Devin Booker, Kevin Durant, new-look Suns need to get ready for extra scrutiny, criticism
There’s nothing brighter in the NBA solar system than the glare of the Phoenix Suns.
New coach. New players. New uniforms. New expectations.
It seems like the only thing constant around the Footprint Center is Devin Booker — and he’s got new shoes with Nike prepping his Book 1s to hit stores just in time for the playoffs.
That means fans in Arizona need to get ready to share. No more basking in the Suns all alone. This is sure to be the most popular, most parsed, most polarizing, most preached-about team in the association.
Expect online forums to get flooded with posers acting like they were up with the Suns before it was cool, and the sidelines will have so many celebrity fans that Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce might want to call Deion Sanders and The Rock to complain about how excessive it’s all gotten.
The good news is, key players in the organization — from the front office to the frontcourt — are more than ready. They’re enjoying it!
“It’s been an amazing time,” franchise owner Mat Ishbia said.
His excitement is clear. He’s happier than a Midwesterner with a tan.
“I’ve had the best time. When you dream about buying a team and running an organization, it’s fun; and then when you actually do it, it’s 10 times better. … You ever see those things on the internet? Like if you could build your own franchise, who would you build it around? My guy was Devin Booker! I got to buy a team that had Devin Booker! It’s a dream scenario.”
Booker, for his part, has always been as cool as Phoenix is hot. There’s no coincidence that the temperatures around here spike every time he goes on vacation.
It might seem like he’s finally arrived after being known for years as the league’s next big thing, just don’t expect him to share that opinion.
“I feel like I’ve been there, honestly, since ’96. That’s when I arrived,” Booker said, referencing his birth year with a deadpan delivery that would make The Fonz say “heeeeey!”
General Manager James Jones isn’t new to all the attention, either. He used to play with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh on a team so popular they called themselves the “Heatles.” He knows just what to tell his players to help them prepare.
“You rarely get a chance to be in this position,” he said. “Don’t take it for granted. Embrace it, and attack it.”
Heightened scrutiny is a part of success.
“No one plays this game to come in second,” he said. “Everyone wants to be first. Everyone wants to lift the trophy. You want to win. So when you legitimately have a chance to win, just bring it every day. Every day you come into the building, just think about how you can move us closer to winning a title.”
Frank Vogel has similar experience, having coached LeBron James on the Lakers. He has thoughts on how to guide his guys through the haboob they’re about to drive into.
“I think the No. 1 lesson is we have to block out all noise,” Vogel said. “Positive noise. Negative noise. We really have to focus on the task at hand and the people that are in our building, in our group.
Phoenix might be a smaller media market compared to Los Angeles, “but we’re a star-laden team,” he said. “We’ll get a great deal of national attention, and we can’t let anything that’s said change the way we’re approaching our business. We know what the job looks like and what we have to get done. We can’t let outside noise distract us from that.”
There’s no one in the organization with more experience rising high above all the chatter than Kevin Durant, who’s either 6-foot-10 or 7-foot-2, depending on who’s holding the tape measure. Either way, he’s been a big target for a long time.
He knows all about what’s coming when the season starts on Oct. 24 at Golden State, and he says the best way to deal with it is to look within.
“The expectations people put on us really don’t mean anything unless we put the work in every single day,” he said. “That’s the most important thing. The people that are consistently with us in that building every single day are the voices we should listen to.”
He knows what it’s like to be the main character in the NBA show.
“Obviously, it’s hard to get away from the opinions of everybody and how they feel about our team,” he said. “But, at the end of the day, when you realize that the guys that you’re going to (play) with every day are the people you see every day and you tend to focus on them, then everything is pretty smooth from there.
“Expectations are going to come from everybody. It is what it is. It’s a part of the business. As much as we can focus on who’s in the building, the better for us.”
There’s nothing brighter in the NBA solar system than the glare of the Phoenix Suns.
Arizona fans might not be ready for it, but the organization — from the front office to the front court — sure is, and the key players seem to be enjoying it.
Reach Moore at gmoore@azcentral.com or 602-444-2236. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @SayingMoore.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Devin Booker, Kevin Durant will be NBA's most-scrutinized players
