It might not be time for fans of the Phoenix Suns to panic but they are certainly very nervous right now.
The Suns were up 2-0 over the Dallas Mavericks heading into the weekend.
Now, just a few days later, the team has evened it up, 2-2, following two back-to-back wins from Dallas.
There are many reasons why the Mavs are back in this series (Luka Doncic is fantastic, the team’s bench has come to life) but one of the largest is the absence of Chris Paul.
No, Paul hasn’t been on the bench for the last two games but he has been uncharacteristically bad.
Sunday night was the first game in Chris Paul's postseason career he recorded more personal fouls (6) than points (5). pic.twitter.com/UqVzk9gHoY
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) May 9, 2022
In fact, Sunday night was the first game in his entire storied postseason career where Paul recorded more personal fouls than points.
Paul earned his sixth personal foul in the third quarter and was sent to the bench.
But even before he fouled out, Paul wasn’t doing much on the floor.
CP3 Problems
Paul is usually one of the best players in the game – any game.
But that hasn’t been the case for the last couple of games against Dallas.
In Games 1 and 2, Paul put up 19 and 28 points, respectively.
However, since the series moved to Texas, Paul has only scored 12 points followed by Sunday’s 5.
He’s also been fouling a lot more: he earned four fouls in Game 3 and then fouled out with six in Game 4.
It looks like the Mavericks have figured out how to make Paul a non-issue and that’s very scary news for the Suns.
It’s even scarier because Paul usually bounces back after a bad game.
For example, he only put up 4 points in Game 4 against the Pelicans in the first round.
After that, he responded with a 22-point game.
However, things actually got worse after his painful Game 3 in Dallas.
Will he be able to flip the switch and turn it back on when the series returns to Phoenix on Tuesday?
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