Well, I’ll be honest — I didn’t see this one coming. I thought the Spurs would win this series in six or seven games. I knew the Suns were good, but I had no idea that they were this good.

Amare Stoudemire had 29-5, Steve Nash posted 20-5-9 and Jared Dudley added 16-6-4 off the bench to lead the Suns over the Spurs in Game 4, 107-101. It was tight down the stretch, but Stoudemire hit a couple of long jumpers off of Phoenix’s screen-and-roll to keep the Spurs at bay. The Suns almost let the Spurs climb back into it with a Dudley turnover (leading to a bucket) and a Stoudemire foul on a George Hill three-pointer, but Phoenix played a clean final minute and closed out the series in style.

I figured after winning Game 3, the Suns would relax (not unlike the Cavs in Game 4) and the Spurs’ pride would be enough to avoid the sweep at home, but this win in San Antonio shows what these Suns are made of. They have great chemistry, two stars (Nash and Stoudemire) and a number of talented role players (Jason Richardson, Grant Hill, Channing Frye, Goran Dragic, Jared Dudley and Leandro Barbosa), who all made news at one point or another in this series. They should also be getting Robin Lopez back for the Conference Finals, which should help the Suns match up with the Lakers’ long and lean front line.

Who would have thought a few months ago, with Stoudemire very much on the trade block, that the Suns would be the first team to clinch a spot in the Conference Finals?

Photo from fOTOGLIF

In his latest column, regular Steve Kerr critic Bill Simmons breaks down the series of events that turned around the Phoenix Suns.

You need luck with these things. Somehow, some way, Kerr got lucky four straight times. In order …

1. Gentry. Who fell from the sky, basically.

2. Cavaliers GM Danny Ferry talked himself into Shaq. Beautiful. Kerr dumped him for Ben Wallace’s expiring contract and bought Wallace out, saving Phoenix about $13 million (including tax), and leaving the Suns some wiggle room to sign Channing Frye, yet another good-chemistry guy and someone Kerr’s staff felt could spread the floor and shoot 3s. As weird as this sounds, Frye was a better fit for Phoenix than one of the greatest centers of all time.

3. Last summer, Kerr had to sign Nash — only the face of his franchise, the most popular Phoenix athlete ever and the heart of his locker room — to a contract extension. Kerr knew Nash couldn’t stop rehashing the past four years, thinking of all the couldas and wouldas and whatmightabeens. He knew Nash wondered if Kerr and Sarver knew what they were doing. He knew that, if this were anyone else, Disgruntled Superstar X would have demanded a trade or made it clear, “I’m playing this last year out, and if we fall short again, I’m out of here.”

But he also knew Steve Nash isn’t wired that way. He’s loyal. He’s Canadian. He’s old-school. He believes in things like, “I am the leader of this team, so as soon as I say that I might want to leave, I can’t lead anymore.” Nobody else would have stayed. Steve Nash stayed. Kerr promised him things would be better, that the window hadn’t closed, that he would, for lack of a better word, fix this. He even believed it.

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Phoenix 110, San Antonio 102

When starters Amare Stoudemire (23 points), Jason Richardson (19), Steve Nash (19) and Grant Hill (18) combine for 79 points, it may seem odd to give props to the Suns bench, but without Channing Frye’s 15 points (5-of-6 from 3PT) and Jared Dudley’s all-around game, Phoenix would have been in trouble.

Tim Duncan posted 29-10 for the Spurs, but was having a tough time matching up with the Suns on the defensive end. (By the way, Andrew Bogut got screwed out of 2nd Team All-Defensive honors. I realize that Duncan plays a lot of center, but he’s listed as a forward. Anderson Varejao made the 2nd Team at forward. Are they really serious that Varejao had a better defensive year than Bogut, who had the second most combined blocks, steals and charges in the league? They should have listed Duncan as a forward and given Varejao’s spot to Bogut.) Duncan was forced to guard Frye out on the perimeter, so at one point he switched over to Hill for a couple of possessions and Hill just dribbled into his range and knocked down a pair of key jumpers.

With this win in Game 2, the Suns own all the momentum in the series. Their mission now is to win one game in San Antonio, while the Spurs desperately need to win both Game 3 and Game 4 if they hope to come back and win this series.

It’s funny — for years, I’d always root for the Suns in their playoff matchups with the Spurs, but now I find myself rooting for San Antonio. Maybe they’re a bit of an underdog, or maybe they’re the team that could seriously challenge the Lakers in the Conference Finals. Or maybe it’s a combination of the two.

Anyway, they’re in big trouble, so there’s a great chance we’re going to see a Lakers/Suns matchup in the next round.

Photo from fOTOGLIF

The Utah point guard doesn’t understand all the fuss about his assertion that he’s the best point guard in the league.

On Wednesday, when asked, Deron Williams declared himself to be the best point guard in the NBA.

On Thursday, after local and national media members in search of fresh and deadline-friendly story angles from the Jazz’s first-round playoff series with the Denver Nuggets jumped on the claim and ran with it, Williams expressed dismay over the hullabaloo.

“It’s stupid,” he said. “I’ve said it before. I mean, I don’t know how many times I’ve been asked that, and now it gets blown out of proportion.”

“If you are a competitor, you are going to think you are the best at something,” Williams said. “It’s as simple as that. That’s how you keep your edge. That’s how you stay focused, stay sharp.

“It is what it is. Chris Paul thinks he’s the best point guard. Steve Nash thinks he’s the best point guard. Kobe (Bryant) thinks he’s the best shooting guard, best player in the world.

“That’s how it is” he added. “That’s how you are supposed to think.”

It’s not like he scheduled a press conference to make this announcement. He was asked by FanHouse who he thought was the best point guard in the NBA, and he responded with his honest opinion.

A humble player might have responded with a name like Chris Paul or Steve Nash, but you don’t get to the top of the mountain in the NBA by being humble. Williams is right in that players of his caliber think they are the best in the league, that’s part of why they are so good.

Confidence is half the battle. If you are playing against a guy and are thinking, “Wow, this guy is better than me,” then you’re probably not going to play very well. Part of being great is believing that you’re great, that you’re up to the challenge of beating the best players in the world.

Moreover, he has a point. Who is playing better at the point than Williams right now? Chris Paul struggled with injuries this season and is sitting at home watching the playoffs on television. What Steve Nash is doing at the age of 36 is incredible, but he’s always been something of a defensive liability.

Williams just might be the best point guard in the league.

Photo from fOTOGLIF

After the season, I like to tackle questions like these. To me, a good three-point shooter has to shoot a high percentage and make a good number of threes per game, so I put a few requirements on the eligibility of players:

1. They must have played in a minimum of 60 games during the season.
2. They must make a minimum of 38% of their 3PT attempts.
3. They must make a minimum of 1.0 threes per game.

Here are the results:

(As always, click on the graph for a larger version.)

Most impressive shooter? It has to be the rookie Stephen Curry, who quickly adjusted to the longer distance in the NBA and finished with the fourth-highest percentage of eligible players. He was also in the top 10 in makes per game.

Biggest surprise? Probably Jason Kidd. A career 35% shooter from deep, Kidd has been well over 40% since joining the Mavs. He’s hitting more of his threes because he’s able to play off of Dirk Nowitzki and can spot up instead of trying to hit threes off the dribble.

Best big man shooter? Channing Frye, who hit 2.12 threes a game at a 44% clip.

So who is the best shooter in the NBA? Well, it depends on your criteria. Accuracy and number of makes are important, but it’s even more impressive when the player in question is the first or second option on his team (like Aaron Brooks, Chauncey Billups, Paul Pierce, John Salmons, Steve Nash — or Jason Richardson — and Stephen Curry), and can still make a lot of threes at a high percentage when the defense is game-planning against him.

You be the judge.

Photo from fOTOGLIF

Late last year, there was some question as to how Andre Miller was fitting in with the Blazers, but in January, he started settling in and had a nice second half of the season. With Brandon Roy out for the foreseeable future, Miller had his best game of the season, posting 31-5-8 along with three steals in a 105-100 win in Phoenix.

The game was pretty nip-and-tuck the whole way, but a 9-3 Blazer run late in the fourth quarter gave Portland a seven-point lead with 1:29 to play. The Suns kept fighting and a pair of missed free throws by Jerryd Bayless with 0:12 to play opened the door for a game-tying three-point attempt by Steve Nash which only hit the front of the rim.

Game 2 is Tuesday night.

This is one way to kill time on the team plane…

DALLAS – So there I was last Friday afternoon in Austin, Texas, a little over 48 hours before the historic 2010 NBA All-Star game would take place just 200 miles away in Dallas. Somewhere around 100,000 tickets were said to be sold, including an unquantified number of $30 Standing Room Only “party passes.” The Great Recession of 2009 had left me nearly flat broke when they went on sale last year though, so I remained ticketless and with little hope. Then I read an interview with Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, where he seemed to up the ante on what this event could be.

I don’t think Cowboys Stadium has really been leveraged as a party destination the way it can. I think people are going to be pleasantly shocked. It’s more designed to be a night club than a destination for a sporting event. And because this is really geared toward fun, I think it’s really going to shine,” Cuban told the Dallas Morning News. “You’re just there to have fun. I think that makes a big difference. No one’s betting on this game. No one’s screaming and yelling. It’s just ‘Are you having fun? Yes or no.’ That makes for better people-watching. That makes for better enjoying of libations and such. It’ll be a lot of fun.”

Cuban was probably engaging in a hype game, but all this talk of unprecedented, newly leveraged fun seemed to demand personal investigation. I hit the Dallas and Austin Craigslist ticket boards, trying to find someone who might unexpectedly have found themselves with a couple of those party passes to sell for face price. Most were asking around $60 apiece, while some pirates sought $100. Then I saw a posting that more of the party passes were now on sale at Ticketmaster.com – one click later, he shoots, he scores! I knew prospects for getting a decent view of the game were slim, but how could any serious NBA fan pass up the chance to attend this historic contest for a mere $30 and a three-hour drive? Not to mention that a California friend had just relocated to Dallas that week for a new job, providing free lodging to boot. It had clearly become a mission from God.

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This is probably only interesting to NBA nuts and Mavs fans, but the transcript from the Cuban/Nelson arbitration hearing has been released, and there are some interesting tidbits of information. Like the story of how the Mavs almost drafted Pavel Podkolzin at #5 (instead of Devin Harris) in 2004.

But as June’s draft loomed, Nelson testified that he had no reason to believe he wouldn’t continue to lead that process, noting that he had selected standout Josh Howard with the 29th pick of the previous year’s draft.

On draft day, the Mavericks acquired the No. 5 pick from Washington. Nelson testified that as he settled into the draft room to talk to team scouts, he was surprised to hear son Donnie, the team’s vice president of operations, discuss taking “this big Russian” with the No. 5 pick.

The player’s name is redacted from the arbitration transcript, but it is clear that Nelson was referring to 7-foot-5 Pavel Podkolzin.

“I said, ‘Donnie, I cannot take that Russian five,’ ” Don Nelson testified. “And he asked me if I would go in the men’s room. I went in the men’s room with him, and he informed me that I wasn’t in charge of the draft.

“And I said, ‘Oh, really? Well, who is?’ He said, ‘I am.’ And I said, ‘Well, it’s nice of somebody to tell me.’

“And I said, ‘Well, if that’s the case, then as your father I’m asking you don’t draft [redacted].’ … And Donnie didn’t. He took Devin Harris.”

Later in that draft, the Mavericks sent a future first-round pick to Utah for the rights to No. 21 pick Podkolzin – who never played a regular-season game for Dallas.

The article also discusses how the Mavs failed to match Phoenix’s offer to Steve Nash, and how that affected the franchise.

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Two-time MVP Steve Nash has agreed to a two-year extension with the Phoenix Suns.

After receiving an improved offer last week and taking a few more days to deliberate, two-time NBA Most Valuable Player Steve Nash notified the Phoenix Suns over the weekend that he is accepting their two-year extension offer worth an estimated $22 million, according to team sources.

The Suns offered Nash a two-year, $20 million extension two weeks ago in addition to the $13.1 million he’s owed next season, then bumped it higher in a meeting in Las Vegas last Wednesday attended by Suns owner Robert Sarver, president of basketball operations Steve Kerr and Nash’s agent Bill Duffy.

When the Suns traded away Shaquille O’Neal, it seemed to indicate that the franchise was ready to start the rebuilding process. But with this extension, GM Steve Kerr appears to be building around Nash and, for the time being at least, Amare Stoudemire. I’m not sure what Kerr’s long-term plan is, and I’m not confident that even he knows.