On today’s episode, we go player by player reacting to the preliminary round of Las Vegas Summer League games. Deandre Ayton’s debut has been less dazzling than we expected, but his value to the team is already apparent as an interior force. The backcourt cluster of Davon Reed, Josh Jackson, Mikal Bridges, Shaquille Harrison and Elie Okobo has created more questions about next season’s rotations than answers. And Dragan Bender, ever the lightning rod for Suns negativity, has had an uneven three-game performance. We try to make sense of it all. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts here, or listen to this episode below! Follow on Twitter: @LockedOnPHXSuns, @esidery, @BrendonKleen14<doc-sep>Squaring off against the worst seed in Las Vegas to open begin Summer League bracket play, I expected Phoenix once more to roll over Philadelphia. However, that wasn’t the case. From the beginning, both the Suns and 76ers went back-and-forth throughout, which ended in a two-point loss for Phoenix. Igor Kokoskov ran his final play off the made free throw from Askia Booker, but Mikal Bridges wasn’t able to handle it before time expired. Instead of labeling these as “Good” and “Bad”, I’m going with a new name. It’s “Thumbs Up” and “Thumbs Down” for now on. With that being said, lets see what the instant grades were from the Summer Suns’ fourth game. Thumbs Up: Shaquille Harrison was by far the biggest winner from Thursday’s contest. In 31 minutes, Harrison tallied up 17 points, 8 rebounds, 6 assists, and 3 steals on 6-14 shooting. Not only that, but he was taking over in the fourth quarter helping Phoenix nearly pull off the 10-point comeback. Possession after possession, Harrison was driving to the rack constantly while pressing Philadelphia’s guards for 94 feet. Harrison is still struggling with playmaking, as far as feeding Deandre Ayton consistent looks via post entry passes, but he was looking good elsewhere on drive-and-dish opportunities. So far in Summer League, Harrison is proving not only belongs with the Suns but on a lot of NBA rosters with his two-way tenacity. At this point, I think it would be an upset to see Harrison not on Phoenix’s opening night roster as the main backup point guard to Brandon Knight. Harrison brings so many tools to the table that you can’t show on the box score, but his defense alone nearly won Phoenix another one like he has already this week. Thumbs Up: Even though the perimeter shots weren’t falling for Davon Reed, he made up for it like Harrison by constantly blowing by his defender forcing easy free throw attempts. Reed ended up going to the line finishing 7-9 while also showing off his defense deflecting multiple passes out of bounds. The active hands Reed showed off at Miami (FL) and the little he played last season continue to show itself for Phoenix’s front office, which is treating this as an evaluation period for him after pushing back his guarantee date past Summer League. So far in Vegas, Reed is averaging 14 points, 4.3 rebounds, 2.8 assists, and 1 steal while shooting 47.4% on 3s. It would be a massive understatement to say it would be a terrible move by the Suns’ front office to let Reed go after his performance so far. Unfortunately Reed wasn’t able to show off his two-way profile last year due to his meniscus tear, but he fits like a glove into the defensive system and attitude head coach Igor Kokosokv is trying to build. Keeping Troy Daniels over Reed would be a head-scratching move, that’s for sure. Thumbs Down: Unfortunately for Ayton, he lands in the negative spectrum of today’s grades. He was having consistent issues going against Cameron Oliver and Philadelphia’s defenders were able to easily swipe the ball away from Ayton post-ups on multiple occasions, four to be exact (six total turnovers). Also, Ayton fumbled away three different dump offs next to the rim. By far, this was the worst outing for Ayton so far. He was struggling against switching out onto the perimeter, where Isaiah Miles was able to pick them apart in these situations going 5-6 on 3s himself. Another area that will need to be drilled into Ayton is his aggressiveness in calling for the ball on the block. That wasn’t happening much, but, as mentioned, Phoenix’s guards are still unable to feed him with looks to capitalize off of. In the Summer Suns’ final game against either San Antonio or Milwaukee, I hope to see Ayton become the focal point of the offense. We haven’t seen it yet from Kokoskov, but maybe they bring it out as a sneak peek before exiting the action up in Las Vegas. Thumbs Up: Dragan Bender, at least on Thursday night, looked like the game was slowing down for him. Even though it won’t show on the box score, Bender was consistently staying with Philadelphia’s guards off switches and they were unable to take advantage on most of them. As ESPN’s Fran Fraschilla was pointing out on the broadcast, Bender looked as if he wasn’t overthinking things like he usually does. No hesitation at all on catch-and-shoot opportunities, which Kokoskov wants to make even more of a staple of Bender’s game. And with the wide-open space shooters see in the motion heavy system he rolls out, it wouldn’t surprise me to see Bender get close to 40% from deep this coming season. After his awful showing in the first two showings for the Summer Suns, Bender has bounced back to the tune of averaging 11.5 points and 6.5 rebounds while shooting 50% from deep (5-10) versus Orlando and Philadelphia. Nothing flashy or dominant is coming from Bender, which should be what we come to expect at this point, but he’s at least producing at a respectable level in the role he’s being utilized in. Maybe I’m higher than most on the aspects of Bender long term, but letting him develop alongside Ayton could do wonders for him. With that blend of size and foot speed from both of them, they are the ideal inside-out frontcourt combo in today’s NBA. Both are only 20-years-old, so let them mature together and that could turn into a formidable duo a few years down the line. Players like Mikal Bridges (4 steals and 2 blocks) and George King (9 points in 12 minutes) also had notable performances, which is another good look for the Suns’ rookie class. Bridges had an amazing sequence in the first half that saw him have a chase-down block, then the next time down he was found in his corner hot spot hitting the three-pointer. Bridges with the chase-down block, then hit a corner 3 and stared at Philly’s bench next time down. pic.twitter.com/gswUlZyLsj — Evan Sidery (@esidery) July 12, 2018<doc-sep>Casey Jacobsen Jackson Vroman Maciej “Magic Lamp” Lampe Leandro Barbosa Brett Blizzard (this dude has a superhero name) Yuta Tabuse Derrick Dial Austin Nichols Michael Wright Arthur Johnson Jerry Holman That was the roster for the first ever Suns’ Las Vegas Summer League team in the first iteration of the off-season de facto youth scrimmages. The first summer league consisted of just 13 games played between six teams (Phoenix Suns, Orlando Magic, Washington Wizards, Cleveland Cavaliers, Boston Celtics, Denver Nuggets). In their opener, just the second Vegas Summer League game ever, the Suns handled a Washington Wizards squad “headlined” by Jared Jeffries and Steve Blake. Barbosa scored 18 and Jacobson had 17 in the Suns 92-88 win. Brett Blizzard’s super power was apparently grabbing one rebound in nine minutes (lots of zeros on that boxscore). The second game saw Phoenix fight off a 17 point, 20 rebound performance from Lonnie Jones to down the Cleveland Cavaliers 98-89. Jones would go on to play a grand total of zero minutes in the NBA. Jacobson led the Suns with 23 points in just 15 minutes. Barbosa equaled his point total from the first game (18). Blizzard redeemed himself with a 13 point effort. In their finale, Phoenix rolled the Orlando Magic 119-95. This time the Suns faced a couple actual NBA players, with Dwight Howard filling up the box score to the tune of 12 points, 15 rebounds, 7 assists, 4 blocks, 9 turnovers and 7 fouls while playing all 40 minutes. Jameer Nelson led the Magic with 22 points. Jacobson (23 points) and Barbosa (20 points) once again led the charge for the Suns. This time the “Magic Lamp” made his presence felt, posting 18 points and 11 rebounds against Orlando’s phenom center. Phoenix finished the first summer session 3-0. There was no championship or playoffs back then. That practice didn’t start until 2013 when the Suns finished runner-up to the inaugural champion Golden St. Warriors. The Suns finished runner-up again in 2015. Despite Jacobsen’s strong showing, the best player across all teams in the first Summer League wasn’t on the Phoenix Suns. Nikoloz (Night Train) Tskitishvili, drafted by Denver, led all players with an average of 26.0 points per game. Unfortunately, Skita wasn’t able to carry over his dominance to the actual NBA and became one of the more spectacular busts in NBA history... averaging just 2.9 points and 1.8 rebounds per game in 172 career appearances before washing out of the league (including 12 for the Suns in 2005-06). The 2002 #5 overall pick was in the summer league after two disappointing seasons to start his NBA career... two seasons that made Dragan Bender look like Nikola Mirotic. He was out of the NBA by the age of 22. Tskitishvili that is... even Bender will probably hang on longer than that. Casey Jacobsen’s sensational play over the summer didn’t end up translating to NBA success either. Interestingly enough, he actually played in 84 games during the 2004-05 season by virtue of a mid-season trade (40 for the Suns and 44 for the New Orleans Hornets). Following that, though, he ended up overseas for two years before a final stint of 53 NBA games with the Memphis Grizzlies during the 2007-08 season. It wasn’t all melancholy for Casey. He ended up with a cornucopia of German League championships, German Cup victories, Finals MVP’s and All-League teams. He was no Luka Doncic, but he still held his own. The Brazilian Blur went on to be a Suns’ fan favorite. Barbosa played a total of nine seasons with the Suns during three separate stops with the team. The Blur was named sixth man of the year after averaging a career high 18.1 points a game as a sub during the 2006-07 season. Leandro carved out a 14 year NBA career and won a championship with the Warriors in 2015. Here are the Suns results over the past seven Summer Leagues (none played in 2011 - lockout) — all since the Suns last made the playoffs. 2012: 2-3 2013: 6-1 runner-up 2014: 2-3 2015: 5-2 runner-up 2016 4-2 semifinals 2017: 2-4 2018: 3-0 #3 seed entering playoffs So the Suns have been 21-15 in the Summer League since their last playoff appearance... and 253-387 in regular season games. Maybe these games haven’t been the greatest barometer for the Suns. People should be reasonably dubious of the results of a league that produces MVP’s like Josh Selby, Kyle Anderson and Tyus Jones... and champions like the 2014 Sacramento Kings. And by dubious I mean that Summer League results are virtually meaningless in terms of predicting regular season success for players and teams. But winning is still better than losing even when the results are meaningless... especially now that the field has expanded to include all 30 NBA teams. And especially when the players getting the lion’s share of Summer League minutes are actual rotation players for the regular season Suns. So let’s take home that Summer League trophy, Suns! They get a trophy, right? ————— #TBT: Throwback Thursday<doc-sep>Second-year forward Josh Jackson will not play Thursday as the Suns’ Summer League squad faces the Philadelphia 76ers in Las Vegas, reports 98.7 FM Arizona’s Sports Station’s John Gambadoro. Phoenix will move rookie and No. 10 overall pick Mikal Bridges into the starting lineup. Bridges has averaged 6.3 points, 3.7 rebounds and 1.3 steals in 20.0 minutes per outing in three Summer League wins so far. The Villanova product has shot 7-of-13 from the field. The Suns traded the No. 16 overall pick in 2018, which was used to draft Texas Tech guard Zhaire Smith, plus a 2021 unprotected first-round pick owed by Miami to the Sixers in order to move up and draft Bridges. Jackson, the 2017 fourth overall draft pick, has played 24.0 minutes per game and averaged 20.3 points, 2.3 rebounds and 1.3 assists per outing. He’s shot just 24 percent from the floor, taking a team-high 41 shot attempts. Follow @kzimmermanaz<doc-sep>
After losing a close game in their Summer League opener to Boston (we’ll always have the Furkan game), the Summer Sixers were blown out in consecutive games by the Lakers and Wizards. Now, entering the tournament portion of the proceedings in Sin City, Coach Kevin Young and his motley crew of mostly future G-leagues and overseas players will look to put their 0-3 start behind them. Unfortunately, they’ll be up against the Summer League version of the Warriors, the 3-0 Phoenix Suns. Undoubtedly, some people will try to make this meeting a referendum on the draft night trade between the two clubs, playing up the Zhaire Smith-Mikal Bridges matchup. I’m sure any video clips of one scoring on the other will be pure social media catnip. However, the two players couldn’t be in more different situations on their respective Summer League rosters. Whereas the Sixers don’t have a single lottery pick on the team in Vegas (technically, Smith went 16th overall), Bridges is just the fourth-highest drafted player on the Phoenix squad (behind DeAndre Ayton, Josh Jackson, and Dragan Bender). The Suns are a few years into a full rebuild, and while it remains to be seen whether they can rise above the dregs of the NBA standings this season, they certainly have more than enough young firepower to dominate in the desert. First overall pick DeAndre Ayton has been the main cog for the Suns, averaging team-highs of 16.0 points, 11.0 rebounds, and 1.0 blocks across the first three games. As for Bridges, after shining in his professional debut to the tune of 14 points on 4-5 shooting from behind the arc, the Villanova alum has since struggled, tallying just 5 points against the Kings and going scoreless against the Magic. In all, Bridges is averaging 6.3 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 1.3 steals in 20.0 minutes per night. We’ll see if any desire to prove the Sixers should have kept him for longer than 20 minutes on draft night will focus Bridges’ efforts. As for the Sixers, while prevailing over a talent-stocked Phoenix group might be too much to ask, it’d be nice to see their relevant players get back on track. No one expects Furkan Korkmaz to drop 40 again, but an improvement over his 0-12 mark from behind the arc the last two games would be welcome. I want to see Jonah Bolden avoid airballs on his outside shots and tally more than his average of 2.7 defensive rebounds per game. Zhaire Smith has done a good job showing off his defensive prowess and athleticism at the rim; can he keep it going against upper lottery talent? Discuss all tonight’s action in the comments below. Time: 6:30pm EST Location: Thomas and Mack Center, Las Vegas, NV TV: ESPN2