What went wrong in Mike Budenholzer's lone season at the helm with the Suns?

After just a single season in the big seat, the Phoenix Suns fired head coach Mike Budenholzer with the team going 36-46 in the regular season and missing both the playoffs and, more impressively, the play-in.

(Seriously, do you know how bad you have to be to miss the play-in? Even the 39-win, Luka Dončić-less, world-hated Dallas Mavericks made it!)

Phoenix now owes Budenholzer the remaining $40 million left on his five-year deal, and a good portion of Frank Vogel’s five-year, $31 million contract when he was fired after one season in 2024.

When a team is paying that kind of money for two coaches not to coach it, you know things are bad. Let’s break down what went wrong for the Suns, who are also expected to trade Kevin Durant this summer.

The Phoenix Suns owe Mike Budenholzer quite a bit of cash. (AP Photo/Darryl Webb)

(ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Poor rotations

Budenholzer, who won a championship with the Milwaukee Bucks in 2021, curiously decided against using two rookies, both of whom could change the defensive tone of a game, in Ryan Dunn and Oso Ighodaro.

Dunn, who even learned how to hit 3-pointers before the season after a grand total of 12 over two years at Virginia, should have been penciled in for a solid 25 minutes a night given his positional fluidity, defensive prowess and ability to play off of superior scorers.

Instead, Dunn’s minutes were all over the place, totaling 35 games of under 20 minutes played and 39 over that mark, all intertwined at varying points of the season. He also played less than 10 minutes in numerous games.

While Budenholzer does tend to rely on veterans, in the case of Dunn the reasons for his limited usage became unclear as the 6-foot-6 Swiss army knife forward has a game that lends itself well to Budenholzer’s emphasis on defense.

(And with Phoenix finishing 28th in that department, it’s difficult to find any reason as to why more solutions weren’t sought to juice up that side of the floor.)

In the case of Ighodaro, the 6-10 big man displayed the ability to rebound and finish plays around the rim, and he even operated well in short-roll action, as his passing ability is fairly advanced.

To have such a player at your disposal and not get more out of him is outright odd, especially for a coach who historically has experience coaching multiple big men who can influence the floor via their intelligence.

No buy-in

It’s worth mentioning Budenholzer fought an uphill battle, as the roster seemingly refused to buy into his schemes from the get-go.

Players were often going through the motions, playing an individual style of basketball that didn’t lean into a more team-oriented approach, of which Budenholzer had found success in the past, especially in Milwaukee, winning a title in 2021.

While no one can deny the talent of Kevin Durant and Devin Booker, Budenholzer flat-out failed to weave their games together and to optimize both within the flow of action.

Both Booker and Durant were assisted on roughly 43% of their made 2-pointers this season, underlining a “your turn, my turn” style that didn’t exactly give the Suns an unpredictable offense.

In fact, of players averaging more than 10 points, only one — Grayson Allen — was assisted on over 70% of his 2-pointers, and that’s almost not even worth mentioning when 71.6% of his shots were from the 3-point line.

It shows an almost complete lack of high-quality shots created within the flow of the game, for both stars and role players, with players seemingly content to take long jump shots, or simply create looks of their own.

The front office didn’t help

Remember when both fans and pundits were busy falling over each other to point out the acquisition of Bradley Beal meant huge positional overlap with Booker, to the point where it would likely work against the Suns?

Owner Mat Ishbia clearly disagreed, but after this season the Suns owner no longer has a leg to stand on in that conversation.

The Beal experiment didn’t work. It’s never worked since he was brought over in 2023. The idea that one of Beal and Booker could somehow turn into a full-time point guard, or one of them could become a wing, was always one of the most forced and illogical approaches to team construction we’ve ever seen.

The Suns paid over $99.4 million for two shooting guards who couldn’t play together, meaning they essentially wasted Beal’s $50.2 million salary slot, which could have been used much more effectively.

If only thousands of people had screamed in unison of such challenges when the trade was rumored …

Oh well.

Phoenix’s season is now over, Budenholzer is done, Durant will be traded within the next few months, Beal still has a no-trade clause, and the Suns have virtually no control of their own long-term draft picks.

It’s not looking great, folks.

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