ESPN and The Ringer released their Top 100 lists. Where do Suns players rank?

The Big Three make their appearance. But where?

As the regular season approaches, the anticipation heightens, and the final stretch of ranking debates and predictions takes center stage. Among the most anticipated evaluations are ESPN’s annual Top 100 list as well as that of The Ringer.

This year, Phoenix Suns players aren’t well represented. They’re, well, represented. Only three make the Top 100 in both rankings, which is understandable I guess. I’m not sure if Tyus Jones or Jusuf Nurkic have the chops to earn a spot.

Five teams — Boston Celtics, New Orleans Pelicans, New York Knicks, Sacramento Kings, and Oklahoma City Thunder — each had five players make The Ringer’s Top 100 list. The Minnesota Timberwolves stood out as the only team with six players ranked. Poor Brooklyn has just one player, and it was Nic Claxton at 91.

The perception of last season’s follies has impacted the overall view of Phoenix Suns players, and we are “seeing the fallout.” Biases from a season ago are carrying over, whether it be how the Suns are being represented in Top 100 lists or where Vegas expects them to end up.

Let’s take a look at where ESPN and The Ringer have the Suns ranked this season.

Bradley Beal

ESPN: 70

The Ringer: 63

Let’s start with ESPN, the struggling conglomerate that fires quality basketball analysts and holds on to those who get clicks for click’s sake.

ESPN insiders, Dave McMenamin in this case, have Bradley Beal ranked No. 70 overall. This is a noticeable drop from last season when he was positioned at No. 37, reflecting a shift in perception as he prepares for season two with the Suns.

McMenamin wrote:

It was quite the precipitous fall for Beal as he had 51/43/81 shooting splits in his first season with the Suns, but he missed 29 games, prohibiting Phoenix from really finding an identity. Since the start of the 2019-20 season, Beal has now missed 130 games because of injury — which is more than Anthony Davis (120) and in the neighborhood of Kawhi Leonard (161) — without taking the hit to his reputation the way those two did. This plummet in the rankings is directly tied to his recent unreliability. If he can stay on the court and help the Suns realize their potential, he, too, will rise again.

I can’t argue with McMenamin’s assessment of the Suns’ lack of identity. The team felt rudderless for much of the season, and Beal’s injury only added to the uncertainty.

As for where Beal landed on the list? I’m not entirely convinced.

Beal’s ranking places him one slot ahead of the Dallas Mavericks’ sharpshooter, Klay Thompson, and just behind the Houston Rockets’ rising star, Jalen Green. Players like Brandon Miller, Cade Cunningham, Malik Monk, Immanuel Quickley, and Coby White were all ranked ahead of him. Sure, some of them might have a bigger impact on their teams this season—they need to. But let’s not underestimate the “Real Deal” Bradley Beal. If he stays healthy (yes, I know that’s a big ‘if’), he’s poised to play a significant role in the Suns’ success.

It seems that being the third option on his team took a toll on Beal’s overall ranking, despite the fact that he managed to score the third-most points among all tertiary options in the league. The only other players to achieve this were Kristaps Porzingis, who climbed to No. 46 after being ranked 62nd last season, and CJ McCollum, who saw a steep drop, failing to 84th after being ranked 44th last year.

At The Ringer, Beal was ranked 63rd overall, a slight rise from his June position at 70th. However, this still marked a drop from February, when he was placed at 59th.

What did The Ringer’s Michael Pina have to say?

Beal’s first season outside Washington was a total disaster. Injuries limited him to 53 games, destroying any chance for the Suns to develop an on-court rhythm or reliable rotation. Beal’s turnover percentage was a career high despite his usage rate dropping to its lowest mark since 2015.

He was accurate from behind the arc (on a low volume) and posted the highest true shooting percentage of his career, but he wasn’t particularly efficient in isolation or able to lift Phoenix’s offense when he didn’t share the floor with Kevin Durant and/or Devin Booker.

Now in his second year with the Suns, there’s real pressure on Beal to stay healthy, defend, and perform like the explosive, irrepressible scorer he used to be. Beal doesn’t need to average 30 points per game, but it’d be a huge relief if he could consistently take advantage of rarely being guarded by the opponent’s top perimeter stopper.

A “total disaster”? I lived it. I experienced the ups and downs. It sucked. It was frustrating. But I wouldn’t say it was a “total disaster”. That buzzword take aside, Pina makes some valid points. You know, like he doesn’t need to average 30. Duh.

Devin Booker

ESPN: 15

The Ringer: 13

It’s more than just his number on the USA Olympic team. It’s his ESPN Top 100 ranking! Booker fell from 11 to 15 year over year, and it 100% has to do with the Suns’ performance in the postseason, at least according to McMenamin:

Booker has been a model of scoring consistency, averaging between 25.6 and 27.8 points in each of the past six seasons. And after being part of Team USA at the Paris Olympics, Booker was praised by coach Steve Kerr for all the parts of his game besides scoring — playmaking, staunch defense, court awareness — that helped the team win gold. His ranking has regressed ever so slightly because of team success as he went from putting up 40-point games in the 2021 Finals to getting swept out in the first round last year. But at 27 years old he is just scratching the surface of his prime.

Here is where he fell relative to his peers:

• 17. Donovan Mitchell
• 16. Tyrese Haliburton
• 15. Devin Booker
• 14. Jaylen Brown
• 13. Anthony Davis

I’m not going to argue about his place in the rankings. He’s a top 15 player in the NBA, and that’s solid. The company he exists among either made their jump year-over-year due to postseason performance, or they are Wemby — who went from 47th to 11th — because he’s effing Wemby.

As for The Ringer, Booker holds steady at No. 13. He’s maintaining that position, and it’s interesting to see the variations in the staff’s takes on players in similar spots.

• 15. Victor Wembanyama
• 14. Jaylen Brown
• 13. Devin Booker
• 12. Jalen Brunson
• 11. Anthony Edwards

Danny Chau said the following, titling his summation, “Kobe acolyte who remains one of the steadiest offensive forces of his generation.”:

For a player who entered the league in 2015 largely pigeonholed as a shooting specialist, Booker has led many different lives across his nine seasons. He was in Phoenix when the Suns were the worst team in the NBA, and he was in Phoenix when they made their first Finals appearance since 1993. Sure, he’s been at times the team’s best shooter, but also its best isolation player, its most reliable pick-and-roll ball handler, its pluckiest perimeter defender, its de facto point guard, its unquestioned leader. After killing his ego as a spot-duty utility wing playing for Team USA in Paris, Booker enters year 10 in Phoenix with a new perspective. Perhaps he has it in him to be all of the above, on a team that also boasts arguably the most versatile offensive player in history.

It’s strange to think of Booker—entering his age-28 season, still firmly in his prime—as an old soul, but he wears his influences on his sleeve. He animates the legacies of Bird and Mamba in every game: He gets his buckets however he wants to, he talks his shit, and then he does it again. It’s heartening to know that the vision of a dominant scoring wing can thrive in any era.

The Ringer

Chills much?

Pina’s observations perfectly capture how we feel about Booker. It’s that old-soul aura that resonates with the fanbase, something we truly appreciate and cherish. Even with one of the all-time greats, Kevin Durant, on the roster, it’s Booker who must lead this team if they’re ever going to reach the promised land.

Kevin Durant

ESPN: 9

The Ringer: 8

It’s official: ESPN has it out for the Phoenix Suns. Every Suns player took a hit in the rankings. Durant, who was 7th last season, dropped to 9th. You better have a solid explanation for that one, McMenamin!

Why he fell 2 spots: Durant’s ranking is more of a reflection of the ascension of others than any atrophy of his game. After all, last season he appeared in 75 games — 20 more than he played in any season since suffering a torn Achilles in 2019. He was his usual efficient self, averaging 27.1 points on 52/41/86 shooting splits and earning his 14th All-Star nod. While he could have been dinged for the Suns’ underwhelming playoff performance, it’s hard to peg the first-round loss on him after he averaged 26.8 points on 55/42/82 shooting splits against Minnesota in the four-game series. He showed off his sustained excellence all over again during the Paris Olympics as the team’s third-leading scorer, behind Stephen Curry and LeBron James.

Biggest question for 2024-25: Can the Suns win as constructed? Durant is already recognized as an all-time great, but the only way he can even further solidify his reputation is to replicate the championship success he had with Golden State. That pursuit has stalled in recent seasons, as he has been swept out of the first round in two of the past three seasons with Brooklyn and Phoenix. The franchise replaced coach Frank Vogel with Mike Budenholzer in the offseason and signed point guard Tyus Jones, but the team’s ceiling still figures to be determined by how well Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal mesh together.

No, I’m not complaining about KD being ranked 9th. In fact, having two players from Phoenix inside the NBA’s top 15 is something to celebrate. McMenamin’s reasoning for KD’s slight dip is understandable; it’s a mix of postseason struggles and the rise of emerging stars like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Sure, Durant slipped a bit, but given the context, I see where he’s coming from.

Photo by Kelsey Grant/Getty Images

KD climbed in The Ringer’s rankings, moving from 9th in June to 8th, bumping Anthony Edwards down from 8th to 11th. You got all of that movement?

Justin Verrier of The Ringer, titling his summation, “Living legend passively-aggressively trying to lift his team into the same rarefied air as his individual game,” said the following:

How can a player so metronomically consistent keep finding himself in such a mess? Even at age 35, Durant had yet another supremely effective and efficient season: 27.1 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 6.1 assists on near-50/40/90 shooting while playing steady defense across 75 games—his most since vacating the Bay Area. But the pilot season of the Big Three Suns was a slow lurch toward a first-round exit, with injuries disrupting chemistry and an iso-heavy approach producing surprisingly stilted offense.

You can’t fault KD for the Suns’ struggles; unlike in Brooklyn, he didn’t exactly handpick his costars. But he keeps falling into this pattern where his individual play shines while the team as a whole disappoints, like the “This Is Fine” dog with TweetDeck open on the laptop in front of him.

Maybe Mike Budenholzer—Durant’s sixth coach since leaving the Warriors in 2019—can bring structure to a talented roster, starting with getting everyone, Durant included, to take a few steps back from their favorite midrange spots to reap the extra value. But can an old bagman learn new tricks? KD shouldn’t have to alter anything at this point, especially with what’s being asked of him defensively in Phoenix’s guard-heavy lineups, but it may be his only way to hang with the young up-and-comers gunning for his spot, rather than becoming merely their idol.

I’m not sure there’s much to argue with Verrier’s take on the KD situation. He’s played great. His teams aren’t winning it all. And he’s on Twitter a lot.

---

As the rankings keep rolling in, it’s clear that last season’s struggles still shape perceptions of the Suns. With ESPN and The Ringer weighing in, it sparks a fresh round of debate on where Phoenix’s stars stand among the league’s elite. Do you think these rankings fairly reflect the talent on this roster, or are past disappointments overshadowing their potential?

We’d love to hear your take on how Beal, Booker, and Durant were evaluated. Are they getting the respect they deserve, or are they being undervalued? Let us know your thoughts!