Bickley Blast: Why Phoenix Suns head coach Mike Budenholzer is in the hot seat

Bickley Blast: Why Phoenix Suns head coach Mike Budenholzer is in the hot seat

and marada boings Arizona Sports the local sports leader bigley blast very few things in sports are as hot as the seat that Mike buen holer now occupies it is a seat that has held three Suns head coaches in the past calendar year it is a seat that comes with a Minefield of superstars and in terms of temperature it is a seat that seems better suited for Death Valley and not just the valley that seat by the way is now officially occupied by Mike buen holer a whole Brook kid who is full of Championship dreams dreams and saying all the right things but nothing to me was more important than coach Bud telling the Phoenix media that he’s had healthy conversations with Devin Booker and Kevin Durant that struck me as extremely important because it would imply that our big two are now pacified and they’re down with the change in leadership that they’re ready to run it back with good faith because to be fair we’ve heard very little of substance from either Booker KD neither was available after his exit interview neither was in attendance at buen holder’s press conference and while none of that qualifies as evidence of lingering unhappiness you all know how the NBA works and if the New York Knicks are going to try to get in Devin Booker’s ear or maybe even even consider a trade for KD instead now would be the time either way I’m going to hope for the best because from his tears of joy to his sense of History to the way he bowed down to Al McCoy our new head coach brings something else to the job buen hoer is one of us and in the sporting equivalent of Death Valley that matters a lot all right today’s Bickley blast brought to you by my great friends at Chap and BMW who make luxury attainable find them online at Chapman bmw.com you know we have some great players and Devin and Kevin and Brad you know they are big time um you know so I think they know that I’m going to have high expectations of them I’m going to coach them I’m going to hold them accountable but that’s what I’m going to do with everybody and so it’s not any different um so um you know that’s kind of been my road map for coaching whether it’s the best players or the entire roster Mike buen holes are part of his press conference on Friday at footprint Center on holding star players accountable which seems like very high on the checklist of duties of a coach at any level mhm uh yet we know that it doesn’t always happen to the degree that it needs to happen for teams to be successful or to meet their potential I don’t think it happened to the degree that it was expect that it needed to happen last year and that’s one of the reasons why we’re talking about an introductory press conference for Mike buer so knowing that and I think um you know I I don’t think there’s anything false about what Mike buen H is saying he’s like he’s always done that he’ll always do that the degrees of success will change but that’s that’s something that needed to change with this organization at the top of it I don’t know about you but I I am always I always have a higher level of trust in head coaches who are the sons of coaches you know what I mean if their father is an accomplished head coach that means something that means a lot of life’s lessons have been parted on you about the coaching industry very early on so and I love the way that Mike buen holer said that his dad still to this day insists that he plays with pace and that he presses defensively press and play with pace and we know this team needs to play with Pace the pressing part I’m not sure it’s going to work with this roster but the playing with pace is something that they have got to do and and they’ve got to find a way to to unlock this offense and and I think hopefully that will begin with a collaboration it will begin with Mike buen hoser talking to very receptive superstars who will say yeah coach last year was was junk and with all due respect to Frank vogle there are many people who believe Mike buen holer was their guy last year Mike buher as you pointed out um Not only was he fired by a team that he led to a championship when he lost to the Miami Heat who were were they a playing team they were weren’t they okay that you’re talking instead about something where there was also a personal tragedy his his brother dying in a car accident in the middle of that Series so it was one of those what am I doing with my life I’m going to pour myself into my family here before I lose the thread completely yeah and he did that and and so I I think that I think we can look back and say Frank vogle for all his strengths not a fit here it just it wasn’t a personal fit with these Superstars his system wasn’t a fit and it right so and he wasn’t able to enact the changes that needed needed to happen during the course of the Season all that so so there you go I find it interesting James Jones did that interview with Burns and gambo on Friday as well and and that subject came up like Mike buen Holzer was available the Suns had an opening uh Frank vogle emerged as the favorite SL hire late in the whole process it it seemed like if you remember last summer it seemed like it was trending toward Kevin young getting that job Doc Rivers very late in the process pulled his name out even though he wasn’t getting the job because that’s what some coaches do Mike buen hoer was out there why not Mike buen hoer last year here was James Jones with Burns and gambo helps if I turn that up um it’s just time like I mean Mike was coming off of a heck of a run in Milwaukee um personally professionally um he had given a lot and uh you know things move fast in this business so going from one team to another um we just didn’t he didn’t have the proper time to be compressed and I think he he talked about it today in his pressure um sometimes you just need to get get your mind right get healthy and and and get into a right spot where you can give everything you need to the position and he just wasn’t in a position to do that last summer so maybe this will be a situation where the year off does everybody good Mike buher comes in refreshed with a you know a a a different perspective a healthier perspective again he went through the ringer at the at the end there with Milwaukee but you know a lot of it does have to change and and uh part of where the Suns need to improve most basketball people will tell you is the addition or the increase of three-point shots they shot an NBA low 26 three-pointers per game in their four games in the playoffs which is by far the lowest of any team that made the postseason they were in the bottom five or six in attempts per game over the course of the full regular season and uh Mike buen holler was asking at his press conference you know he knows the importance of the threes but how do you weigh that against having players that Excel and really enjoy the mid-range game yeah I mean you know there there’s going to be you know philosophical uh approaches to how we practice every day how important shooting threes is and um you know the spacing and all the value and all the things that come from from being a high volume three-point team you know I’m going to work with the whole group to to help them embrace it understand why it’s important to us and you know when I think about you know Kevin and Devin um you know being two of the greatest uh you know maybe all time certainly this generation and and as we talk about today’s NBA in the mid-range I I think of it as just adding to what they do it’s it’s they are they’re so talented they are so good at everything they do I don’t want to take away from anything that they do I want to add to what they do I want to make them better I want to push them to be their best and what’s best for our team and to get all of us to understand you know how do we win that’s it’s an interesting dilemma because um you know the numbers bear that out something else you hit in the blast that I want to address real quick too and I’m I’m with you to a degree like don’t dismiss the possibility of anything happening MH yet the Devin Booker New York connection I still I’m not dismissing it as a possibility um I’m almost dismissing it and we had fun with it too because it just seemed like Stephen A Smith trying to get a good player to come to the Knicks but does that I mean just from the Knicks standpoint would that make sense this off season I I don’t look at the New York Knicks who just got eliminated from the playoffs yesterday the reason why is not because they were lacking a BigTime scorer the reason why is because everybody got hurt I think they healthy Knicks team breezes past Indiana but but do you but do you think a healthy Knicks team is good enough to beat the Celtics because there’s there’s there’s a belief among some I think that this team was great but but this group of people that that this might be as high as they get yeah I don’t know I don’t know it’s it’s a very abstract thought because they were so hurt and we’re not going to see that matchup but the the Knicks to me completely meet the criteria of a team that’s confident frustrated but ready to run it back to see what they can do next year and if it doesn’t work out next year maybe we re revisit that possibility I I that what I would bet on I would bet on Mike buen holer plus the Paris Olympics are going to keep Devin Booker certainly de Devon Booker rooted and I think KD as well but again I’m just I’m keeping my eyes open to everything Deon Booker didn’t even go to Villanova he’s the wrong kind of wild cat for the that’s right that is true and look on the flip side of it the suns are a team that wants to prove that this was not representative of who they are MH if we’re talking in in May of 2025 and both teams fall short of their goals maybe it aligns a little bit better then and I don’t want it to happen I want Deon Booker to stay here his whole career but uh my door is almost shut on that but not completely it’s it’s foolish to completely close the door on any possibility that’s all I’m saying yep thanks for watching Bley and marada click to see the latest Bley blast and hit the button in the middle to subscribe to Arizona Sports

Dan Bickley explains why there is no seat hotter than the head coach position with the Phoenix Suns and what fans can expect after Mike Budenholzer was officially introduced by the organization on Friday.

Video: Felisa Cárdenas and Jeremy Schnell/Arizona Sports
Photos: Jeremy Schnell/Arizona Sports; David Berding, Matthew Stockman, Christian Petersen/Getty Images

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