Phoenix Suns 2025-26 season preview: Devin Booker rejuvenated? Promising rookies? Let's hope so

The 2025-26 NBA season is here! Over the next few weeks, we're examining the biggest questions, best- and worst-case scenarios, and win projections for all 30 franchises — from the still-rebuilding teams to the true title contenders.

PHOENIX SUNS

2024-25 finish

• Record: 36-46 (11th in the West, missed playoffs)

• Offensive rating: 114.7 (13th)

• Defensive rating: 117.7 (27th)

Offseason moves

• Additions: Jalen Green, Dillon Brooks, Mark Williams, Nigel Hayes-Davis, Jordan Goodwin, Jared Butler, Khaman Maluach, Rasheer Fleming, Koby Brea, Isaiah Livers, CJ Huntley, general manager Brian Gregory and head coach Jordan Ott

• Subtractions: Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal, Tyus Jones, Mason Plumlee, Vasilije Micić, Cody Martin, Monte Morris, TyTy Washington Jr., Damion Lee, Bol Bol, Jalen Bridges, general manager James Jones and head coach Mike Budenholzer

• Complete roster

The Big Question: Can the Suns rebuild a respectable team on the fly?

OK, so … that didn’t work.

Don’t believe me? … Wait, really? Seems kind of odd that you’d dispute this, considering the Suns finished 10 games under .500, missed the playoffs for the first time since the bubble, fired their head coach (again), traded away the future Hall of Famer they’d estranged by surreptitiously trying to move him at the 2025 trade deadline, and used the stretch provision to eat nearly $100 million worth of the former All-Star that they’d mortgaged what remained of their future to get.

OK, well, if you don’t believe me, just ask the guy who signed off on it all.

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“After last season, we said, ‘That old stuff that we did? It didn’t work,'” Suns owner Matt Ishbia told reporters at Phoenix’s media day session.

See? (One hopes that “trade for older stars” isn’t the only “oldstuff” that the Suns plan to leave in the past.)

Out with the old, in with the new, in an offseason overhaul that has turned the Suns from the third-oldest roster in the NBA last season to what’s projected to be a middle-of-the-pack group this season. The idea: Get younger, bigger, more athletic; develop more camaraderie and esprit de corps; form a new organizational ethos, developing an identity predicated on toughness, physicality and defense — a team, frankly, that sounds a lot like the one to whom they just traded Kevin Durant — while installing a more aggressive defense and demanding a more competitive, more enjoyable-to-watch brand of ball than what Phoenix mustered during what Devin Booker recently called the two toughest years of his career. (Here’s where we remind you that the Suns didn’t win more than 24 games in his first four pro seasons.)

Good thing, then, that one of the key pieces coming back to the Valley in the KD deal was Dillon Brooks — a perennial habitual line-stepper and tone-setting, vibe-shifting perimeter stopper who played an integral role in Houston’s transformation from one of the NBA’s most permissive defenses into one that finished seventh and fourth in defensive efficiency after his arrival.

The 29-year-old was one of just three players in the NBA last season to rank in the 95th percentile or higher in average matchup difficulty, individual perimeter defense and defensive positional versatility, according to The BBall Index’s metrics, alongside Jeremy Sochan and Dorian Finney-Smith. He did so while shooting 39.7% from 3-point range on 6.3 attempts in 31.8 minutes per game across 75 starts — all career highs.

The hope: Veterans Brooks, Royce O’Neale and EuroLeague standout Nigel Hayes-Davis take on top opposing options and wreak havoc in the gaps; young wings like second-year forward Ryan Dunn and rookie Rasheer Fleming follow suit, generating deflections, steals and blocks; Booker and Jalen Green just hold their own at the point of attack; an intriguing but unproven center room led by ex-Hornets Mark Williams and Nick Richards, backed by rising sophomore Oso Ighodaro and 7-foot-2 No. 10 overall pick Khaman Maluach, provides more rim protection than the Suns have seen in a minute.

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Get all that to work out, and maybe Phoenix has the positional size, quickness, athleticism and tenacity to climb out of the bottom 10 and back toward league-average defensive efficiency. Get that, and find a path toward more efficient offense in no-traditional-point-guard lineups helmed by the newly re-extended Booker and the inarguably explosive Green than they did when Booker, Durant and Beal failed to mesh, and maybe the Suns won’t wander through the desert in their search for respectability for quite as long as most predict.

Would that kind of change result in a dramatic shift in the win column? Maybe not right away. But this year’s Suns aren’t going to be measured in wins and losses; they’re going to be measured in success.

Don’t believe me? Tell ’em, Mat:

See? (C’mon, you know what he means.)

Best-case scenario

Booker turns the page on the failed experiments of the last two seasons and turns in the kind of full-tilt scoring and playmaking season that us “Point Book” heads have been clamoring for, vying for the league lead in scoring while putting up career-best assist numbers and vaulting back into the conversation for an All-NBA spot. Green finds shot-selection and rim-pressure religion, blossoming into an increasingly efficient and exciting second banana for a better-than-expected offense. Williams finally stays healthy, turning those flashes he showed in Charlotte into consistent two-way impact. The Suns grind their way to play-in contention; this time, that doesn’t feel like a disappointment.

If everything falls apart

The vibe shift is short-lived. New coach Jordan Ott looks overmatched, the defense doesn’t come together, and Booker and Green mesh about as well as Book/KD/Beal did — which is to say, very badly. Add it all up, and the Suns, elevated levels of scrappiness aside, look like one of the worst teams in the West. And with their 2026 first-rounder leveraged to all hell, no tradable firsts through 2032 and $23 million worth of waived-and-stretched salary on their books for the next half-decade, they can’t even enjoy the fruits of the badness; the long walk through the desert is just starting.

2025-26 schedule

• Season opener: Oct. 22 vs. Sacramento

• Complete schedule

Over/under win total: 31.5

Even in a roundly disappointing season, the Suns had the point differential of a 34-win team with Booker on the court, according to Cleaning the Glass. If the star guard — who last season played more than 70 games for the first time since 2017 — stays healthy, Phoenix would seem to stand a good chance of flirting with a win total closer to the mid-to-high 30s.

More season previews

East: Atlanta Hawks • Boston Celtics • Brooklyn Nets • Charlotte Hornets • Chicago Bulls • Cleveland Cavaliers • Detroit Pistons • Indiana Pacers • Miami Heat • Milwaukee Bucks • New York Knicks • Orlando Magic • Philadelphia 76ers • Toronto Raptors • Washington Wizards

West: Dallas Mavericks • Denver Nuggets • Golden State Warriors • Houston Rockets • Los Angeles Clippers • Los Angeles Lakers • Memphis Grizzlies • Minnesota Timberwolves • New Orleans Pelicans • Oklahoma City Thunder • Phoenix Suns • Portland Trail Blazers • Sacramento Kings • San Antonio Spurs • Utah Jazz