So much for being deep at the guard positions.
Injuries to Eric Bledsoe (knee), Brandon Knight (groin) and Ronnie Price (foot) have depleted the Suns’ well-stocked backcourt cupboard. Head Coach Jeff Hornacek has been left to make do with other ingredients, most of which have never been so prominently featured in their NBA careers.
This is especially the case for Archie Goodwin, someone who defines the phrase “paying his dues.” The 6-5 guard entered the league as a late first-round draft pick with gobs of potential and the will to unleash it. Doing so, however, required countless extra hours in the gym and nearly as much time watching games transpire from the bench.
Goodwin stayed ready by remaining relentless in practice settings and with the occasional D-League assignment in Bakersfield. Until the Suns’ recent rash of injuries, he was still biding his time.
With nary a point guard to be found on a point guard-driven team, however, Goodwin was thrust overnight into the same role held by Bledsoe, Knight, Steve Nash, Jason Kidd and Kevin Johnson before them — starting point guard.
The change in workload is comical, but there has been nothing to laugh at when it comes to Goodwin’s response to his new duties. In just two games, he has already accounted for more than 20 percent of his total previous production this season.
The leap in the young guard’s minutes, production and responsibility was never more visible than the final play of Phoenix’s win over Atlanta on Saturday. There Goodwin was, on the floor in crunch time, handling the ball in the game-deciding play, making the decision to keep the ball and make the play when a better opportunity failed to present itself.
When his game-winning shot hit bottom, he was the one being mobbed instead of being part of the mob as he had been the vast majority of his NBA career. He briefly joked about redesigning the final play (it was drawn up for Alex Len) for himself, but his serious explanation of how the play broke down sounded…well, like a starting point guard’s point of view.
“It was really just a screen for me to come off, draw two [defenders] and throw it back to Alex, but he still wasn’t open because the shoulder [defender] switched on him,” Goodwin said.
Reading defenses in late-game situations was the norm in college (he was the starting point guard for a similarly injury-riddled Kentucky team), and now the Suns have a sudden need for him to recall that experience midway through the season. The new development is his three-point shooting, which sits at a sparkling 50 percent in his two starts after sitting below 20 percent in sporadic playing time early this season.
“We were kind of stuck and he made a great play out of it,” Hornacek said of Goodwin’s last-second shot.
