Clyde Drexler thinks the Suns will make playoffs. This year.

Steve Nash is gone. Grant Hill is gone. Michael Beasley is going to be picking up a lot of the scoring slack. Channing Frye is now likely out for the season.

It’s going to be a rough season for the rebuilding Suns… unless you ask Clyde Drexler.

Drexler is the one Suns true believer. He thinks that even though this team missed the playoffs with that Nash guy last season they are going to be better this season without him. Here is what he told Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic.

“They’ve got a real team now,” Drexler said in initiating a discussion about the Suns while attending the Jerry Colangelo Basketball Hall of Fame Golf Classic in Litchfield Park last week. “They can really play. You already got (Marcin) Gortat. Now, you got (Luis) Scola. You got (Goran) Dragic. And you got (Michael) Beasley. You’ve got three new starters coming in who can play.”

The Glide is right, the Suns totally didn’t have a real team with Nash because he broke out of the flow of the offense all the time to run a lot of iso-Nash. You know how he’s the big dog and has to pile up his numbers, then everybody else can get the scraps.

So, next Coro says that most experts think the Suns are about the 12-14 seed in the West. Maybe better than only the Kings.

“Are you kidding me? If they don’t get the fourth or fifth playoff spot, I’m not standing before you. They’re big. They’re athletic. They know how to play.”

Somebody that knows Drexler and wants a free lunch should bet him on this stuff. It’s easy money.

The Suns are not going to be quite as bad as some predict, but still, a playoff team? I’m sure stranger things have happened, but I can’t think of one off the top of my head.