Bigger Is Still Better, but Don’t Tell Suns

The Phoenix Suns don’t look like a team the Lakers should fear.

Shaquille O’Neal has shoes larger than some of their players. Phoenix hasn’t had an imposing big man since Paul Silas and afros were around.

But there are the Suns, closer to the Lakers in the Pacific Division standings than the Lakers are to the Seattle SuperSonics, threatening to knock the Lakers down to the fourth-seeded spot in the Western Conference playoff picture, meaning they could face the pospect of runing into the SuperSonics in the second round.

The Suns do it with a lineup that defies the notion that bigger is better. Not one player is listed as a pure center, but they have five called forward/centers. Their roster has more slashes than an Internet address. The Suns’ approach: We play ball. We’re small. Deal with it.

Coach Danny Ainge sends whatever group he feels is appropriate out on the floor and lets the other team worry about how to stop it.

When the Suns faced a San Antonio Spur team that started three 7-footers on Feb. 14, Ainge’s response was to go even smaller and start three players 6-4 or shorter: Jason Kidd, Rex Chapman and Steve Nash. Phoenix won.

“I don’t think we’re the best team in the league,” Ainge said. “But I wouldn’t want to play against us.

“Even from my perspective, I have no idea where we’re going to get our points some nights.”

Select any five-game stretch of the season at random and you likely will see five different Suns who led the team in scoring each night. Eleven players have had the honor this season.

That shows the strength of their bench, which has five players who used to start regularly in the NBA: Kevin Johnson, Danny Manning, George McCloud, John “Hot Rod” Williams and Dennis Scott. A sixth player, Nash, was one of the most coveted players in the league in trade talk, but the Suns didn’t want to part with him.

“Their second team is as good as most first teams,” Philadelphia 76er Coach Larry Brown said. “The way Danny uses them, with the mismatches, it’s brutal.”

Since the Suns can’t pound on teams, they push the ball in the transition game and spread out in the halfcourt set. Their idea of an inside-out game is to get penetration from the guards, then throw the ball back to the perimeter. They’re always looking for alley-oops. All of it makes for entertaining basketball.

The only thing missing is a real center. It has been that way around here for the last 20 years. From Alvan Adams to James Edwards to Mark West. Even A.C. Green and Wayman Tisdale have played center for the Suns.

These days, it’s Williams and Clifford Robinson and Mark Bryant occupying the post, but doing little else.

“Our approach has been that unless we could go out and get a proven veteran center that would make a difference, you’ve got to do the best with what you have,” General Manager Bryan Colangelo said.

The Suns made it to the finals in 1993 with West at center, and Colangelo likes to point out that the Chicago Bulls have won five championships and the Detroit Pistons two in the last nine years without a dominant center.

But Phoenix’s 85-84 loss to the 76ers on Tuesday night showed how badly the Suns need one. The Suns held a 20-point lead in the third quarter, then the 76ers decided they wanted to play defense. They closed down the penetration, were quick to help and completely shut down the Suns to earn a comeback victory at America West Arena.

Phoenix went more than 7 1/2 minutes without a field goal. The Suns had no one to go to for a good shot. Antonio McDyess, at 6-foot-9, is an explosive leaper who sometimes plays as if he’s 7 feet, but he doesn’t have a refined set of moves and sometimes relies on dunking to score.

The Suns could be face-to-face with their answer when they play the Clippers at the Sports Arena on Friday night. Newly acquired Clipper center Isaac Austin will be a free agent after the season and the Suns, who can get as much as $16 million under the salary cap, will have plenty of shopping money.

Now that the trading deadline has passed, there’s nothing they can do for this season. They probably don’t have enough to keep playing into late May, and Robinson is notorious for disappearing in the playoffs.

But the Suns will keep winning regular-season games and remain the most fun team to watch while we make the interminable wait for the playoffs to arrive.

Fun for everyone but the Lakers, that is.