Phoenix Suns Narrow Coaching Search to Final Candidates as Mat Ishbia Decision Looms
The Phoenix Suns are reportedly down to their final coaching candidates, and the list is shorter than anyone expected. After a season that ended without a playoff appearance despite a roster full of stars, owner Mat Ishbia is finally getting serious about who runs his $400 million experiment.
The names being floated include a handful of current assistants and one or two retread head coaches with championship resumes. The Suns have not officially confirmed the list, but multiple sources have suggested that Phoenix wants a coach with playoff equity. That eliminates a lot of the rising assistant pool and pushes the search toward proven names.
This is the third coaching change in three years for Phoenix. Frank Vogel got fired after one season. Mike Budenholzer got fired after one season. Whoever takes this job is walking into a hot seat that is already glowing red.
Why Phoenix Is Such a Tough Job
The Suns have one of the most top-heavy rosters in the league. Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, and Bradley Beal account for north of $150 million in salary. The supporting cast is mostly minimum contracts and second-round picks. Any coach taking this job needs to be ready to manage three alpha personalities with overlapping shot diets and almost no defensive identity.
The other complication is Ishbia. He is a hands-on owner who treats the team like a fantasy roster. Every coach he has hired has talked about the support behind the scenes, and every coach he has fired has been blindsided by how quickly the patience ran out. Whoever takes this job needs to walk in with eyes wide open.
Still, the talent is real. If Booker, Durant, and Beal can stay healthy at the same time for an entire season, this team can win 50 games. The problem is they have not done that yet, and there is no guarantee they ever will.
The Candidates Make Sense, But the Job Does Not
Whoever Phoenix lands will face the same problem the last two coaches faced. The roster is built for offense and the defense is held together with duct tape. Until the front office addresses that imbalance, no coach is going to fix what ails the Suns.
The smart move would be a coach with a defensive background who can squeeze every drop out of the Beal trade and figure out how to share the ball between three guys who are used to being the focal point. That coach exists somewhere on the candidate list. The question is whether Ishbia picks the right one.
A decision is reportedly expected within the next two weeks. The Suns have already missed out on a few candidates who went elsewhere, and the longer the search drags, the smaller the pool gets.
Phoenix has all the talent and almost none of the structure. The next coach has to fix that, or the cycle starts over again next May.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
