Mourning the setting of the Suns: End of an era, all the should’ve, could’ve, would’ves of the year

It is pretty safe to say that my beloved Suns’ season is over, as we are 5 games behind 8^th spot and only 18 games left. There is still a tiny bit inside of me who is dying to believe that we can make a miraculous 16-2 rally to finish the season. I’d like to think of myself as a more optimistic and loyal (and often times angry) fan. And perhaps I should personally go to Dallas and set the damn German and his usually under-achieving team on fire so we can make the playoffs. But with all said and done, this has been a very heartbreaking season for me.

To me, it all went downhill with the trade of the Big Shaqtus. Don’t get me wrong, Shaq has converted me from a hater (since the damn Shaq & Rapist cheated the Kings championship days) to a semi-fan this season with his dedicated effort, better free throws, monsterly performances and many funny tweets.

Shaq's funny tweet for the day

However, no matter how much I have turned around to enjoy Shaq’s playing time in Phoenix, it is apparent that he is not meant to be a Sun from the get-go. I understand Steve Kerr’s side of bringing in a true center for us and the need for the team to play better defense. But he did it all wrong. You cannot change a winning veteran team 180 degrees by simply bringing in the biggest man on earth and a meanie rookie coach. He decided to go big, really big, and took a super big risk that leads to a disastrous failure of our season.

I believed in Mike D’Antoni’s “seven seconds of less” system. Yes we were allowing opponents to score more, but hey if we can shoot the lights out and out score you, why not? Yes we got beat by the stupid Spurs in the playoffs, but it was a combination of bad luck (Amare’s injury), unfortunate events (unfair suspensions + Horry hip-check Nash + Tim Duncan 3 pointer), and the lack of depth of our bench. Shawn Marion is quite a commodity available for trade, and I still insisted that we could’ve gotten someone that would have been a better fit to our team than Shaq. Many of my friends have heard my rant in the past year about how much I wish we got Marcus Camby instead—someone that could rebound, block shots, picking up some defensive slack for Amare, while giving Amare the space and touches he needs to be as explosive as he can. Jason Richardson is great, but we really should’ve held onto Bell…. But I guess after all, these are just the tip of the iceberg of all the should’ve, would’ve, could’ves for our season.

Now it’s finally time for me to mourn and accept the fact that we will most likely miss the playoffs. What a heartbreaking rollercoaster year this have been- from byebye Marion to Tim Duncan’s 3 pointer, from Amare’s 49pt game to Mason’s 3 pointer on Xmas, from firing Terry Porter to back to back 140point games… Although I really wish our season didn’t end in the hands of the damn Texas teams.

Being a bitter and heartbroken fan as we got oust in the West, I will most likely cheer for the Eastern conference team to win it all.