Quote Originally Posted by mabber
It starts and ends with D'Antoni. Unless he demands the effort on defense, he won't get it. It's that way with any coach/team for the most part. D'Antoni is more interested in offensive perfection (which at times the Suns come close to). It really is scary how similar he is to Don Nelson (outside of different ways to run an offense) in how he runs a team.

He preaches defense more then people give him credit for. Are the Suns ever going to be confuse for the Spurs or the Pistons the answer is likely no but when they are active in the passing lanes forcing turnovers and doing a decent job on the boards they can hold thier own. Plus the Suns are pretty good at defending the 3 point line when they put thier minds to it. When thier offense is clicking thier defense is adequate enough to win. However sometimes it seems they forget about defense when the shots are not falling. BTW I appreciate the irony of Mavs fans talking about defense. After all the Mavs are where they are today due to Don Nelson. He put the Mavs on the map as legit contenders and gave Avery his chance to be the Head coach.