Suns F Miles Bridges and GM Brian Gregory were “brutally honest” regarding Bridges’ trade and “addressed the positives as well as the negatives — namely the serious felony domestic violence charge” leveled against Bridges in 2022, but Suns owner Mat Ishbia was “missing” from the news conference, according to Bob McManaman of the ARIZONA REPUBLIC. One would think “that on the very day the Suns made Bridges available … that the Suns owner would have not only been in attendance but also been seated front and center at the table alongside Bridges and Gregory.” It was Ishbia, after all, the “architect of this so-called new-and-improved look of an NBA franchise,” who gave the “final green light on the Suns acquiring Bridges along.” McManaman wrote the decision to bring in Bridges “not only divided a good portion of Suns fans: those who weren’t — and aren’t — happy about the trade and a large number of the diehards who keep telling the other side to get over it and move on.” Making Gregory “face the music as the only representative from management felt like a cop out on Ishbia’s part.” McManaman: “Ishbia should have been there, and the Suns shouldn’t have staged the Bridges presser without Ishbia, period” (ARIZONA REPUBLIC, 7/22).
