Dillon Brooks wasted no time making his presence felt in a Suns jersey.
Just five minutes into Phoenix’s preseason opener Monday night against the Detroit Pistons, Brooks and John Collins got tangled up in a heated exchange that quickly spilled beyond normal preseason edge. Brooks bumped and pushed Collins during live action, Collins responded by putting his hands around Brooks’ neck, and the sequence ended with Brooks drawing a technical foul and Collins receiving a flagrant 1 for grabbing his throat.
After Tuesday’s practice, Brooks gave his version of how it all unfolded.
“Some people can't take the competitive physicality and he probably felt embarrassed when he tried to hit me and he fell to the ground,” Brooks said to The Arizona Republic’s Duane Rankin.
“And then, knowing me, I just like to do insult to injury. So, when he's getting up, I'm right on him again and he ran to the corner, wanted no smoke, and then, once he saw the shot go up, he felt like he had that chance to get a hit on me.
“Then got the hit on me, and then I'm like, I'm not letting you go up. And then he turns around, and tries to choke me, and put his hands on me, and that's why I don't get why I got the technical foul.
I mean, I didn't start nothing. I'm playing within the game.
I try to bet on myself, but I'm betting against the house.”
Collins, who joined the Pistons this offseason, said he wasn’t looking to make that kind of entrance - but he also wasn’t backing away from it.
"I wasn't necessarily trying to set that tone, but I'm glad I did," Collins said. "Just sometimes you have to play basketball and get physical. I'm going to go out there and compete every night.
"Guys do what they do. We're going to play basketball.
You can't control every aspect of the game. You just have to go out there and hoop."
Brooks had already said he wanted to cut down on technical fouls this season, and he spent part of the offseason on a trip to China, where he learned Taoism and said it could help him stay more centered. Still, his preseason debut looked a lot like the Dillon Brooks experience everyone already knows: maximum edge, maximum friction.
The good news for Phoenix is that preseason technicals don’t carry into the regular season. Brooks’ count will reset for the Suns’ opener on Oct. 21 against the Portland Trail Blazers, and the 16-tech threshold that leads to a suspension won’t start mattering until then.
For now, Phoenix has four more preseason games to sort things out, starting tonight against the Chicago Bulls.
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