PHOENIX — The emcee of the Suns’ NBA Draft watch party greeted 8,000 or so fans on Thursday with a question.
With a show of applause, he wondered, who should Phoenix draft?
Phoenix native Marvin Bagley III? A few claps, a couple of boos.
How about European star Luka Doncic? A slew of boos. He was the last player Suns fans watching from Talking Stick Resort Arena wanted.
When the emcee asked about former Arizona Wildcats big man Deandre Ayton, however, he was overwhelmed by claps and passionate cheers. It was a collective “I’m fed up” from fans of an organization that has won just 68 total games the past three years.
Fans’ hopeful cheers turned to pandemonium shortly after 4:30 p.m., when NBA commissioner Adam Silver announced that Phoenix was selecting Ayton.
One fan sporting an orange Devin Booker jersey kept jumping up and down and proudly shouted “Phoenix is rising! Phoenix is rising! We’re back, baby!”
Phoenix landed its chosen one, its native Sun.
Former Tucson native and Phoenix resident Michael Velasco wore a UA shirt as he sat with his family in the front row. His Phoenix fandom was on the line.
“If they didn’t pick Ayton,” he said, “I was getting ready to walk out.”
Suns fans overwhelmingly wanted the team to pick Deandre Ayton with the first pick Thursday. Phoenix went 21-61 last season.
Marc Beilin has lived in Phoenix for 24 years, adopting the Suns as his team when he moved from New York. He reveled in the team’s glory days, when Charles Barkley was named MVP and led the Suns to the NBA Finals in 1993. Beilin misses the days when the Suns were competitive.
“The Suns haven’t been relevant since Barkley. We’ve had Steve Nash and Amare Stoudamire, yeah, but nobody has really cared about them for the last 15 years,” Beilin said.
Beilin is the father of two UA students, and so he watched Ayton from afar. He determined that Bagley and Doncic weren’t the answer, and warmed to the Bahamian big man. Beilin compares Ayton to generational players like Shaquille O’Neal and Tim Duncan.
“He’s going to average 27 (points) and 15 (rebounds) all day long. He’s the next Tim Duncan, he’s the next Shaq,” he said.
“The kid is a beast. He’s absolutely a beast.”
Ayton joins a Suns team that includes a dynamic scorer in Devin Booker and a rising core of young players.
Ayton’s presence in Phoenix could change the complexion of the league — or at least the Western Conference. Watching Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson going toe-to-toe with LeBron James may get television ratings, but isn’t much fun for fans in most other markets.
“To watch LeBron and Curry play in the finals again and again and again, it’s boring. It gets old,” Beilin said. “The NBA needs parity again.”
That part remains to be seen, but the 7-foot-1-inch, 260-pound Ayton provides hope.
It’s not just Ayton’s skills on the court that make him a home run draft pick. His easygoing personality and goofiness off the court should endear him to many Suns fans.
During the Pac-12 Tournament in March, Ayton showed off his personality in the locker room talking about playing video games and his competitiveness playing video games.
“He’s so open, relatable and funny,” said Tucson’s Ryan Maese, a UA and Suns fan who drove to Phoenix from Tucson on Thursday. “Watching basketball, you invest so much emotion into these guys as fans and he’s just relatable. He’s funny, he’s goofy, he plays video games and is always talking about Fortnite.”
The combination of personality and an out-of-this-world skillset makes Ayton — and, by extension, the Suns — the talk of the town.
“They matter now,” Beilin said. “We haven’t had a guy like that since ever.”
