team trade, the Magic would trade that same 2002 first-round pick back to the Suns along with Bo Outlaw in exchange for Jud Buechler in order to shed salary and create cap space. The 2002 1st-round pick that was traded away and later reacquired by the Suns was ultimately used by the Suns to draft Amar’e Stoudemire. If not for the Suns’ second trade with Orlando, Amar’e Stoudemire would have likely never been a Phoenix Sun.
On August 8, 2000, Kevin Johnson retired from the Phoenix Suns for the second and final time after being called back into service during the regular season after Jason Kidd broke his ankle. Although Johnson had not played in an NBA game since April of 1998, he stepped right back into the Suns’ starting lineup almost 2 years later to start in six of the Suns’ final 10 regular-season games and came off the bench to play in all nine of the Suns’ playoff games before the team was eliminated in the 2nd round by the Lakers. After his 2nd retirement, KJ went to the NBA on NBC studios to call games during the 2000-01 regular season.
Important Future Dates
Sept. 28 – Media Day
Sept. 29 – Training Camp opens
Oct. 5 – Suns @ Pistons (preseason) 4:00 PM
Oct. 7 – Suns @ Bulls (preseason) 5:00 PM
Oct. 10 – Suns vs. Spurs (preseason) 7:00 PM
Oct. 14 – Suns @ Spurs (preseason) 5:00 PM
Oct. 16 – Suns vs. Jazz (preseason) 7:00 PM
Dec. 15 – Most players signed to new contracts can be traded
Jan. 5 – 10-day contracts may now be signed
Jan. 10 – All NBA contracts are guaranteed for the remainder of the season
Jan. 15 – All players signed to new contracts can be traded
Feb. 11 – Trade Deadline
Feb. 19-21 – NBA All-Star 2027
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