The Phoenix Suns were pretty poor on the offensive end of the second game of the first round of the playoffs on Wednesday, with the Suns scoring just 95 and 93 points in Game 1 and Game 2 of the first round despite being in the top 10 in the league in the regular season, and the disadvantage of trailing 2-0 in the series has led to talk about how the Suns will handle the roster this offseason, and more specifically what they will do with Bradley Beal.
Beal was acquired by the Suns from the Washington Wizards in a trade last offseason, but he is averaging just 18.2 points per game this season, his lowest since the 2015-16 season, and looks unable to adapt to the Suns' offensive system that revolves around Kevin Durant and Devin Booker. Beal, who has also suffered serious injury problems, has missed 24 of the first 30 games of the season, and if the Suns are eliminated in the first round of the playoffs, Beal will likely change teams again this offseason.
But there's one issue to be aware of, and that's that, as was the case when he was traded by the Washington Wizards, Beal's contract has a trade veto right in mind, which means he has considerable control over his trade. In 2022, Beal signed a hugely questioned, five-year, $251 million contract extension with the Wizards, making Beal the only active NBA player with trade veto power. According to reports, Beal almost joined the Miami Heat last offseason, but the Heat reportedly insisted that Beal give up his trade veto if he was traded to the Heat, and Beal was unwilling to accept this condition, so he was eventually sent to the Suns.
The Suns had a clear goal of trading Beal last summer, which was to win a championship. Matt Ishbia immediately showed his desire to win a championship when he bought the team in December 2022, and just a few months after buying the team, Ishbia single-handedly led the trade of former regular season MVP Kevin Durant, giving away multiple future first-round picks, as well as young players such as Mikal Bridges and Cameron Johnson.
But the big deal didn't help the Suns win a championship in 2023, mainly because Durant's injury caused him to play only eight regular-season games. In the playoffs, Durant and Booker led the Suns to a comfortable 4-1 win over the Los Angeles Clippers in the first round of the playoffs, but met the future champions Denver Nuggets in the semifinals. Although Booker and Durant played well in the semifinals, the Suns lacked the help of other players other than the two, and no one averaged more than 11 points per game, and the Suns also lost 2-4.
After that loss, the Suns wanted to add another 30-point-per-game scorer to increase their chances of winning a championship, so they brought in Beal from the Wizards. But what people didn't expect was that Beal's injury situation was just as serious, and the Suns were severely lacking in roster depth due to two big trades, and the team didn't even have a real point guard, all of which could limit the Suns' ceiling.
But even if the Suns lost to the Timberwolves in the first round, it's hard to argue that the Suns traded Beal as a lost decision. Beal was basically traded Chris Paul, who has only played a few more games this season and will be 39 next month. Regardless, nothing is out of the blue, as the Suns will host the Timberwolves in Game 3 and Game 4 in anticipation of the Suns' bottoming out.