Ishbia formally takes over Suns

PHOENIX — Before addressing assembled media, former Phoenix Suns players, city officials and others during his introductory news conference Wednesday morning at Footprint Center, billionaire mortgage lender Mat Ishbia first spoke to Suns employees in an upper-level food court at the arena.

Ishbia, who was approved Tuesday to become the Suns’ new governor after buying a controlling 57% stake from Robert Sarver for $2.28 billion, didn’t talk for long, with his remarks lasting about 10 minutes to a group that numbered well over a hundred employees. The 43-year-old former Michigan State men’s basketball walk-on acknowledged that some may be wondering what changes will take place under his reign. But Ishbia said that change will wait because, first, he wants to listen.

He said he wants to hear from employees about what the organization does well and what needs improvement, and, Ishbia added, he wants their ideas, big and small, on everything.

Throughout the brief comments, Ishbia centered on one theme, first and foremost: the Suns’ workplace culture.

“We’re going to win together, we’re going to lose together — as a team — and we’re going to be a family,” Ishbia told employees early on in his initial remarks, according to team sources. “We’re going to take care of each other. We’re going to care about each other.”

Ishbia’s remarks about culture came with the backdrop of years of workplace misconduct allegations against Sarver — first reported by ESPN in November 2021 — that led to a 10-month NBA investigation and, ultimately, to Sarver selling the Suns and the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury. There were also allegations of workplace misconduct from some top Suns executives under Sarver, all of which contributed to what some employees described as a sometimes toxic and hostile work environment.

While questions remain about Ishbia’s leadership structure, his vow to improve the Suns’ culture — a theme that he hammered on throughout his talk with employees and later during a news conference, which many employees watched from a distance — addressed head-on a major concern among many whom Ishbia is inheriting from Sarver’s nearly two-decade tenure as owner.

Ishbia told employees that everyone’s role matters, that he wants the Suns to be an elite place to work, and that — as with United Wholesale Mortgage, the Michigan-based mortgage lending giant that Ishbia runs — he doesn’t refer to employees as employees but rather as “team members.”

“The…