With a new coach in town, what do the Phoenix Suns do now?

The Phoenix Suns have gone through a monumental series of changes in the last year, starting from the blockbuster trade that sent Shawn Marion to Miami for Shaquille O’Neal to the departure of long-time coach Mike D’Antoni to the New York Knicks.

There also have been years of disappointing playoff performances for the team.

When Coach D’Antoni first came to town, he adopted a style of basketball that changed the game that we see today. The years of the slow, methodical center who dominated the game disappeared. This ushered a new style of play that had point guards racing up the court, allowing only the players that could keep up to have a chance to score.

The Phoenix Suns became notorious for this style of basketball. The main philosophy depended on outscoring the opponent rather than playing strong defense and relying on stops.

The Suns became very popular around the league, but were never able to win a championship. D'Atoni started coaching the Suns in the 2003-2004 season through the end of this year. Throughout his career, the Suns lost to the San Antonio Spurs in the playoffs four out of his five seasons. The other year, they lost to the Dallas Mavericks.

Under his command, the Suns always had great regular-season records, but were repeatedly defeated in the playoffs. After this year’s first-round loss to the Spurs, D’Antoni decided to leave the Suns and now coaches for the New York Knicks.

It was always rumored in Phoenix that D’Antoni and Suns general manager Steve Kerr differed on how to coach the team, which inevitably added to his departure.

After D’Antoni left, Steve Kerr and the Suns took their time interviewing candidates for his job. They interviewed internal candidates that worked for the organization, including Eddie Johnson, Tom Chambers, and Vinny Del Negro (Vinny recently took the Chicago Bulls head coaching position).

The Suns also interviewed experienced assistant coaches that included Elston Turner, Tyrone Corbin, Brian Shaw, Jeff Hornacek, and Mike Budenholzer. They even interviewed Mark Jackson, who had no coaching experience.

Eventually, they interviewed only one candidate that had previous head coaching experience—Terry Porter.

Porter played in the NBA for 17 seasons for four teams, and retired as one of the few players to have never been traded in his entire career. He was the head coach for the Milwaukee Bucks for two years during the '03–04 and '04–05 seasons and an assistant coach for the Sacramento Kings in 2002. He has been the assistant coach for the Detroit Pistons for the last two seasons.

He also has a great relationship with the team's General Manager Steve Kerr, dating back to when they were both teammates on the Spurs for two seasons.

The Suns needed a coach that will hold their players accountable for their defensive mistakes. Terry Porter has always been known for his defensive toughness and offensive explosiveness, and the Suns hope he can bring that style of play to their team.

The Suns roster will probably have a different appearance next year. Most of the key players should be around, but Steve Kerr has stated that he is open to offers that will make his team better. The highest-paid player on the roster next year is Shaquille O'Neal, getting $20,000,000.

O'Neal seemed very motivated after the trade to win a championship. When he was introduced to the crowd at his first game after arriving in Phoenix, he stood up in the V.I.P. suites at the arena, and pointed to his finger for another championship ring.

When he came to the team, they had to completely change their style of play to adjust to him, as much as they did not want to admit it. We all witnessed a lot of great moments from Shaq and he did a great job on defense against Tim Duncan throughout the series—when he could stay out of foul trouble.

He stepped in and gave them the toughness that they needed, but definitely ran out of steam in the end. The Spurs adopted the “hack-a-Shaq” technique to completely take him out of the game offensively, and he became a burden to his team.

There is absolutely no excuse for Shaq’s inability to shoot free throw shots. He is a professional basketball player that gets paid a huge amount of money. I hope that this off-season (for the first time in his career) he learns how to shoot a free throw, so he doesn’t have a negative impact on his team in critical situations.

Amare Stoudemire had the best season of his career last year. The potential that he has is immeasurable at this point, but he still needs to work much harder on his defense and rebounding this off-season. You can see his flashes of defensive greatness throughout the year—but then he gets lazy at times and makes foolish fouls.

He has shown that he is virtually unstoppable on the offensive side, and has the athletic potential to be an All-NBA first-team defender. Next year, he needs to establish offensively that this is his team and he is offensive option number one.

He performs a nearly perfect pick-and-roll with Steve Nash and should get more passes down in the post against the slower power forwards.

Steve Nash obviously lost a step last season. It really showed in the playoffs when he became a defensive liability while on the court against Tony Parker. He was sloppy with the ball and had many turnovers in critical situations.

He attempted to change his style of play to adjust to O’Neal throughout the season, but it inevitably led to his poor production in the playoffs. He had absolutely no chance of keeping up with Tony Parker defensively. He needs to be in better shape next year and be held accountable defensively.

The Suns also need a dependable backup point guard to relieve Nash of his heavy minutes. It is becoming more and more important to have a strong point guard in this league, and Steve Nash needs to prove his best days are not behind him.

Boris Diaw and Leandro Barbosa are both under contract for next year. These players both have great potential but are very inconsistent and could not be counted on in critical situations.

Barbosa is a lightning-quick player that can take anyone off of the dribble. This year, he changed his style, settling for jump shots and three pointers.

Barbosa is at his best when he drives to the basket off the dribble and creates offense for himself. He needs to develop strong confidence in what he does best and become the NBA star that he can be.

Raja Bell has always been known as a great defender, but struggled to guard Manu Ginobili in the playoffs this season. He suffered several injuries which negatively impacted his offensive numbers as well.

Grant Hill displayed he still had some game left in him, but suffered injuries that kept him out of the playoffs. Hill has been plagued by injuries his entire career, and needs to see less minutes in the regular season so he is still healthy come playoff time.

The only other players under contract next season are rookies DJ Strawberry and Alando Tucker. Nobody really knows what to expect from these guys because D’Antoni never utilized them in his rotation. Instead, he rotated them back and forth from the D-League.

The Suns have the 15th-overall pick in the draft, and have shown interest in players like Brandon Rush, Robin Lopez, JaVale McGee, and Donte Green. They could use this pick to add young talent to their franchise or trade the pick to improve their roster.

The only player that should be not be considered to trade is Amare Stoudemire. He is the future of their franchise and a soon-to-be MVP. Everyone else should be considered in order to improve the team.

They have an expensive, aging roster that needs to be adjusted. Whichever players are around at the start of next season need to be held accountable on defense and continue the offensive production of the previous years.

The Western Conference is very deep now, with a lot of young, athletic, and talented teams, and it will be extremely difficult to make the playoffs next season.

This team is full of limitless potential—but is in desperate need of a change. Hopefully, Porter will bring the attitude and toughness these guys need to get it together.