Suns’ Dudley not worried about playing time
Mar 6, 2013, 12:59 AM | Updated: 1:16 am
If there has been a high point for the Phoenix Suns in the 2012-13 season, this is it.
The Suns are in 13th place in the Western Conference, but are currently riding a season-long three-game winning streak that includes a victory over the the owners of the best record in the league — the San Antonio Spurs.
One of the biggest differences during the winning streak has been the guys in Suns uniforms on the court for the bulk of the action. Shannon Brown hasn’t played a minute and Michael Beasley is seeing only 13 minutes of playing time on average.
They’re not the only two players who have seen a decrease in playing time. Jared Dudley, who has started 49 games for the Suns this season, has seen his playing time cut from about 30 minutes per game to about 20.
Some NBA players would be vocal about such a reduction in their workload, but Dudley is not one of them.
“I’m doing pretty good,” Dudley told Doug and Wolf on Arizona Sports 620 Tuesday. “I go through peaks and valleys, I’m never a guy who’s about stats. I don’t worry about stats. I know when I play consistently, my numbers over the course of the season will play well — I’ll shoot the ball well, play well.”
It’s commonplace in most professions for an employee to go have a heart-to-heart talk with the boss once expectations and expected contributions change. Dudley, however, hasn’t done that with Suns interim head coach Lindsey Hunter
“I don’t go in his office, I’m not someone who needs a lot of pep talks,” he said. “I know I have my job. I’ve always been this way, where you don’t need to tell me what I have to do — usually I’m someone who knows their roles.”
Dudley did reiterate that the lack of communication between he and the coach isn’t a bad thing.
“You can’t even say this is Lindsey’s first year — he’s been on the job for what, two months,” he asked. “He’s got a lot of stuff thrown at him and and I’m one of things that ‘hey, I’m not worried about Jared, Jared takes care of his business. Right now I’m worried about trying to change the culture to my style of coaching.'”
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