I have watched a few of their games this year and they always looked like complete strangers on the court together, just no chemistry. I think prior to the trade, this team was headed for a disapointing year.

Now, Kerr has shaken up the roster and added a legitimate scoring threat in the prime of his career. When you have Shaq and Nash on the roster, you have to make this type of win-now move. Now they have one of the more dynamic starting lineups in the league, and J-Rich could very well be the spark they need to turn the season around.

I agree about their front court, it looks mighty thin, but I expect Dudley to get some backup 4mpg, and they will likely find another warm body to bolster the lineup as well. I wouldn’t be surprised if J-Rich turns some heads with his D, he has all the tools to be a premier defender and now he should have the motivation with the talent around him.

I don’t know, call me crazy but I am going to go out on a limb and say this is now a potential WCF team. There is just too much talent on this roster to contend with over a 7 game series. The key is Terry Porter, he needs to get each one of these guys to buy into their roles. One thing is for sure, the west just got a lot more interesting.

Had they Richardson last night, Phoenix would have beaten the Lakers in L.A. Richardson will exploit the Lakers D. They cannot defend slashers.

Amare is already complaining about wanting to be the star. Now that the Suns have brought in another scorer and traded away a facilitator (Diaw) and a 1 dimensional spot up shooter, won’t Amare be even more frustrated?

with Richardson clearly being the best player in this deal. I just don’t see it. He’s one of those guys who seems to drag losing records with him everywhere he goes. I tend to agree with guava_wrench, who called him 1 dimensional. In my opinion, he’s more of an athlete than a basketball player. I think I’d rather have Diaw on my team.

…potentially. From watching them earlier in the year, one of their biggest issues seemed to be a lack of athleticism and offense initiation from the wing. In the new Terry Porter/halfcourt regime, having only one offense initiator in Nash is no longer enough because it was too easy for half-court defenses to take the ball out of Nash’s hands. When they do that, guys like Bell and Barnes (and even Amare) can’t create for themselves. And the offense stagnates. Richardson can shoot the 3-ball as good as Bell ever did, but he also can create when he needs to.

Plus, Kobe (and Manu) were just too large of mismatches for the Suns. Bell is no longer an elite defender (if he ever was truly "elite"), and with his lack of offense the Suns were just losing that position by too much. They couldn’t even really make Kobe work for it. Richardson can make Kobe work, possibly at both ends, which is to the good of the team.

If the Suns settle into roles: Nash as the initiator distributor, Hill/Barnes as glue guys/wing defenders, Shaq as the defender/rebounder that he was to finish last season, with Amare and Richardson as the primary scorers…I think they could build a very legit offense with better defensive roles as well. Now, the question is all about the mix…can they mesh together and get confident in those roles. If so, they are a dangerous team. If not…the way they were constructed, I don’t think they’d have done it anyway, so not sure there’s much downside here.

I think this trade is a risk for both teams. If Diaw plays up to his potential, Charlotte wins the deal.

It was becoming clear that the Bobcats had to move either Richardson or Gerald Wallace. My guess is that they tested the market for both players and found it easier to move Richardson. I’m sure the fact that Wallace is a vastly superior defender also had somehting to do with it.

Diaw is a much better fit in Charlotte than Richardson, especially given the fact that Scott May is useless.

There’s two parts to this deal – the actually deal and the parts surrounding the deal

The Trade

This is a home run for Phoenix. Pure upside for them.

Due to the changes Kerr has brought about, mainly Porter, the team needed another go-to scorer. They also needed more contributions (of any type) on the wing, and more shooting from the wing. They also needed more athleticism on the wing. Jason Richardson answers each of these needs. The Suns also needed a wing who’d run the floor which has somehow become a problem for them this season (Porter?).

Richardson is also a good defender who’s D has gotten lost from shouldering huge offensive burdens, similar to Pierce and Kobe in recent years. He’ll go to Phoenix and he’ll be a very good defensive player.

Diaw did great things for the Suns last year defensively but I haven’t seen the same impact this season, again I’d look at the way Porter using him, so I think Dudley/Lopez can replace his defensive contributions easily enough.

The Parts Surrounding The Deal

Steve Kerr showed great guts in making the Shaquille O’Neal trade, but since that day he has ran a passive program, and had a pathetic summer where he ran to the middle of the road. The Shaq trade could have worked if he had followed through and made aggressive moves this summer to fill the consequential holes but he didn’t have the backbone (or was it a lack of vision?) to make those moves. Instead he wasted his draft opportunity, wasted free agency, and failed to make the necessary trades.

This team had a one year window after the end of last season. That’s all. It couldn’t afford a summer like the one Steve Kerr had, but that’s what it got. Their window is now finished with and this J-Rich trade won’t re-open it.

The team is now in transition and it needs to start thinking about 2010. The good news is that Jason Richardson can figure in that. Richardson is capable of being the third best player on a title winning side (not a first or second best, not a good enough playmaker). They sign one top level player to put alongside Amare/Richardson/Barbosa and they can be right back competing for Championships all over again. So the trade has a secondary upside beyond the present tense.