The Phoenix Suns are going to be far more interested in a game going on elsewhere Friday while they take on the Los Angeles Lakers.
The Portland Trail Blazers will host the Los Angeles Clippers, and the winner will likely take the eight seed in the NBA Play-In Tournament to face the Suns on Tuesday. A Clippers win clinches it, while the Blazers would then have to also beat the tanking Sacramento Kings on Sunday to secure their fate.
While Phoenix has had its own problems the last two months, this draw is rotten luck. Both teams are flat-out bad matchups, particularly Portland.
But which one should the Suns prefer to face?
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The timeline we will be focusing on for both teams is over a two-month period, since Feb. 6. It is the most helpful and convenient for a few reasons we will get to.
The Clippers are 18-12 since while the Blazers are 17-12.
To start, Phoenix has not seen a proper version of what these two teams are now.
The Suns played either group just once over that time, taking a 92-77 loss to Portland in Phoenix on Feb. 22. Blazers star Deni Avdija played one minute in that one and Devin Booker was out for the Suns. Avdija also didn’t play in the Suns’ Feb. 3 win over the Blazers while a 25-point loss to L.A. two days prior also did not feature Booker.
Go back before that and the last time Phoenix played the Blazers or Clippers was in late November. So in general, the Suns really don’t know either squad all too well.
The Clippers in that Feb. 1 win still had James Harden on their roster, who they traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers in a return that included point guard Darius Garland. They also shipped out All-NBA center Ivica Zubac and got back picks, plus wing Bennedict Mathurin.
Portland on that Feb. 6 date got back 2023 No. 3 overall pick Scoot Henderson, who has shown more and more flashes the last year of meeting that potential. It has also been without scoring guard Shaedon Sharpe for all but one of the games since then, thanks to two different injuries. Sharpe, however, was upgraded to doubtful for Portland’s loss on Wednesday, so perhaps he could return for the play-in tournament or sooner.
The biggest difference in either team is its star power, and this was a lot more of an argument before that date. But not now.
Across that two-month span, Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard is averaging 28.5 points, 6.6 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.7 steals per game while shooting 51.5% from the field, 38.7% at 3-point range and 86.4% on free throws.
The boogeyman that the Suns briefly saw in the first round of the 2023 playoffs who completely took over and won Game 1 of that series before later getting injured is back. Some will go as far as saying he’s even back to his 2019 levels when he carried the Toronto Raptors to a championship.
Needless to say, Phoenix has zero answers defensively for Leonard. He’s one of the five best players in the league at the moment and the thought of his terminator-like dominance in a play-in format should terrify Suns fans.
Avdija was an All-NBA lock at the halfway point of the year, but a nagging back injury has affected not only his availability but quality of play.
Since Feb. 6, he is posting 20.9 PPG after a 25.5 PPG number in the games prior. His 3P% has free-fallen from 35.6% to 19.6%.
With that said, Avdija has played 16 straight games now and in his last four is at the more customary 27.3 PPG. In some ways, he’s a worse matchup for the Suns than Leonard, because Avdija is right there with anyone when it comes to drawing fouls via downhill drivers. He is one of eight players in the NBA making at least 15 drives per game, and his 19.5 lead the league, becoming the first to top Shai Gilgeous-Alexander in six years. And Avdija is far bigger, 6-foot-8 and 228 pounds.
That is the argument for an anti-Blazers draw.
They’ve been top-3 in drives per game both before and after this Feb. 6 date. We saw the likes of Toumani Camara, Jerami Grant, Jrue Holiday and others give the Suns a whole lot of trouble, a handful of players you wouldn’t describe as slashers but under this directive become the exact matchup problem that has plagued Phoenix all year.
Henderson would be a huge part of a hypothetical matchup, because that is his primary M.O. like Avdija. He’s turned into one of the focal points of Portland’s offense without Sharpe and is at 14.4 PPG in his last 28 games.
The Suns’ problems with size and on-ball defense in general would flare up majorly. In another bad sign, the Blazers are fourth in offensive rebounding rate since Feb. 6. Donovan Clingan (4.4 OREB/G) has been great down the stretch and Robert Williams III (3 OREB/G) has been providing decent spurts. Both of those types of bigs, a behemoth and an energetic bruiser, have had success against the Suns.
Now, the Suns could choose to contain Portland’s pressure and interior presence with extra help defense, but its shooters are knocking down shots lately. Grant (6.4 3PA/G, 41.8 3P%), Holiday (7.3 3PA/G, 40.8 3P%), Camara (7.3 3PA/G, 40.8 3P%), Henderson (5.4 3PA/G, 35.5 3P%) and Clingan (3.4 3PA/G, 37.5 3P%) are all shooting it well currently. The Blazers are fifth in their percentage of shots at the rim, and use that to be fourth in the percentage of their shots from 3. Problematic!
Grant, it should be noted, is dealing with a right calf strain and has missed the last five games.
What that whole matchup problem does is make a mediocre Blazers offense better than it is. Across that timeline, they are 17th in offense while getting back to their identity last year on the other end, where they are sixth in defense.
The Clippers are more consistent. They are 10th in offense and ninth in defense over that time. To continue on that theme in the last two months, they are sixth in turnover percentage and fourth in how many they force.
L.A. is second in free-throw rate, another stylistic gaffe for the Suns this year. Mathurin is one of the best around, sporting 7.7 FTA/G, right ahead of Leonard’s 7.1 FTA/G. Both would pose serious issues in that department.
And Garland with his overflowing juice as a ball-handler with lots of shake and paint touches has been putting up great numbers in a Clippers jersey. He’s at 20.4 PPG on 48.9%/45.8%/83.8% shooting splits. That’s on over seven attempted 3s a game.
How about some weaknesses?
For the Blazers, it’s taking care of the ball. Even without a more volatile decision-maker in Sharpe, they are still last in turnover percentage. That is where the Suns could get back to doing what they did best in the first half of the year, and their numbers started getting back on track in March, too.
L.A. doesn’t have size. Trading Zubac and losing promising rookie Yanic Konan Niederhauser for the season has the Clippers only playing Brook Lopez as the team’s 5, and he’s a pick-and-pop guy offensively while doing his best at his age in his patented drop coverage on the other end. The Clippers rank bottom-10 over that span in rebounding rate on both ends.
Despite lots of what we built up as a Portland squad that poses a ton of problems for what the Suns struggle with, the team to avoid is still the Clippers. They have Leonard in a one-game environment, who the Suns do not have the defensive personnel for, plus tons of postseason experience across the roster. On top of that, Ty Lue is constantly lauded for his playoff gameplans and adjustments, which he could be cooking up against a first-time head coach.
With that said, the Blazers would be a difficult draw as well. If anything, in the event that the Suns lose on Tuesday, their fans should be rooting like hell for Stephen Curry and the 10th-seeded Golden State Warriors on Wednesday.
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