Haven't had one of these in a while...
The Summer Suns (minus Alando Tucker who will meet the team in Vegas and plus Amare Stoudemire who was in the gym working out) got together today for some work prior to heading up to Vegas later this week.
After practice Coach Gentry tried to get summer league head coach Dan Majerle to take on the assembled horde of local media but Thunder Dan was uncharacteristically demure in front of the cameras.
Gentry talked about the progression of Earl Clark's transition to the NBA and Robin's physical improvement so far this summer. Alvin still thinks Dragic will be a terrific player and is looking for him to do well in Vegas running the team and playing big minutes.
Amare came into the gym after the Summer Suns finished and put on a little dunking display for the media and worked on various inside and outside parts of his game. He definitely looked rusty and lacking some of his usual explosiveness but that's to be expected and I think he came into the gym directly from the weight room.
His body was impressive as always showing no signs of having sat around the house for several months waiting for his eye to heal. No Boris Belly here. Some people (can't recall who) had mentioned recently that Amare looked even bigger in the upper body and arms but I didn't see that. He looked the same to me which at this point in his recovery has to be a positive sign.
After his work out he took questions for about 10 minutes. As usual for Amare, he was pretty direct with what he's feeling and his frustrations with the team. He clearly isn't happy about all the changes the the Suns have made and while understanding of the situation he's also not thrilled with the uncertainty regarding his contract.
He still thinks he's a max contract player and sees the contract as expression of the team's confidence in him. Amare never suffers from lack of confidence in his own abilities and his time off hasn't changed that.
He says he wants to play for a winning organization and said specifically when asked about Golden State that he's not interested in a rebuilding team and that if he were going to sign with a mediocre team he would stay in Phoenix.
There's no doubt in listening to Amare that he's frustrated with the Suns and he also understands that his future is in his hands right now.
Here's a write up from Amare's discussion from KTAR and from Coro at the Republic. The full audio is available after the jump. It's probably best to listen to it yourself.
Full Amare Stoudemire audio via Sports 620 KTAR
Alvin Gentry
Goran Dragic spoke with me one on one for a bit as well. He is going to skip playing with his national team to instead work on his preparation for the season with his trainer in LA.