The Phoenix Suns came into this season expecting to be in the hunt for a playoff spot in the Western Conference. That hasn't happened, and at times this season has been an absolute disaster for them. The team has been through a bunch of changes and has dealt with a lot of injuries.
Lately the Suns have actually been playing pretty good basketball as they have won three of their last five games. Two of those wins came against the Lakers, but they are wins nonetheless. A big reason for the Suns having any sort of recent success has been rookie Devin Booker. Booker was a guy who came out of college and had a ton of potential, but nobody knew how long it would take for him to fulfill that potential in the NBA or if he would at all.
When Earl Watson took over as the interim head coach of the Suns, one of the first things he said was that the offense would run through Booker. This was partially out of necessity because Eric Bledsoe and Brandon Knight were injured, but Watson also saw how good of an offensive player the rookie could be.
Booker has rewarded his coach by putting up big numbers since entering the starting lineup and becoming a focal point. The 19-year-old has had his stretches where he has struggled, but that is to be expected from the youngest player in the NBA. Being the focal point of the offense is something new for Booker, as he wasn't even the focal point in college at Kentucky, and he says that he is struggling to find the balance between playmaking and scoring.
On the season Booker is averaging 12.7 points but only 2.4 assists per game, so clearly playmaking is the next step for him, but that is something that he can easily learn as he gains more NBA experience. For now the Suns need Booker to score as they don't have too many other bonafide scoring options available to them, but moving forward he should be able to increase his ability to set up his teammates.
Booker has already shown progress in this area as he is coming off a game in which he scored 28 points but also dished out seven assists. That performance was huge in helping the Suns beat Kobe Bryant and the Lakers, a game which Booker says he will tell the story of for the rest of his life. Booker also had a game last week where he didn't shoot well, but he handed out 11 assists, so clearly he is starting to understand the idea of playmaking.
Booker is not a guy you hear about a lot when people talk about the Rookie of the Year race, but he should certainly be in the discussion. He is hurt by the fact that he didn't have much of a role early in the season, but he might be the rookie with the highest ceiling of them all.
