Suns lead Spurs 2-0

I blame Steve Kerr. He's the GM of the Suns and also a former San Antonio Spur. When his Shaq experiment turned sour with an overtime three from Tim Duncan, deflating a talented Suns team in the first game of the first round of the 2008 playoffs, the rebuilding project of sorts held the potential to force him out of a job. He took over a terrific team and proceeded to almost change them fundamentally, first with Shaq and then by getting rid of the brains behind it all, Mike D'Antoni. They missed the playoffs in 2009 and got rid of Kerr's hand-picked coach. Coming into 2009-2010 in a Western Conference budding with young, hungry, and developing teams, it seemed their time was setting.

But the sunset everyone was expecting turned out to be a bright sunrise, showing its full colors and brilliance in the first two games of the Conference Semifinals against a seemingly fading Spurs squad. The strange aspect of this is that Phoenix is beating San Antonio the way the Spurs used to take care of the Suns: strong, penetrating point guard play (Nash); a selfless big man playing excellent pick-and-roll offense and defense (Stoudamire, who appears to finally be a good teammate); a lock-defender who chips in points as needed (Grant Hill); a three-point sharpshooter hitting his stride (Richardson); a bench that knows its role and produces (Dudley, Frye). This Suns team seems to have taken the blueprint from the '03, '05, and '07 Spurs championship teams -- and that's why I blame Kerr, who played on two of those teams.

Yet, it may not be Kerr's fault at all. I don't know who's responsible for getting Stoudamire to play selflessly. Whoever that is deserves the credit. For the heartbreaking series from '05, '07, and '08, the Spurs "let" the Suns' big man go wild, which in effect slowed down the fun-and-gun Suns, streaming their offense through Amar'e instead of Nash. The Spurs knew he was looking to get his; as they kept him focused on that, their offense slowed, his teammates weren't involved, and the Spurs won.

But Stoudamire also didn't have the help he does now. Frye, Dudley, and Richardson hang out around the perimeter in the same way Horry, Kerr, and Bowen did for the Spurs. Their team defense has improved as well, with Stoudamire having to learned to play sometime along the way. The spark of energy that had been provided for the Spurs off the bench has been better played by Dudley, Dragic, and Barbosa this series. The loose balls that DeJuan Blair seemed to always get during this season aren't being corralled by him; the Suns seem to get everyone of them.

The worst cut of all is that the Suns look more like a team than the Spurs. Whether it was Stoudamire or Marion on those other Suns' teams, there seemed to be enough discontent or uncertainty with each other that the chemistry the Spurs had revealed itself as trust on the court. This time around, that's what the Suns have in larger doses than the Spurs.

At least that's the case in Phoenix. Here's hoping the Alamo City allows an immediate reversal in this great rivalry.