National Basketball Association

Suns brass responds to Dragic: 'This isn't singles tennis'

Published Feb. 20, 2015 4:54 p.m. ET

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PHOENIX -- Goran Dragic packed up those trust issues, his point-guard identification card and that crucial player option just in time to haul everything to South Beach.

But before making a spirited case for prized replacement Brandon Knight, the Suns didn't exactly go quietly into the post-All-Star-break stage of the 2014-2015 NBA campaign.

Two days after the team's front-office was characterized as untrustworthy by Dragic -- its closest approximation to a franchise player -- Lon Babby and Ryan McDonough counterpunched.

At the opening bell of a Friday morning press conference designed to help sort out what occurred during the most active trade-deadline repurposing in team history, Babby took that opportunity to "offer a robust response."

Babby, the Suns' president of basketball operations, addressed Dragic's publicly dispensed issues with the front office's character as "unfair and unwarranted."

Dragic, who was unable to embrace working in the same backcourt with two more dominant ballhandlers, now will play for the Miami Heat. In his pre-departure wake was an accusation of broken promises supposedly issued by the team's hierarchy, dovetailing into dissatisfaction with a system that last year helped him become a third-team All-NBA selection and the league's Most Improved Player.

Although it has been presumed the Suns were blindsided by Dragic's deadline ultimatum, Babby said the team began attempting to gauge his commitment to re-signing weeks ago.

"We try never to be blindsided," he said. "I don't think we were. We were aware of his concerns going back to training camp after we signed Eric Bledsoe. The answer didn't come as a surprise, and we were prepared for it."

Perhaps the saltiest salvo Babby unloaded was in response to Dragic's unhappiness with the Suns' additions of Bledsoe and Isaiah Thomas in back-to-back off-seasons: "If some of those moves ruffle Goran's feathers, so be it. We're not going to stop (making moves) until we get it right."

McDonough, considered a rising front-office star in his second season as general manager, also made his sentiments known in response to a general question about the five players sent packing Thursday:

"Sometimes players get a little selfish and are more worried about I, me and my than us, our or we.

"We're looking for team-first guys. This isn't singles tennis."

McDonough vigorously defended the signing of the 5-foot-9 Thomas, whose presence has been a lightning rod for criticism by professional hoop critics and Dragic loyalists.

"I didn't feel we had enough talent," McDonough said. "We were swinging for the fences."

Did he, in retrospect, consider the Thomas addition a mistake?

"No, not at all," McDonough said. "He played well and we played well."

But while the Suns were adding Knight to join Bledsoe in that double-PG offense, Thomas and his shoot-first focus were sent to the Boston Celtics for shooting guard Marcus Thornton and a first-round draft pick.

Two off-the-dribble playmakers (now Bledsoe and Knight) can be better than one, as we've seen, but three -- regardless of how they're matched -- can be a crowd.

Anyway, this two-point-guards-at-the-same-time system -- which co-starred Bledsoe and Dragic during an-injury-limited, 23-victory hike over the previous season -- also was indirectly called into question at Friday's press conference.

As Suns coach Jeff Hornacek has explained repeatedly since last season, McDonough said that instead of attaching positional labels to similarly-sized players, the focus should be on having multiple players on the floor capable of creating opportunities off the dribble.

"The system works," McDonough said. "Obviously, it requires buy in from the players.

"The thing we like about Brandon Knight and Eric Bledsoe is that they're basketball players."

The translation: There are multiple methods for achieving efficient offense. Instead of worrying about which player is the point guard and which is the shooting guard, both guards should (if everyone buys in) have opportunities to attack.

The notion of alienating the Suns' best player by having him "stand in a corner" -- as Dragic asserted on Wednesday -- was met with even more McDonough pluck.

"Eric Bledsoe and Markieff Morris are still in Phoenix Suns uniforms."

As for the big picture view of the franchise moving forward, McDonough said he shared Babby's belief that Thursday's deadline deals did not represent a short-term step backward. "We feel like we got the best player (Knight) in the trade, coming or going," he said.

When the subject of having their negotiating power diminished by Dragic's highly-publicized preferred destination list, McDonough said, "I never saw a list ... maybe it was written in vanishing ink.

"We really didn't care if there was a list or not."

Babby and McDonough's tag-team defense of the team's credibility didn't seem to be softened by a series of getaway comments posted Thursday night on Dragic's Twitter and Facebook accounts.

McDonough said the basketball operations team, including Hornacek, has chatted with Knight and his representation regarding the shared-ballhandling duties and were convinced it wouldn't be a problem.

"I think we're confident that there won't be issues," McDonough said of the 23-year-old guard, who will be a restricted free agent at the end of the season, "because of the character of Brandon Knight.

"We're getting a player of the highest character. His work ethic is legendary."

That sounds pretty familiar.

At 23, Knight, brings the ability to score (17.8 points per game for the surprisingly good Milwaukee Bucks), distribute and defend either traditional guard position.

"He's a big-game player," McDonough said. "He's a game-closer."

And he's expected to help create a dynamic backcourt right now -- and for several seasons -- alongside the franchise's new on-court leader.

"I think this trade is the ultimate confidence in Eric Bledsoe," McDonough said.

Follow Randy Hill on Twitter

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