Mat Ishbia Explains Where Suns Went Wrong With Failed Star Trades

The Phoenix Suns owner says he wasn't as involved as people think.

Nov 6, 2025; Phoenix, Arizona, USA; Phoenix Suns owner Mat Ishbia against the Los Angeles Clippers at the Mortgage Matchup Center. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images | Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

PHOENIX — Phoenix Suns owner Mat Ishbia has largely been involved in turning the organization around for its 2025-26 campaign.

The Suns' previous star experiment of Devin Booker, Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal failed, miserably, and Ishbia decided to hit the reset button this summer by moving off Durant/Beal.

The results have been surprisingly successful — Phoenix is 32-23 entering the All-Star break and now has flipped preseason expectations upside down. The Suns are a legitimate playoff team in a tough Western Conference and have yet to see what their team looks like at full health thanks to injuries.

Ishbia, reflecting back on the failed "Big 3" era in the Valley, says the blame for that assembled squad fell on him was misguided:

“When people wanted to blame me last time, I wasn’t actually doing it my way,” Ishbia toldThe Athletic's Sam Amick.

“Now, I am, and there’s no question about it.”

Phoenix mortgaged several future assets in terms of draft picks to acquire Durant and Beal in trades. The star trio of Booker-Durant-Beal didn't win a single playoff game together despite pushing the Suns into luxury tax hell. Their 2023-24 roster remains the most expensive roster in NBA history with over $400 million in combined salary/luxury tax penalties.

It's notable this past offseason, while star players departed, also featured the likes of general manager James Jones and head coach Mike Budenholzer dismissed. It was a total clean slate for Ishbia.

However, later in his conversation with Amick, he admitted he probably jumped the gun without fully thinking things through — letting the excitement of successfully purchasing a new team get to him.

Amick's article concluded with Ishbia taking accountability for not quite setting the culture correct when he first arrived:

“You could blame me for not defining and setting the culture up front, because at the end of the day, that’s the leader’s responsibility. And I’m the owner. I’m the leader. It’s my job…So what would I have done differently? I would have said, ‘Let’s do this the right way.’ But I got excited. I bought a team," said Ishbia.

“The transactional (mistakes) wouldn’t have happened if I had set the cultural stuff, because — no disrespect — but the type of players and the type of people we were looking to have, it’s different (now), I would have said, ‘Does that meet my identity? Is that the definition of what we’re about?’ And we wouldn’t have made those moves, potentially.

“But (now) everyone’s aligned. …(It’s) what kind of guy do we want? What kind of player do we want? What are the things we’re looking for? We’re very aligned. We could be aligned and be wrong, by the way, too. But at least we’re f—— aligned.”

They're certainly aligned in Phoenix. And if this is Ishbia's way — so far, so good.