Continued good health will have Suns hoisting championship trophy
Playoff basketball tests a team’s fortitude, patience and poise. And as we’ve seen this post-season, also its ligaments, bones, and soft tissue.
The last NBA team standing might be the team with the most players able to do so.
The Suns are beat up, sore, tired. But they are intact, and their opponent in the NBA Finals, either Milwaukee or Atlanta, is not.
The Bucks might be missing their best player, Giannis Antetokounmpo, who suffered a hyperextended knee in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference finals on Tuesday. And Hawks guard Trae Young missed that game with a foot injury.
The Suns could beat either team straight up.
But the Bucks without Antetokounmpo?
The Hawks without Young?
Absent a catastrophe, “Larry,” as Suns guard Devin Booker called the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy, will come to Phoenix for the first time.
The prayers of Suns fans — “Lord, let us reach the finals in good health” — have been answered, although “good” is a relative term.
As he sat down for an interview after the Suns dispatched the Clippers on Wednesday night, Chris Paul let out a long groan worthy of a man much older than 36.
His medical file has grown exponentially since the playoffs started nearly six weeks ago.
A stinger in the opening game against the Lakers in round one that limited him in at least three more games. A positive COVID-19 test between rounds two and three that caused him to miss the first two games of the Clippers series while quarantined. A wrist injury that led to an MRI on Tuesday. A ligament injury that’s required two fingers on his right hand to be taped together.
“What was it, Game 3, I find out I tore some ligaments in my hand,” Paul said Wednesday night. “I said, ‘Oh, here we go.’”
But through it all, Paul never doubted he and the Suns could win a title.
“I ain’t built like that,” he said. Wednesday night, Paul decided against taping together the two fingers on his shooting hand. He scored 41 points. Booker ditched the mask he had worn since suffering a broken late in game two. He scored 22 points.
Wisely, Booker put the mask on in the final minutes to protect his nose, which looks like a mogul run at a ski resort, from growing another bump.
The Suns, and their fans, have had plenty of reminders how tenuous a run for the championship can be.
Wednesday night, coach Monty Williams said he believed before this season that his team could win a title. But he’s been around long enough to know the difficulty in doing so.
“You get one shot sometimes,” he said.
That shot can be gone in an instant. That thought crossed Williams’ mind when he received the phone call telling him Paul would miss time because of the positive COVID-19 test.
“Your heart sinks for a second because you’re like, ‘Man, not right now,’” he said. “It’s just been an emotional ride for us, just in this series alone.”
The Suns have been stretched, bruised and tested in these playoffs, but they also have been fortunate.
Lakers forward Anthony Davis wasn’t a factor in the first round after suffering a groin injury in Game 4. The Nuggets, the Suns’ opponent in round two, were without guard Jamal Murray. Kawhi Leonard, the Clippers’ best player, missed the
Suns series because of a knee injury. Their center, Ivica Zubac, missed the last two games because of a knee sprain.
No apologies from the Suns are necessary, of course. Attrition plays a role in determining championships in every sport, and besides, the Suns, their coaches and their fans have suffered greatly to get to this point.
Paul, in his 16th year, will be playing in the finals for the first time.
“That tells you how hard it is to get there,” forward Jae Crowder said.
The Suns failed to make the playoffs the 10 seasons before this, and Booker was there five seasons, including 201819 when the Suns bottomed out by going 19-63.
“I’ve been through a lot of bulls--t, honestly,” Booker said.
As have Suns fans, Booker acknowledged.
This will be just the third time in their 53 years of existence the Suns have made it to the finals. It’s hard to imagine a better opportunity will come along in the next 50 or so years.
They took care of the best the Western Conference offered. No Michael Jordan in the Eastern Conference stands in their way.
They say if you have your health, you have everything. In the Suns case, everything would include “Larry” finding a new home in the desert.