Devin Booker says he will make sure the Suns make the playoffs next season

Devin Booker’s individual numbers have improved drastically in each of his first three seasons in the NBA.

Posting 24.9 points, 4.5 rebounds and 4.7 assists in 34.5 minutes per game for the Phoenix Suns this year, the 21-year-old star has already emerged as one of the league’s premier offensive players.

The only problem is that the team around him has been abysmal.

The Suns went 21-61 this season. That comes on the heels of a 23-59 campaign in his rookie year and a 24-58 mark last year.

Overall, missing out on the playoffs has taken a toll on the young guard.

“It’s hard man, honestly,” Booker recently told Marc J. Spears of The Undefeated. “I was talking about it with [teammate] Tyson [Chandler]. It was probably the most disappointing [season] for me. My first year, rookie year, I’m just trying to get a chance to play. Just trying to be out on the court so I got that opportunity, and I took advantage of it, came back the second year, and I was trying to solidify that I wasn’t just a backup plan, starting minutes, doing well. So I started my second year. We didn’t play that well, teamwise. … And then this year, I thought it was going to be the year where we make that jump. And with so many things going on here, we fell super short. So, being a competitor, being a winner most of my whole life, it’s really hard.”

On Wednesday, he reiterated those remarks and made a surprising claim.

"I'm done with not making the playoffs,” Booker told reporters on Wednesday, per ESPN. "I'm serious. This is probably my last year ever not making the playoffs. If that's putting pressure on myself, I'm going to take this summer and work that hard so that it doesn't happen again.”

Booker's goal is to make Phoenix a perennial threat in the West. "You watch the highlights of [Charles] Barkley, [Steve] Nash and them and how alive the arena was," Booker noted. "So, one of my goals is to get it back that way.”

Recently, Booker expressed his faith in the team’s front office heading into the offseason.

“It’s only up now,” Booker said. “This summer is a big summer for us. You hear our GM [general manager Ryan McDonough] come out and say he’s going to be super aggressive. We have young talent, we have a lot of picks, with a lot of money too. So I think there’s definitely going to be a lot of moves made this summer.”

On Wednesday, McDonough made it clear that his focus will be adding proven veteran talent to the team's roster. Since the Suns will have a large amount of cap room, they’ll have the space necessary to make a couple impactful signings if they can be persuasive.

”… I think the losing starts to set in and the guys start to become accustomed to that and the bar is lower," he explained. "Next year we're going to try to raise the bar. We're going to try to raise our standards. We won't be as young. We won't have nearly as many young players as we had last year.”