Phoenix Suns owner Mat Ishbia told CNBC Sports: “I kind of just threw money at the problem”. I read it at the club bar, between two tokens. I don’t know how much, and I’m not asking: he gave no figure, so I’m not putting one.
What interests me is the rest. He says Phoenix had no defined culture, no direction, so a player like Kevin Durant doesn’t necessarily lead to a title. His lesson, according to Basket USA: they needed to define an identity, and he didn’t do it at the start. Now he’s involved in every decision, from the first player to the fourteenth.
Kevin Durant replied on X that he’d stayed at the top of his game at 36. Ishbia answered that he wasn’t accusing him and wished him good luck in Houston. Durant added that Ishbia should thank him at every opportunity. I’m not picking a side, mind you. Two people answering each other in public: at our place, we put one at each end of the bar and serve them the same thing.
A culture, at our place, I know where it is. It’s in the store room behind the cafeteria, with the stacked chairs. A club’s culture is who stays after the buzzer to fold the telescopic stands, which unfold when they feel like it. We never threw money at the problem: we didn’t have any, so we threw volunteers at it, and nearly twenty years on it’s holding.
“I turned up with one bag. They showed me the chairs before the changing room.”
I’m not jealous, I’m a club president. I wish them luck finding their identity. I’d advise them to look at who locks up the hall. As for me, it’s midnight, and I’ve still got the key to hand back.
It’s true, we checked: Basket USA.
