Commentary: Amare’s mouth burns Suns

? Amare Stoudemire is an exceptional talent.

Too bad for Phoenix he stinks as a motivational speaker.

The Suns’ center couldn’t let a sleeping champion lie. Stoudemire called out San Antonio before Game 3, enflamed an already hostile crowd, then stepped back and let his teammates deal with the consequences.

If you want to call the Spurs dirty, fine. But you’d better be ready to go elbow to elbow. You’d better stay on the court and do something about it.

Stoudemire didn’t. Foul trouble took him out of the game. Throw in a poor shooting night by Steve Nash, and the Suns went down, 108-101.

The Spurs regained the swagger that was missing after a 20-point loss in Game 2. They did it not by being dirty, but by attacking the Suns’ suspect defense. They did it by pounding on Nash defensively with Bruce Bowen and Tony Parker and making him work for every shot.

A physical game?

“Well, half of it,” Suns coach Mike D’Antoni said. “Their half. Now we’ve got to make it our half.

“We’ve just got to be tougher. If that’s the way everybody wants it, then we’ll play that way, too. We’ve just got to take care of business.”

Stoudemire didn’t take care of business.

Two days earlier, Stoudemire called Bowen, Manu Ginobili and the Spurs dirty players. Before Saturday’s game, he talked about how those comments would motivate him. He didn’t set out to play the villain for the San Antonio crowd, but he didn’t mind.

“I was just being totally honest,” Stoudemire said. “The reaction happens, and that’s how it is.

“Everybody pretty much agrees with what I said. There are no hard feelings, no hard intent with the comments I made.”

He may want to check with the Spurs on that.

Stoudemire went to the bench after picking up his second foul with just under five minutes left in the first quarter. He picked up his fourth foul with 10:35 left in the third quarter and went to the bench for the rest of the period.

He started the fourth quarter, picked up his fifth foul 19 seconds later and went back to the bench.

“Yeah, he got frustrated,” D’Antoni said. “He’s going to have to avoid the little stuff.

“But some of the stuff you can’t avoid. You’ve got to protect the basket. I thought a couple of them (fouls) were very close. They just went against us tonight.”

Stoudemire scored 21 points, but he played less than 21 minutes. Six Suns played more minutes. Six Spurs played more minutes.

Phoenix can’t win if that happens again.