5 things to know about Suns reportedly hiring Mike Budenholzer as head coach

On Thursday, the Phoenix Suns officially fired coach Frank Vogel. We barely had time to sift through their replacement options before The Athletic‘s Shams Charania reported on Friday that the Suns were planning to hire Mike Budenholzer as their next head coach.

According to Charania, they’re closing in on a deal that will pay Budenholzer an eight-figure annual salary. Assistant coach David Fizdale was offered a front office role, which called into question what James Jones’ role as general manager and president of basketball operations might look like, but Fizdale is reportedly not expected to accept the job.

In any case, Vogel is out and Budenholzer is reportedly in. The question is, what can the Suns expect from Bud as their new head coach?

For the uninitiated, Budenholzer is a native of Holbrook, Arizona, and he grew up rooting for the Suns. He was obviously the head coach of the Milwaukee Bucks team that took down Phoenix in the 2021 NBA Finals, but bringing the first ever NBA title to the Valley would go a long way in redeeming him in the eyes of Arizona sports fans.

At only 54 years old, Budenholzer has extensive coaching experience in the league, both as a head coach and as an assistant. He spent 17 years learning under Gregg Popovich with the San Antonio Spurs, where he won four championships as an assistant.

Bud later branched out as the head coach of the Atlanta Hawks, leading them to a 60-win season and Eastern Conference Finals appearance in 2015. After five seasons in Atlanta, he became the head coach of the Milwaukee Bucks, who won 60 games in his first season, never won less than 60 percent of their games over his five seasons there, and won a title.

For those concerned about his resume, Budenholzer is 20th all-time in playoff wins and is known for racking up regular-season wins as well:

Beyond that, here are five more specific things to expect from a Mike Budenholzer Suns team moving forward.

5. Mike Budenholzer teams play respectable defense

For some reason, the Suns being the NBA’s 13th-best defense this season was looked as an indictment of Frank Vogel’s prowess as a defensive-minded coach. If anything, being an above-average defense despite having Jusuf Nurkic as their rim protector and zero defensive-minded personnel in the rotation was an achievement.

There’s no doubt about it: Phoenix needs more size and defensive-minded wings to take that step toward being an elite defense. Kevin Durant played at an All-Defensive level, but having him carry such an immense burden on both ends of the court at age 35 just isn’t sustainable moving forward.

Regardless, Budenholzer has proven throughout his career that with the right personnel, he’s capable of fielding respectable — and even elite — defenses. The Suns still have work to do on the “personnel” front, but Budenholzer’s teams have historically ranked pretty well in defensive rating:

• 2013-14 Hawks: 15th
• 2014-15 Hawks: 5th
• 2015-16 Hawks: 2nd
• 2016-17 Hawks: 4th
• 2017-18 Hawks: 24th
• 2018-19 Bucks: 1st
• 2019-20 Bucks: 1st
• 2020-21 Bucks: 9th
• 2021-22 Bucks: 14th
• 2022-23 Bucks: 4th

As a reminder, the Suns were 13th in defensive rating despite lacking a traditional rim protector. Josh Okogie, Keita Bates-Diop and Jordan Goodwin were all defensive-minded players, but they were either traded at the deadline, unplayable offensively, or both.

Hopefully the front office gives Budenholzer more of a chance to field a top-10 defense than they gave Vogel, but his teams have always fared well on that side of the ball. Budenholzer’s relationship with Darvin Ham from their time together in Milwaukee could help here too, since Ham is a defensive-minded coach and was recently let go by the Los Angeles Lakers. Bringing him to Phoenix as an assistant would be a great move if Ham isn’t pursued elsewhere for a head coaching gig.

4. Expect Suns to play faster

Since Chris Paul’s first season in the Valley, the Suns have ranked 24th, eighth, 22nd and 15th in pace. Their fastest-paced season was the year they won 64 games, but since trading younger players like Mikal Bridges and Cam Johnson away, that pace slowed again.

Moving on from Chris Paul led to a slight increase in tempo, but all that really jumped is their ranking: Phoenix may have leapt from 22nd in the league in pace to 15th, but their actual pace only crept up from 98.83 to 99.00.

Under Budenholzer, they need to find a way to push the tempo without wearing down an older roster. That could be a challenge in its own right if the Suns aren’t able to add younger, more athletic players over the summer. But over his 10 seasons in the league, Budenholzer’s teams have never finished worse than 15th in pace, and they were a top-10 team in pace every single season in Milwaukee.

• 2013-14: 13th
• 2014-15: 15th
• 2015-16: 9th
• 2016-17: 11th
• 2017-18: 8th
• 2018-19: 5th
• 2019-20: 1st
• 2020-21: 2nd
• 2021-22: 3rd
• 2022-23: 10th

Great coaches tailor their approach to their personnel, so this may not be a guaranteed area that gets upgraded. But Mike Budenholzer teams play a certain way, and the Suns desperately need to pick up their tempo, so hopefully this one sticks.

3. Mike Budenholzer teams take a lot of 3s

If you wanted the Suns to take more 3s, Mike Budenholzer is quite possibly the best hire you could’ve asked for. Despite being a top-five team in 3-point percentage this season, Phoenix was 25th in attempts. In the playoffs, they were dead-last in attempts among all 16 teams, taking only 26.0 per game — right around the same number of attempts as last year’s playoff run, when they were also dead-last in attempts among all playoff teams.

Among the 64 different teams that made the playoffs over the last four postseasons, there were only 10 instances of a team failing to average 30 3-point attempts in their respective postseasons. The Suns accounted for four of those 10 instances, failing to average 30 attempts in a single one of their playoff runs.

That just can’t happen anymore.

Fortunately, Budenholzer’s teams have a pretty good track record in that category:

A staple of Budenholzer’s offenses is getting up a high volume of 3s, but it’s not just chucking up 3s simply for the sake of chucking them; his teams have historically ranked 13th, 2nd, 15th, 23rd, 15th, 15th, 18th, 5th, 5th and 10th in 3-point percentage as well.

The Suns have elite shooters. Throughout the season, Vogel mentioned numerous times that they wanted to get up more 3s, and assistant Kevin Young recently alluded to the difficulty of getting midrange maestros to take more 3s.

It will require buy-in, but Budenholzer stands as good a chance as any coach out there in getting his Big 3 — and the rest of the roster — to finally modernize their approach by taking more 3s.

2. Bud’s motion-heavy, 5-out offense will require buy-in

Speaking of buy-in, Budenholzer’s entire approach on the offensive end will require plenty of it. His teams have typically featured a five-out approach, with plenty of motion and movement on the offensive end.

As of right now, it’s reasonable to question whether the Suns have the right personnel for that approah. In Atlanta, Budenholzer had Paul Millsap and Al Horford. In Milwaukee, he had Bobby Portis and Brook Lopez. In Phoenix…well, they don’t have any reliable stretch-5s. No one should want Nurkic to start taking 2-3 triples a game, and if Drew Eubanks opts into his player option to return, he’s in that same boat.

Beyond the glaring absence of a stretch-5, there’s the obvious question about whether the Big 3 will finally start taking the number of 3s and shots at the rim that would make them unstoppable. Over the last four years, look how Phoenix has ranked in their frequency of shots at the rim, from 3-point range, and from the midrange, per Cleaning The Glass:

• Rim: 25th, 30th, 30th, 30th
• 3-pointers: 19th, 18th, 25th, 14th
• Midrange: 2nd, 1st, 1st, 6th

Now take a look at where Budenholzer’s teams ranked in those same categories:

• Rim: 22nd, 21st, 15th, 17th, 2nd, 17th, 4th, 8th, 16th, 22nd
• 3-pointers: 4th, 6th, 12th, 4th, 3rd, 6th, 16th, 6th, 3rd, 2nd
• Midrange: 25th, 17th, 14th, 23rd, 29th, 20th, 21st, 28th, 26th, 23rd

That’s quite a difference! Bud’s teams could be hit-or-miss in getting to the rim depending on their personnel, but they were consistently taking a lot of 3s and consistently avoiding the midrange.

There will probably need to be some give-and-take there, because guys like Devin Booker, Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal will never fully eliminate that shot from their arsenal — nor should they. But under Budenholzer, we’re going to find out pretty quickly if A) the Suns’ lack of 3-point attempts this year was due to Vogel’s coaching or B) the Big 3 simply didn’t buy into what Vogel was preaching and just carried on doing what they do best with a barrage of middies.

Either way, there are question marks. Will Booker finally cave and start taking pull-up 3s more consistently? Will Durant be willing to run a bunch of actions to get the ball in his preferred spots rather than settle for isos and post-up looks in those same spots? Can Beal accept more of an off-ball role where he needs to be more of a catch-and-shoot threat, especially coming off a year where he shot a career-best 43 percent from deep?

And most of all, can Budenholzer continue to devise an offense that doesn’t need a traditional point guard to initiate things, catering his offense to his Big 3 like he did in Milwaukee?

These are just the start of the many questions Phoenix will have to answer, but it’ll take more buy-in than the Big 3 gave Vogel. If they’re able to do so, the Suns might be onto something formidable, since Budenholzer’s teams have historically ranked pretty well in offensive rating (especially when he’s had the requisite talent):

• 2013-14: 19th
• 2014-15: 6th
• 2015-16: 20th
• 2016-17: 27th
• 2017-18: 26th
• 2018-19: 4th
• 2019-20: 8th
• 2020-21: 5th
• 2021-22: 3rd
• 2022-23: 15th

1. Bud will either hold the Big 3 accountable…or we’ll be right back here again next year

The biggest difference between Vogel and Budenholzer (hopefully) is that Bud will be able to hold the Big 3 accountable. This team has a limited window, so he’ll need buy-in from day one. Vogel didn’t get that, or at least, it wasn’t sustained throughout the season as the injuries and inexplicable losses piled up.

Budenholzer will need to take a more direct approach. For all their talent, Booker and Durant are more “lead by example” guys. Beal cares, but he’s more of a happy-go-lucky kind of guy in nature. This Big 3 needs strong leadership at the top, and they need to respond well to it, being willing to be held accountable when they make mistakes.

Mike Budenholzer alone won’t inherently fix things. The Suns need to upgrade their center rotation, add more playmaking for the bench, and supplement their Big 3 with more size and defensive-minded wings. Running it back with the same team and simply changing the coach won’t suddenly change everything.

But if Budenholzer can hold every player on the roster accountable and get them to adhere to an offensive system that’s been proven to work, the Suns may finally become the unstoppable offense people were expecting in Year 1. They’ll be respectable enough defensively, and hopefully around this same time next year, they won’t fall apart at the seams when that playoff adversity hits.

But if Budenholzer’s attempts to hold people accountable lead to a personality clash, or if the Suns fail to fully buy in and wind up as another disconnected team that went home early in the playoffs…we may be having this exact conversation again next summer.