Yesterday I had the amazing experience of being a member of a small studio audience made up of Suns and Amare Tweeps for the filming of the season's first episode of "Nothing but Net".

It was a fun and exciting experience to hang out with Amare Stoudemire, Tim Kempton, Jamie Morris, Scott Williams, and the stellar Suns production crew.    Just watching them work and listening to all of the other responsibilities and projects the Suns crew has going I really gained a better understanding of how hard they work. I also sat and felt grateful for how fortunate we are here in Phoenix to have a Suns Organization that is so open and candid with its fans, from all the Twitter conversation from the organization and the constant contact they keep with fans - to the fan-connection our players like Jared Dudley, Amare Stoudemire, JRich, and Steve Nash cultivate through their use of social media.

All in all the taping took about 3 1/2 hours - but with the humor of Tim Kempton and Scott Williams keeping things lively it was a quick 3 1/2 hours.   For lunch Dan Hilton was kind enough to order us all pizza and while we ate I spoke with both Williams and Kempton.   Tim Kempton was very happy to talk all about his oldest boy who just started High School at Brophy - and I spoke with Scott WIlliams about his amazing ability to spontaneously manufacture impressive metaphors for game play during the Suns broadcasts!

(FYI - all of those who participated in the Clippers game-day thread will appreciate that!  I told him his 'like lions after a steak' line was kind of corny!! haha - but I did ask if he thought of those funny lines during the break or if they were off the top of his head and he said, "Nah man, that's just what comes out my mouth!  I'll work a little harder on those for you!"  - It was all in good fun)

The first Suns guest for the first episode of Nothing But Net was none other than #1 - Amare Stoudemire.   While we filmed the segments with just Tim, Jamie, and Scott, Amare was at practice with his teammates - we were told he would arrive at a certain time to film his segment, but he didn't show...  they sent someone down to look for him and we didn't hear back from them for about 30 minutes.  When we finally received word about STAT's whereabouts we learned that he was in the shower.  Someone made a joke that he'd be in there for 45 minutes because of how tall he his - "that's a lot of man to wash!" they said.  While we waited - Tim Kempton gave away a pair of lower bowl seats to a member of the audience via a trivia question, and I took a walk to take a look at the arena (see picture above). 

About an hour after the original ETA, Amare finally came up the elevator so fresh and so clean and we filmed his segment - Afterward he thanked us all for coming out and took pictures and signed autographs for us. 

It wasn't until this morning that Phoenix Stan informed me that STAT was late because not only had the team practice time been bumped to an hour later (no doubt because of their win the night before against the Clippers) but that Stoudemire had stayed after practice to work on his game some more!   "Ball before show" - said Stan.   Amare is a class act - he kind and amiable with his fans, and he really does work hard on his game.

It was a fun opportunity for me - I thought I would share!

Hope you enjoyed!