NBA Fantasy Trends: Sun Shine City

Devin Booker is shining, you guys. He’s made 71.4 percent from 3 on the season! That’s 15-of-21 attempts. Not like 3-of-4 or something like that. That’s not a terrible sample size. Here’s what his shot chart looks like:

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Say what? He’s better on above-the-break 3s (80 percent) than Andre Drummond (37.1 percent) and DeAndre Jordan (38.2) are at making free throws COMBINED. Plus, one of his attempts above-the-break attempts was a near halfcourt attempt at the buzzer.

Because that 3-point shooting percentage is so wild, it seemed interesting to how all those threes went through the net. When guys are really on fire, it always seems like they’re swishing everything. So here’s how it went down for Booker on his 15 makes:

Swish

Barely rim (off the rim and straight down) 5

Decent amount of rim 4

That’s pretty good. I have no idea if that has any proof of being sustainable, but it’s not a bad thing. It seemed like a cool thing to check out and watching him drain 3 after 3 was fun, too.

He is just catch-and-shoot from 3 with just one attempt off the dribble — it was a single dribble and he made it too. Every single attempt had a touch time of less than two seconds, so he’s not being asked to do too much with creating his own 3-pointer. Plus, he is not being guarded on his attempts. In fact, he taken 19 attempts with a defender beyond four feet from him — he was 1-of-2 on his tighter defense attempts.

Alright, at least he is doing it in a sustainable fashion and it’s not a fluky amount of contested pullups. I don’t think anyone thinks Booker will be above 55 percent going forward, but he really seems like he could be near 50 percent. It’s intoxicating, which is kind of funny when talking about a 19-year-old kid.

The bigger question is where is he going to get his playing time? Well, last night happening is really the biggest reason why he’s the main story today. Check out the lineup combos from the fourth quarter last night as the Suns pulled off their big comeback with a 41-point quarter:

That’s more Books than a library. OK, maybe more books than a small bookshelf? Anyway, Booker also had a plus-60.8 net rating in his nine minutes down the stretch and he’s also been one of the better net rating guys since he’s been in the rotation.

After the game, Booker did say he cramped up after playing his season-high 33 minutes (via Arizona Republic). That’s not really a surprise because he played at least 33 minutes just once in his career at Kentucky. He’s fine. Don’t worry about it.

Since he’s been semi-unleashed in the last four games — all close ones — here’s a look at the top lineup combos he’s played in:

That’s some pretty heavy versatility with the number of players he’s out there with. Most importantly, he’s played 14 minutes next to Eric Bledsoe and Brandon Knight. That happened for just a combined 22 minutes in the first 18 games of the season — used in five games. Plus, the Suns went air-tight on their guard rotation with Ronnie Price playing just 4.5 minutes — all in one rotation in the first half, and it was with Booker, too. Besides that one rotation right there, it was Knight, Bledsoe and Booker getting the rest of the guard minutes, and they also played together for five minutes, too. Most matchups probably won’t dictate this and it had a little to do with the comeback factor. We’ll talk more about the frontcourt players below, but Price is probably in jeopardy in the backcourt.

If I’m coach Jeff Hornacek, I would really consider bringing Brandon Knight off the bench. For a shooting guard, he’s assisted just 33.3 percent of the time, so he’s obviously capable of being on the ball — only 22.6 percent of his shots are off no dribbles, as well. Knight and Bledsoe aren’t really playing well off each other either. Interestingly, Knight only has a 44.4 effective field goal percentage off Bledsoe passes, and Bledsoe also has a 44.4 eFG% off Knight passes. Those numbers are both below six percentgae points from their season efficiency.

The Suns also have a net rating of plus-2.9 in their 66 minutes with Bledsoe and Booker on the court and Knight off — it is minus-3.7 in 87 minutes with Booker and Knight with Bledsoe off. That is a bigger reason why Knight to the bench could make more sense. Bledsoe is also a better pick-and-roll player with guys like Tyson Chandler, so that helps his case.

If the Suns are really going to tighten up their guard rotation to three guys — it’s been done before and Portland is a great example — that would really help Booker get to 25-28 minutes. Considering Hornacek has talked about using guys like Jon Leuer for spacing, why not just do it in a more conventional sense with a lights-outs 3 specialist?

If you need treys, you can pick him up now. Most owners in standard leagues might want to wait one more game, though. If you drafted him in a Dynasty league, you can probably start doing this (via @NBA)

The frontcourt in Phoenix is also in a transitional phase. Markieff Morris was a DNP-CD on Sunday and he played just seven minutes on Monday. While he is saying all the right things in press conferences, it’s pretty clear something is up.

Marcus Morris called Brandon Knight “soft” the other day and Markieff’s body language doesn’t look great on the court. I mean, what the heck is up with this? (via The Cauldron)

Markieff Morris tries to change sides of the lane between free throws, gets told to stop. Does it again, gets T pic.twitter.com/8anQ8HUI6M

— The Cauldron (@TheCauldron) December 5, 2015

C’mon, man. He’s also been on Hornacek’s bad side at times in previous years and Markieff has been benched multiple times. He’s obviously not happy.

If for some reason he does stay, he will be staying in the second unit. He said he wants to work on a rhythm with the second unit and also said he’s not playing well (via Arizona Republic) “It is what it is. Jon [Leuer] and Mirza [Teletovic] have been playing really well,” Morris said. “If you ask me if I deserve it, I haven’t been playing too well. I’m with whatever the team wants.”

The bottom line is we can start taking Markieff out of the equation. He’s having a horrible year and has made just 38.6 percent from the field. You can probably cut him for Booker or…

Jon Leuer has the starting job on lockdown. In his last two games with Markieff basically out of the picture, Leuer averaged 11.0 points, 9.5 boards, 2.0 assists, 2.0 blocks, 1.0 steals and 0.5 treys. He was also coming in with some nice momentum in his previous two games before this, as well.

The big question here for Leuer is what happens when Tyson Chandler comes back? Well, Alex Len is playing well and he has the best net rating on the team in the last four with these new lineups (among players with more than five minutes), so he’s probably going to get more center minutes than he was getting before the Ty injury.

The top lineup for Leuer has him at power forward in the last four games — with the new starting group right now. After that, the next 10 top lineup combos have him at center, so that’s slightly a bad sign. Of course, that also means he won’t be playing 33.3 minutes per game like he has been.

He should be in more of a timeshare split with Mirza Teletovic to go with probably around 4-5 minutes at center, too. That puts him near 25 minutes, which should be enough for him to hit value with his threes, boards and recent uptick on blocks. He should be worth owning in standard leagues.

Hey, so Mirza! He hit a game winner last night! If you missed it, here it is:

Niiiice. He matched his season-high 20 points in a win over the Bulls with four boards, two assists, two blocks and four 3-pointers in 31 minutes.

His upside isn’t quite as high as Leuer, so he’s probably more of a 14-team guy right now. Plus, if the Suns add a PF, that would likely hurt him more than Leuer.

One last thing to hit on the Suns is how P.J. Tucker has seen his playing time dip in each of his last three games — that’s with this new rotation. In his last four, he averaged just 4.5 points, 7.4 boards, 2.0 assists, 1.3 steals and 0.3 treys. He only had an 11.9 usage rate and was barely involved in the halfcourt offense.

Based on the past, you’d think T.J. Warren would be picking up some run. Well, Warren has just 20.4 minutes per game with pedestrian averages of 8.5 points, 1.8 boards, 1.0 steals and 0.3 treys on 50.0 percent from the field. Again, there is an upward trend for Warren and a 14-minute game against the Grizzlies throws that off a tad. Still, Warren is really going to have to light it up in scoring because he doesn’t do much else.

Also in the last four, the Suns have used 10 different lineup combos with Tucker and Warren at the two forward spots. If Markieff is gone and they don’t get a PF back, the Suns would likely be more inclined to use this in small-ball matchups. They also have a plus-5.9 in their 75 minutes together this season, so it’s kind of working for the Suns. Again, the fantasy impact isn’t really too important.

Let’s end on the studs. I would not be too concerned about Bledsoe and Knight. Taking Morris’ high usage rate out of the equation is a good thing. If their minutes are staggered more, that would also be a good thing. They’re both holds in fantasy.

Don’t try to say the title of this column five times fast in front of kids, by the way.

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