Suns First Off-Season Move REVEALED...

The Phoenix Suns have a lot of questions with this team throughout the offseason and one of the names mentioned on coming back is Drew Eubanks, a guy that was a nice backup center and he wants to come back. The Suns want to have him. We're going to be discussing is this the smart and right decision for the Phoenix Suns or should they be looking at some other pieces around the edges. Plus Chris Haynes has a lot to say about this coaching staff. As we obviously know Frank Vogel is gone but everybody else in that staff is going to be gone as well. We'll be breaking down some possibilities for some guys that could come in to help out Mike Budenholzer as you guys know we're all here on Suns Digest I'm Rufus Velez with my co-host CJ Pierre before we dive in on all this Phoenix Suns content I'd like to let you guys know that around 99 of you guys are not subscribed so I'd greatly appreciate if you guys hit that subscribe button down below as this is the place for daily Suns content throughout the entire off season we have all the news all the drama breaking it down here so if you want to make sure you stay up to date hit that subscribe button without further ado we're going to dive into the first topic at hand today which we mentioned in the introduction which is Drew Eubanks possibly coming back And CJ we want to look at this article here from Duane Rankin we can see that Drew Eubanks as Phoenix Suns they want him back next season as he has a player option we dive in and look at the article real quick obviously we can see that they're on the same page regarding his status with the team the full organization wants him back next season and he wants to be a Phoenix Sun as well as we obviously know this team has a lot of guys around the edges guys like Aaron Gordon Josh Okogie Ding and Lee who also have player options we'll have to see how they handle it as well but Eubanks said he's going to make the best decision for his family and when the time comes so cj my question to you that i have to ask is what are your kind of thoughts on drew eubanks coming in here from portland last season being a decent backup center with this squad do you think that this is a smart decision by the phoenix suns well i at the end of the day you know when you have a guy that has a player option um you kind of want to placate him a little bit you kind of want to you know make him feel like hey you know this is your choice this is if this is what you want to do this is your option a player like drew eubanks who's kind of been a a backup for you know basically his entire career you know to have a player option that's a big advantage there aren't that many backup guys who just have player options on their contract um so you know a player unless he has a feeling or an inclination that he's going to be able to find some long-term contract somewhere else then he'd be inclined to you know take that player option if the suns are encouraging to do that then that means that they they want him around and i think drew eubanks is a he's a good player he's a solid piece he's a solid rotational guy you know energy hustle he brings you know he does all that little the dirty work stuff that you need you know when you're trying to build a championship team you know those guys who end up you know getting the fan favorite chants you know in the crowd the guys who are gonna you know put their bodies on the line drew eubanks you know fills all those categories you know he has his limitations you know he's not that great of a shooter uh he's you know you know he's kind of undersized for a big man and um but he he does have you know he makes himself you know good in the pick and roll game uh he's you know he's smart with his positioning he's a decent passer and i think as a piece it's a as a player that the suns could utilize you know and continue to build you know especially if they're trying to keep the big three together i do have an interesting uh Drew Eubanks stat uh from last season that is a little unfortunate and maybe may give Suns fans some bad news um and I don't know if you know this Bruce uh but Drew Eubanks uh he was last on the team in terms of plus minus meaning he got when he was on the court the team got outscored more than any other player being on the court and that's uh it's not great it's almost 20 more points than any other person um but you have to put that into context right you know he comes off the bench you only average 15 minutes a game so he's not necessarily playing regular minutes with guys like KD or Booker or Beal for the most part and he's also probably not playing with them consistently uh the suns rotations were kind of all over the place over the course of the season so you know give them a little bit of slack i know that's that's not necessarily the greatest stat to hear when you're talking about a player that you're going to bring back on a multi-million dollar uh deal or potentially player option but Drew Eubanks is a solid player he's not uh someone that suns fans will look at and just be like oh man that guy is unplayable i know that felt that way during the Minnesota Timberwolves series but that was just more because of the Timberwolves sheer size and just how and the way that the Suns wanted to play they wanted to go smaller and that kind of put Drew Eubanks in a bind you know kind of took him off the floor um but overall moving forward in terms of what the Suns may be looking to build uh including what they may be looking to add to their roster i think uh if they're they want Drew Eubanks back i don't think that's a bad uh i don't think that's a bad thing and i agree with you CJ I think he's a nice piece you mentioned the hustle the rebound and he tries to give it his all in his best efforts for a guy and we saw that last year with Portland then he came over for Phoenix and I thought that he was one of the better players that they got on those veteran minimum deals I was like you know what Drew Eubanks I feel confident with this guy I kind of want to look at his stats for the season obviously we can see that this season he averaged 5.1 points on 60% shooting 4.3 rebounds in 75 games he only had six starts but like you mentioned he was the backup to Jusuf Nurkic and the Suns did have their second round pick in the 2024 draft that they acquired in a trade but it was rescinded by the NBA for having three agency discussions involving Drew Eubanks before those discussions were allowed kind of going back to last season you also mentioned that he did kind of get played off the court in the playoffs he did play in game two and uh first the first three games and in game two he scored nine point uh eight points in game three scored nine points game two he was used a little bit more because Karl-Anthony Towns was in foul trouble but then you mentioned game four with his sheer size they decided to go small kind of took him off the court here and that didn't help out the Suns as they desperately needed that rebounding on this Minnesota team and even though the Suns you know dominated in the regular season with that series series it seemed like the playoffs the Timberwolves were just way too strong way too powerful and kind of just take over on that physical force down though I know we kind of mentioned possibly some other guys in some other videos some rebounding guys that we would like to see but i would like like you mentioned Drew Eubanks can be that guy maybe move off of Nurkic we'll have to wait and see but Drew Eubanks is one of those guys kind of looking at the uh other things as well talking about Drew Eubanks we want to look and see here we can see obviously that if he does decline his option he might become an unrestricted free agent do you think that the Suns would be able to pursue him if he did decline his option for a bigger deal or do you think that the only way he comes back is on if he accepts this second year contract uh you're muted CJ by the way i believe that he i believe that he could be in addition to the Suns even so i obviously like their their cap flexibility is you know kind of limited so it it kind of could impact uh their ability to resign him to a longer term deal there may be other teams that might be willing to offer more money so that's where things kind of get complicated i think that when you if you're Drew Eubanks you have to look at you know scheme fit you know if you're if you believe that you're going to be able to get some playing time on this team and whether or not you believe that you could be in a position to be a part of a winning team in a championship culture uh you know he's he may get offered more money you know if all of a sudden the Washington Wizards want to give him a call say for example um but is that what he wants is that you know does he want to go and maybe play some more minutes on a team that may make a run at the play-in or does he want to stay with the Phoenix Suns who obviously have championship aspirations that's going to kind of be determined on Eubanks in terms of what he would do if uh he did want to decline that player option he if he was going to sign with the Phoenix Suns he'd probably have to take less than maybe what his market value would be um but i think it's a possibility that the Suns retain him even if he doesn't take the player option okay so all in all we're kind of hearing some similar things CJ it Looks like he's going to be back. It looks like the Suns want him back as well. And we'll get to see how that impacts Drew Eubanks with this squad and kind of the building pieces that they put around, you know, Devin Booker, Bradley Beal, and Kevin Durant in the offseason. We got some more news to break down in this video. Looking at the coaching staff, and I know you broke out a video talking about, obviously, Mike Budenholzer coming in and the truth behind the Mike Budenholzer whole signing. So if you guys missed that video, go check it out. It's on the channel. But CJ, we're going to kind of dive in and look at some more stuff because we have a report from Chris Haynes saying that the Phoenix Suns assistants under former head coach Frank Vogel were informed that they will not be retained by Mike Budenholzer. Basically saying that that coaching staff that the Phoenix Suns had that we pulled up here with Frank Vogel, Dave Fizdale, all of these guys from top to bottom will be officially terminated and the Suns will be going in a new direction with their guy Mike Budenholzer. Now I know in that video you kind of broke it down. you had some possible coaching guys that you liked and Budenholzer was one of the guys atop the list now obviously after that video they signed him to a five-year 50 million dollar contract and now we're hearing the reports of some assistants coming in we've already seen with the Charlotte Hornets they brought in Charles Lee now some of their assistants are coming through we saw the Jazz one of their guys is going to be an assistant the Bulls this morning now going to the Suns so the rumors are coming around and I had to ask you a question because we obviously saw the Lakers firing Darvin Ham and Mike Budenholzer and Darvin Ham do have some relations with working with this Milwaukee Bucks squad so with Darvin Ham possibly being an assistant with Mike Budenholzer being a new head coach do you think it's a possibility that Darvin Ham could join this coaching staff alongside Mike Budenholzer and if so do you think it helps out this Suns team Another former Los Angeles Lakers coach coming to Phoenix? There could be a coaching staff? Sure, that totally makes sense. No, in all honesty, I really think that that would be a really good fit. Budenholzer, you know, I think kind of everyone knows once a new head coach comes in, you know, he's going to want to kind of bring in his own guys, bring in guys that he feels comfortable with, and Budenholzer and Darvin Ham having that history in Milwaukee, I feel like that makes perfect sense for Budenholzer to bring in Darvin Ham, kind of maybe have him as his right-hand man as he continues to build out what he believes, what his vision is for the Suns franchise and future. There are a ton of different names and different guys for different reasons that he could also bring in to acquire onto his staff. One of the names that I had thought could be a possibility for Suns head coach was going to be Scott Brooks. Scott Brooks was the former head coach in Oklahoma City, coach Kevin Durant You know, when he was, you know, a very young player, when he won his MVP, when they went to the NBA finals, has a really good relationship with Kevin Durant, from what I understand. So having someone else like Scott Brooks, who was recently an assistant coach in Portland, he was he was relieved of that of that this past off season after the season. so he's available someone else that can bring in someone that has a relationship with one of the star players and could and can also kind of help you know bridge whatever gaps there may be in terms of the relationship aspect that Kevin Durant was apparently struggling with when it came to Frank Vogel so Darvin Ham great name I think Scott Brooks is another possibility to bring in on the staff but Mike Budenholzer is a smart guy he's a smart coach he he's well liked around the NBA circles he's going to build a coaching staff um that he that i'm sure he believes is going to be the put the Suns in the on the right direction and hopes of winning a championship i think so too CJ i think you brought up some great quality points i'm going to go with three of them at first one you brought up the fact of Scott Brooks i think he'd be a great mentor to kind of bring in and help Kevin Durant you mentioned relieved from his duties from the Portland Trail Blazers bring him in help him be that guy you mentioned Frank Vogel was kind of using him in the corner didn't really Kevin Durant wasn't really happy with his offensive schemes you know what I mean we obviously know that Mike Budenholzer is a better offensive head coach with Frank Vogel being a better defensive head coach so maybe that's some things that are going to tailor their squad a little bit better but having Scott Brooks there to help out would be huge second point I want to bring up is talking about Darvin Ham I know we mentioned it I know you agree that it'd be a good idea and I think so as well Darvin Ham again a better defensive coach than he is offensive coach we've seen that with the Los Angeles Lakers kind of running their game plans running their schemes that was the main gripe from the Los Angeles Lakers so bringing in Darvin Ham again could be that defensive minded guy kind of alongside Frank Vogel but not being like the main voice in the room i think could still do wonders for this team defensively and really help them up especially if he has that one-on-one connection already with Bud having that great relationship already working together they already know how their game schemes kind of work and thirdly lastly Mike Budenholzer you mentioned great offensive head coach i think really fits in with what this team needs offense first kind of finding that offensive scheme you mentioned that not really having a point guard not really having a facilitator no one to really set up this offense was a key struggle so maybe having Bud could take away some of those issues and help out with this squad in that right i still believe getting a point guard is still necessary don't get me wrong but i think that i think that that's something that could you know help out in our ways a little bit and then you know just overall just a good head coach in the NBA as well yeah i think something that uh we'll have to look to particularly once you know we can get to know um what kind of uh roster and staff uh coach Budenholzer wants to build here in Phoenix is the relationship that he's going to have with general manager James Jones and how they want to end up um building out the roster because obviously they're going to want to put something together that's going to mesh it seems like the expectation is that they're going to try and run it back with the big three with Beal with Booker and Durant but how are they going to build around them what pieces are they going to bring in so when we talk about Drew Eubanks and being a piece that they can bring in when we talk about the possibility of finding a true point guard adding more depth in terms of their front court what are we going to do with Nurkic Budenholzer is going to probably have a say in that and you know he's probably going to want to make sure that when he's building his staff and when he's he wants to know you know what is the roster going to end up looking like when we tip off you know in late October so I think that'll be interesting to see as you know we continue to move forward for sure for sure and i totally agree i think him working with james jones is gonna be incredibly to see and i think it's gonna give us a better roster output this season because like you mentioned i think they're gonna run it back with the big three matt ishbia is confident that this team is a championship contending squad if he just has the right pieces and we gotta see it to fruition so honestly breaking down this video has been absolutely fantastic we went over the whole Drew Eubanks saga will he be back with the suns it's looking more and more likely and then talking about this new coaching staff could coach Budenholzer see some of his new guys rejoining his staff and guys like darvin ham like we mentioned we'll have all this to break down for you guys when it actually comes out when all the news are all going around mike budenholzer staff and mike budenholzer press conference any roster news any front office stuff this is the place for you for you guys so if you guys enjoyed the content hit that subscribe button as we try to get to 1,000 subscribers over here on suns digest from your boys bruce velez and cj pierre we'd like to say thank you guys for tuning into this episode of Suns Digest and we'll catch you guys in the next video go phoenix suns and peace out everybody have a great rest of your day