FanPost

Time to Draft Some Defense

Many pro basketball fans like me don't pay that much attention to college basketball until March Madness starts and the NBA draft is getting near. Then I start looking at the various mock drafts and try to watch some of the prospects if they are playing in the NCAA tournement. And like a lot of people, I tend to focus on offense first because, let's face it, we all want to draft guys that have the potential to put up big numbers. We all realize that defense is important but the guys that can score always get the most attention. If they can do more than that (rebound, dish out assists or defend), it certainly makes them more appealing but those things usually take a backseat to offensive production.

Which brings me to the Suns and this year's draft.

The Suns are not a good defensive team. We have a few good defensive players (Tucker, Bledsoe and Price) and some that are capable of playing good defense but don't always do so (Chandler and Len) and a bunch of players that range from average to awful defenders. And since we already have some very good offensive players, I think that defense should be a high priority in this year's draft.

Of course, defense shouldn't be the only thing that we look for in this year's draft but it should be an important consideration. First and foremost, we shouldn't draft anyone who was a sub-par defender in college no matter how good of an offensive player he is. Better to take a guy who plays both a solid offensive and defensive game than someone who is a prolific scorer but a mediocre (or worse) defender.

With our first draft pick we should simply take the best player available but if we get unlucky in the lottery and move down to 5, 6 or 7, then I think that we should start looking at drafting for defense at least as much as offense. And with our later picks, defense should be the priority. For years we've lamented over not having a quality defense. Since we already have a good stockpile of offensive talent, now is the time to start drafting more for defense in my opinion.

I'm still trying to look into who might be the best choices to draft considering defense first but I've already read some interesting things about Jaylen Brown and Dragan Bender regarding their defensive abilities. What I've read about Bender especially intrigues me because I've failed to understand why he has been ranked as high as he has been in mock drafts until now. This kid is a good defender. At 7'1" he can defend small forwards, power forwards and centers. At 225 pounds he can still get bullied around in the paint by bigger and stronger PFs and Cs but at 18 years and 5 months old he still has plenty of time to add bulk to his frame. Perhaps I will write more about him later in another post but right now I will just leave it at saying that my impression of him has improved a great deal the more I have read about him. At this point I'm not saying that the Suns should draft him but I am saying that I'm more open to the idea than I was.

But aside from talking about specific players, in my opinion the Suns need more strong defensive players to build a team that really has a chance at contending for more than a 7th or 8th playoff seed and a quick exit in the first round. Just making it back to the playoffs sounds really good right now but I really think that we need to start building a strong defensive team that will allow us to do more than just get back into the playoffs.