(USA TODAY Sports Images)
Goran Dragic wants out of Phoenix.
He made that abundantly clear after a Wednesday practice session. I dont trust them anymore, Dragic said of the Suns front office. Considering Dragic will be a free agent in July, the Suns must now trade for him or risk losing him for nothing. With the trade deadline fast approaching (3 p.m. ET Thursday), both Dragic and the Suns have huge decisions to make that will have even bigger implications down the road. How did we get here?
The Suns rocked the boat18 months ago, nobody figured the Phoenix Suns would amount to anything. Then they found themselves making a late push for the playoffs last season under head coach Jeff Hornacek, running an amorphous and wide open offense with the two-headed point guard monster of Goran Dragic and Eric Bledsoe that worked like magic for them.The balance was delicate and perfect like a band with two frontmen but neither cared about being lead singer. Dragic was All-NBA third-team and averaged 20.3 points and 5.9 assists in 35.1 minutes per game. The slightest change couldve thrown everything out of wack.
Jennifer Stewart/USA TODAY Sports
Then the Suns brought in Isaiah Thomas, like that one backup singer that the label sends in to improve your sound.
All of a sudden, Dragic was seeing a lot less of the ball 40% less, according to ESPNs Tom Haberstroh and his role was shrinking as Bledsoes was expanding. Hes averaged 16.2 points and 4.1 assists in 33.4 minutes this season.This was all following a stellar 2013-14 season that saw the Suns make promises to Dragic that he would be a crucial part of their future. They even signed his brother Zoran to make him more comfortable about staying with the franchise.
Thats not going to happen now.
The break-up(USA TODAY Sports Images)
Once it became clear that the Suns werent going to be able to re-sign Dragic, they knew they had to deal him. Dragic reportedly has a list of places hed like to go, chief among them the New York Knicks and the Los Angeles Lakers.
However, the Suns are looking for a promising young player and a first-round draft pick for Dragic and neither the Lakers nor the Knicks have either of those things.
The Miami Heat is also reportedly on Dragics list. However, like the Lakers and the Knicks, they dont really have the draft picks or the young talent that the Suns are looking for (theres no way the Heat are giving up Hassan Whiteside now), so nothing quite works for any of the teams Dragic wants to go to without a third team and a lot of finagling involved.
So what happens now?Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
Dragic wants to have an offense flow completely through him, and to do that, he needs to go to a team that doesnt have an established point guard. Those teams without an established point guard and the teams that can actually trade for him dont really overlap.
So the Suns will shop him outside of his preferred list. The Boston Celtics, the Sacramento Kings, and the Houston Rockets seem likely destinations, but well have to wait and see what the Suns organization and Goran Dragic do with what precious little time they have left before the trade deadline.
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Source: http://ftw.usatoday.com/2015/02/goran-dragic-phoenix-suns-trade-deadline
