Monty Williams is a shoo-in for NBA Coach of Seeding Games award

Monty Williams is the only choice for the NBA’s Coach of Seeding Games award.

It isn’t easy ushering in a drastic culture change for a losing NBA franchise in your first year on the job. It’s even harder when you’re working with a group of inexperienced youngsters and veterans who are just as new to these surroundings. It’s downright impossible when you’re invited to an Orlando bubble — in the middle of a global pandemic, social injustice and rampant police brutality — for a mere eight games when the rest of the basketball world doesn’t understand why you even got invited in the first place.

And yet, heading into the second-to-last day of seeding games in Orlando, the undefeated Phoenix Suns are 7-0, giving themselves a shot at the play-in scenario if they can make it a perfect 8-0 against the Dallas Mavericks on Thursday. They’ll still need a loss from the Portland Trail Blazers or Memphis Grizzlies on top of that win, but no matter what happens, one fact remains true: The Suns have reached their coming-of-age moment, and Monty Williams‘ glaring influence should not be overlooked.

Luckily, the NBA seems to agree, announcing late Wednesday night that, in addition to the All-Seeding Games Teams and NBA Player of the Seeding Games, there will be a Coach of Seeding Games award.

They might as well call it the inaugural Monty Williams Bubble Award.

In all seriousness, there’s only one possible answer to this question. While Jacque Vaughn has done a great job with the Brooklyn Nets (5-2), and popular names like Brad Stevens and Gregg Popovich will always come to mind for coaching awards, the Suns have been the biggest surprise of the bubble, and it’s not close.

Is it cheesy to have yet another award based on a minuscule eight-game sample size? Perhaps. But we haven’t had sports in four months, these games have been surprisingly high-quality and this bubble atmosphere is historic; we will never the see likes of this conclusion to an NBA season ever again.

To that end, and because the Suns embody exactly why this bubble experiment has been such a success, why not lean into it? Why not recognize Monty and his Suns for what feels like an unforgettable moment and legitimate breakthrough rather than some one-off fluke? Aside from being the only undefeated team in Orlando, the growth of these youngsters in such a bizarre basketball situation is a tribute to the focus and vigilance he’s instilled in this ball club.

Devin Booker isn’t doing anything new, but he’s elevated his game to superstar status now that he’s finally performing in the national spotlight in the first meaningful games of his career. Mikal Bridges is one of the most stifling defenders in the league. Rookie Cam Johnson is flourishing with the starters. Jevon Carter and Cameron Payne are wreaking havoc off the bench. Dario Saric has been tremendous in his sixth man role. And for all his mental lapses and missed coronavirus tests, Deandre Ayton can still put up big-time numbers in his sleep.

Monty Williams has stressed that the Suns haven’t been focused on making the playoffs or going 8-0 or anything like that; their focus, as a young team that accepted its invite to the NBA restart with humility, has been maximizing each moment in Orlando as a teaching opportunity for the future. With the Suns, the objective has always been “doing the next right thing.”

Phoenix has followed that game plan every step of the way, and now, upon looking up, this group finds itself on the precipice of shocking the world and sneaking into the play-in game(s). Whether they get there or not is honestly irrelevant at this point, because given what the Suns have already accomplished, Monty Williams is the only logical choice for an award that might as well have been created in his honor.