While it won’t be Kyrie Irving and James Harden, Kevin Durant might be running it back next season with a couple of his old Brooklyn mates.
Veteran NBA reporter Marc Stein wrote this week in his latest post to Substack that the Phoenix Suns are eyeing two of Durant’s ex-Brooklyn Nets teammates as potential free agent targets. They are forward Yuta Watanabe and guard Mike James.
Watanabe, 28, is a quality player who is long at 6-foot-9, hustles hard, and hit a sizzling 44.4 percent of his three-pointers last season. James, 32, is a bit more suspect as a guy who has not played in the NBA since the 2020-21 season. But he has an advantage in that Durant is very close with him.
In any case, the Suns need depth and need it for cheap. As Stein notes, both Watanabe and James could be willing to play for the league minimum in order to chase a ring alongside Durant, Devin Booker, and Bradley Beal. In addition to targeting them, Phoenix is also working out some forgotten NBA names this week.
