Detroit Pistons: Stuck in Inferiority...For Now

It is sad to see the state the Pistons have fallen to. An organization that was once top of the league is now regulated to mediocrity. They have struggled to sign high-profile free agents, make good trades, or successfully draft difference-making players. Honestly, I could write a whole separate post about why I never trust the Pistons in the draft, and I probably will at some point. Their owner, Tom Gores, has consistently displayed a form of delusion, where he truly believes that, no matter what, the Pistons are one player away from being a championship contender. He is so detached from reality that he ends up driving the organization further into the ground. I think the move to downtown Detroit encompasses this very well. I do not know of a single person who wanted the Pistons to move downtown. I certainly did not and seeing how much more of an inconvenience it is to navigate downtown Detroit and all of its traffic as opposed to just pulling into the Palace of Auburn Hills, I am now far less inclined to go to a game, especially with how mediocre they have been.

I am going to divide the Pistons final roster into three categories, and I will delve into each group separately. First is our returning players, starting with Gores’ beloved “Big 3.” Second is the new acquisitions, which I am designating specifically as players that the Pistons acquired either through free agency or trades. Lastly, the guys that everyone is always the most interested in, the rookies.

Returning Players

Let’s start with our so-called “Big 3,” Blake Griffin, Andre Drummond, and Reggie Jackson. I am going to be very blunt; I hated the Blake Griffin trade the moment it happened. When I first saw it, I thought it was some sort of joke. Here is a recap of what was exchanged:

Pistons Received: Blake Griffin, Brice Johnson, and Willie Reed

Clippers Received: Tobias Harris, Avery Bradley, Boban Marjanovic, a first-round pick, and a second-round pick.

Now, in what world does it make sense to trade your best overall player in Harris, a solid two-way player in Bradley, a 7’4” monster of a man in Marjanovic, in addition to a first-round and a second-round pick, all for an aging former star whose game largely revolved around his freakish athleticism before suffering multiple injuries which stripped him of that? It made absolutely no sense to me then and it still makes absolutely no sense to me now. Especially when you see that Harris continues to play at a high level and Marjanovic has become one of the more well-known players in the NBA. I just feel like if we were going to trade away those assets, we should have gotten way more in return. I also strongly disagree with a team like the Pistons trading away draft picks. They should be focused on rebuilding because this team will not be competing for championships anytime soon. The Pistons must stockpile assets, and trading them away for a return like this is incredibly underwhelming. If you are wondering what ever happened to Brice Johnson and Willie Reed, the Pistons turned around and flipped them for James Ennis and Jameer Nelson, respectively. Awesome.

Now, I will take a step back and express respect for Blake Griffin, who has evolved his game in a major way to account for his loss of explosiveness. My problem with it, though, is that it largely revolves around him just backing guys down in the post. That is not the kind of basketball we need to play, because whenever Blake enters the post, you know the ball is not going to be passed around much from there. Ball movement is essential to really compete for championships, and I think that is why the Houston Rockets’ iso-heavy offense has not led them to the Finals yet. My point is, we will not get anywhere in the playoffs, assuming we make it that far, as long as Griffin is here.

Somebody who has done zero development to his game is Andre Drummond. Outside of his free throw shooting, I have seen no steps forward whatsoever from him. He is still the exact same guy he has been essentially since we drafted him, an almost-7-footer who is really good at rebounding. His defense is okay, but he certainly benefits from his height. Despite this, I still feel like he should block more shots for being as tall as he is. You look at some of the premier shot-blockers in the league, who are all around Drummond’s height, such as Myles Turner, Rudy Gobert, and Mitchell Robinson, and Drummond does not strike nearly as much fear in opponents as those guys do. His offensive game is by far the most disappointing, though. You would think that a guy of his height just needs to work a little bit on like a sky hook or a solid post move and he could have it down somewhat quickly. Yet, Drummond does not have a move like that, he still gets just about all of his points from dunks. That means one of two things, he is either incapable of learning a go-to move on offense, or he simply does not want to. Either way, it is very concerning. Hey, at least he is trying to become a three-point shooter, right?

I used to like Reggie Jackson. I mean, he certainly is a step up from the days of Rodney Stuckey and Will Bynum. My one major issue with Jackson is that he is a score-first point guard that is a very streaky shooter. Being able to consistently shoot the three-ball is important to his game because it forces the defender to really play up on him, which then opens up the inside more for the other four guys on the floor. The problem is, when he is cold, that threat is gone, and the defenders can lay off him more. The part that is more frustrating about when he is cold is that instead of facilitating the ball to other guys who might have a hotter hand, he just keeps shooting, probably thinking he can shoot himself out of it. Then all of a sudden, he is shooting 20% on the day.

To put it simply, I want all three of those guys traded at some point this season. I was hopeful that when Reggie Jackson actually had some high-scoring performances against the Milwaukee Bucks in that embarrassment of a series, that the Pistons would try to strike while the iron is hot and maybe get a team to give up more than he is worth, like we did for Griffin. Alas, nothing materialized, not even a rumor. There was one rumor going around, though, that there were talks between the Pistons and the Atlanta Hawks involving trading Blake Griffin and our #15 selection in this past year’s draft for something along the lines of Kent Bazemore and the Hawks’ two first round picks, at #10 and #12. In case you are curious, the guys who were not available at 15 that would have been available at 10 were: Cam Reddish, Cameron Johnson, PJ Washington, Tyler Herro, and Romeo Langford. I would love to be able to say that Reddish or Herro is a Piston, but alas, they are not. I wanted so badly for the rumors to be true, especially when Griffin responded to the rumors with a cryptic tweet (although it turns out he was just trolling). Nothing ended up happening, of course, and here we still are with a fragile has-been on a ridiculous contract. In fact, as I was wrapping up writing this post, word came out that Griffin has an injured hamstring and will be out until November. Awesome, that will get teams to want him. Regarding Drummond, there seems to always be some sort of rumor going around that he will be traded, so I hold onto the hope that there are actually teams calling about him somewhat frequently and maybe somebody will offer something that finally gets us to pull the trigger and trade him away.

The rest of the returning players are more or less a mixed bag. There are certainly some things to like in this group, but also some to not be too excited about.

One of the hot story lines from this preseason has been the development of Bruce Brown, one of our draft picks from last year. He showed some signs of promise last year, specifically his intensity and defensive presence. The key for him is to be more consistent on offense. He is solid at driving to the hoop, largely thanks to his hard-nosed attitude, but he is not great from anywhere outside of that. This preseason, he played point guard for us during summer league play, and he did get a triple-double. Yes, it is only preseason, but that is still a tough feat to achieve, especially for a guy who fits more into the shooting guard or small forward position. It certainly was a demonstration of his versatility, which is gradually becoming more important in the NBA. I have grown increasingly optimistic about Brown since we selected him. If he can turn into an offensive player that the opposing team has to really worry about, then we may have a major steal on our hands.

Our other draft selection from last year, Khyri Thomas, is on a slower development track. Ironically, I was more optimistic about Thomas than I was about Brown, and I have since flipped. Thomas came from Creighton as more of a shooting prospect, which is always intriguing, but he has struggled to put it together at the professional level. He spent a good chunk of time in the G League last year and there was even speculation he may not make the team this year, but the Pistons ended up keeping him. I do not really disagree with it because I still believe he has a lot of promise, we just have to hope he puts it all together.

Another guy who has really come on as of late is Luke Kennard. He ended last season on a tear, shooting over 40% from the three-point line after February 1st. Production like that is going to be necessary for this team; we need a consistent threat from three, and Kennard showed he can be that. We also need him to help us forget he was taken one pick before Donovan Mitchell. That is not Kennard’s fault, obviously, but nonetheless it is another bad look for this team revolving around the draft. Now, if Kennard continues to shoot somewhere around 40% from three and develops into one of the most dangerous outside scorers in the league, and maybe even some shot-creating chops, then maybe I can come around to forgiving our front office for the draft selection.

One of my favorite moves the Pistons have made in recent memory is when we flipped Stanley Johnson to the Milwaukee Bucks in exchange for Thon Maker. No, it was not a blockbuster move, but allow me to explain. Stanley Johnson might be one of the worst draft picks in recent history for the Pistons. He had zero offensive game, which in itself was odd for a small forward. He was fine on defense (remember when he shut down Lebron that one playoff game and everyone thought he was the “Lebron-stopper,” before he got torched the next three games in that series? Yeah, that was awesome.) I also could never overlook that we took Johnson over the guy I wanted the Pistons to take, and that was Devin Booker. Not only did Booker show a ton of promise in his time at Kentucky, and since then has developed into one of the better players in the league, he also really wanted to come to Detroit. How often do you hear that nowadays? But no, instead we took a guy that underwhelmed the entire time he was here. Anyways, back to the trade. We flipped, in my opinion, one of the worst draft picks we have made for an athletic 7’1” shot-blocking machine who can also hold his own from the three-point line. Let us not forget that Maker drilled a three-pointer buzzer-beater to take down the Hawks in a game last year. Now, Maker’s knock is that he does not weigh much for his height, and as a result can sometimes get pushed around inside. He spent this whole offseason trying to put on more muscle and from what I have seen there is a pretty noticeable difference. I am not by any means saying that Thon is going to be an all-star or anything like that, I just think his upside is incredible, especially considering he is entering his fourth season and is still only 22 years old.

We made another trade last season as well, sending Reggie Bullock to the Lakers in exchange for Svi Mykhailiuk. I am just going to get this out of the way first, I have no idea how that is supposed to be pronounced. This was another intriguing trade to me because while Bullock was a much better player than Stanley Johnson, it was not upsetting to see him go either, especially because we got a guy that quite a few people were saying we should look at in the 2018 Draft (we ended up passing on him twice). I remember Mykhailiuk from his days at Kansas, he was a knockdown three-point shooter, actually setting a school record for three-pointers made in a season, and he also had a few more offensive skills to offer. Unfortunately, he broke his finger literally three games after we got him in the trade, so we did not get to see much of him last year, which was really unfortunate. He played in the summer league and the preseason, but his three-point shot was shaky at best. Hopefully that is just some rust that he is able to shake off, because as I said before, this team needs perimeter threats badly.

The Pistons also kept Langston Galloway. Honestly, I do not know why, as he is unbelievably average. I have a hard time believing there is nobody else better than him that we could go get. Perhaps we are holding onto him in hopes that he will get off to a hot start so we can trade him and actually get something for him. As nice as that would be, I am not exactly holding my breath.

New Acquisitions

From what I have seen in the preseason, I firmly believe Derrick Rose is our best all-around player. His resurgence last year is one of the best comeback stories. I, and many others, did not think he would be able to ever do what he did last year. I really hope he continues to play well, and I am not just saying that because he plays for the Pistons now. As for his game, the guy just has that knack for knowing what to do with the ball in his hands. He facilitates, gets the ball to the right guys by making crisp passes, and shoots it when he has a good look. I have been very impressed with him and I am excited to see what he can do for us this year.

The guy who was regarded as our “big signing” this offseason is Tony Snell. I guess I can understand where people are coming from when they say that, as he has been a good player for the Bucks. The move just did not move the needle much for me, and I do not really know why. Snell has shown well from the perimeter, which is a very good sign, and he also is a rock-solid defender. He is every bit of a classic “Three-and-D” player. It sounds like he is really going to be a big piece of this team, and I am sure he has the game to really be a contributor.

I think the biggest surprise this preseason has been Christian Wood. He came in and was on fire the whole preseason. He was blocking shots, running up and down the floor, locking guys up, and still contributing a ton on offense. I truly believe that he earned his spot this preseason. I did not know a lot about Wood when we first got him, but now I cannot wait to see what he can do this season.

Fun fact: My first Michigan basketball game I went to was against Tim Frazier and the Penn State Nittany Lions. I do not remember him much, probably because we won pretty handily, but I have seen some promise from him this preseason. Point guard is the one position on this team where the depth chart is really set, and Frazier is the third-stringer. It probably would take an injury or something along those lines for him to see meaningful playing time, but I trust he could do just fine if that came up. He seemed to know how to run the offense and find the open man, similar to Derrick Rose, but just not at the same level.

Yes, we really signed Markieff Morris, the twin brother of former Piston Marcus Morris. Things did not go well when Marcus was here so quite frankly, I have no idea why they thought bringing in Markieff was a good idea. Maybe he will not jack up more threes than he should, like Marcus always did. That alone would be a slight improvement.

Rookies

Ah yes, the most interesting men on the court, the rookies. I would love to sit here and say that I love what the Pistons did in the draft, but I do not. That does not necessarily mean I hate it; I just have some hesitancy to be fully on board with this one. There were some players in particular I would have loved the Pistons to nab, the one I wanted the most being Carsen Edwards from Purdue (a point guard who can actually score, and score a lot).

Let us start with our first selection, Sekou Doumbouya, selected at #15 overall. I never like when a pick comes in and the first word out of my mouth is, “Who?” That is exactly what happened with this selection. I had not heard this man’s name once as a guy we would take in any of the pre-draft research I did. I heard a lot of other names, such as Romeo Langford, Rui Hachimura (both of which were no longer on the board) as well as Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Brandon Clarke (who both were still on the board). But not once did I see the name “Sekou Doumbouya.” That alone caused me a lot of confusion. According to Ed Stefanski, he was expected to go a lot higher, the consensus was he would go to the Washington Wizards at #9. Now, the question that comes to my mind is, why did he fall? And why did he fall so far? Either we got a major steal that other teams slept on, or our front office missed a major red flag that every other team noticed. What is sad is that I do not have enough confidence in our front office in order to disbelieve the latter. His highlights were okay, but not anything awe-inspiring, which is what I normally want to see from a first-round selection. It is always hard to trust a guy from overseas will pan out. Not anything against those leagues or the guys who play in them, it is just that it seems like the hit rate on them is so much lower. Yes, guys like Luka Doncic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Kristaps Porzingis have been drafted from overseas, but for all of those guys you have guys like Dragan Bender, Lucas Nogueira, Bruno Caboclo, and the legendary Darko Milicic. As for Doumbouya, he is athletic for his size at 6’9” and 230 and seems skilled at driving the ball. His outside shooting is not great, but he is not completely incapable. He allegedly made 15 in a row in a pre-draft workout. He shows an ability to find open guys, which is impressive for a guy of that size, and his defense also looks decent. One knock I noticed, though, is he is not particularly fast, especially with the ball in his hands, although seeing as he will probably play a combination of small and power forward, it is possible that ball handling will not be a major part of his game. It is hard to draw too much from film, however, because of unfamiliarity with his competition over in France. He is also young, and now the youngest player in the league, and will require a lot of fine-tuning to his game. It is very possible that we do not see a ton of him this year. I really hope that is not the case because I am always all for drafting an immediate difference-maker in the first round, and I want to see what we got in this selection. I cannot ignore the idea, however, that our front office could be really planning for the future, and they hope that he develops into a star that can lead us back to being contenders. If that is the case, then I have a little more confidence in our front office. I think the easiest comparison to make for Doumbouya is Pascal Siakam, although Siakam is a far more refined player at this point. He is, however, now a major contributor for a Toronto Raptors team that just won their first championship I am very hesitant to say that I think we hit a home run with this selection. I am trying to be optimistic about it, but there are just a lot of things that would have to go right for Doumbouya to become the star the Pistons seem to think he is.

On to our second pick, Deividas Sirvydis, drafted at #37 overall. We doubled down on guys from overseas in the second round. We actually will not see him in the NBA for at least another year, as he is staying over in Lithuania for the upcoming season. I cannot complain too much, although he probably would take Langston Galloway’s spot so maybe I do wish he would just come over. Sirvydis is a 6’7” left-handed shooting guard. He moves well with the ball in his hands and drives hard to the basket. He seems to strongly prefer finishing with his left hand, though, so he will need to work on being more comfortable with right-handed shots around the basket if he is ever going to develop into anything at the next level. He has a nice, quick release, and looks like he can be a real threat from the perimeter. Something I find very encouraging is that he shows the ability to create his own shot. The Pistons do not really have any stud shot-creators on the roster, so Sirvydis could be a difference-maker just in that respect. His passing looks good, as well, and his defense shows some promise. He needs to work on his on-ball defense, but he does show good smarts off the ball, including knowing when to come over and help on a guy. Similar to Doumbouya, it is hard to know how well he will translate to the NBA just from film because the competition there is very different from here. His game ironically reminds me a lot of Svi Mykhailiuk, but I think he shows a little more speed and explosiveness with the ball. I am willing to be more patient with Sirvydis than with Doumbouya because he is a second-round pick. In the NBA Draft, second-rounders are less likely to make meaningful contributions to the team, while it is basically expected that first-rounders either are difference-makers right out of the gate, or develop into one relatively quickly. In the second round, you are largely looking for promise, and Sirvydis has it. There is certainly reason for optimism here, hopefully he can develop more this coming year and be a little more ready when he does finally join the Pistons.

Our final selection, which I did not even know that we had when I was watching the draft, is Jordan Bone, a 6’3” point guard from Tennessee. Of the three picks that the Pistons had, I think Bone got me the most excited. I remember watching him this past college basketball season, and he shows a lot of promise. Bone is exactly the kind of guy you take with one of the last picks in the draft; he is an athletic freak. He is blazing fast both with and without the ball, and is very springy for his size, throwing down dunks quite often. He is also a master of the floater shot, one of my personal favorite moves, and he showed that a lot during the preseason. He is a decent three-point shooter, far from a fantastic one, but he shows the ability to make them. He is somewhat slight of frame, weighing only 180 pounds, so that is concerning when he goes up against some of the bigger guards out there. He does, however, make up for it with the intensity and athleticism that he plays with. I saw him on quite a few occasions stifle a guy into picking up his dribble, and that is the kind of play that can force turnovers. Throughout the summer league he made nice passes all over the floor, including a few no-look passes. Now, allow me to pump the brakes a little bit, he does need time to develop certain aspects of his game, such as shooting and getting stronger, and that is why he currently is on a two-way contract. I will say, however, that should something happen and we needed to call this guy up, I believe he would do alright. It is all about just elevating his game to that next level for him. If you did not see the video that went viral of him at his draft party at the moment that he got drafted, I highly suggest you do, and then try to tell me this guy is not going to give this opportunity everything that he has. I am very excited to see what Bone can do in the future for us.

That concludes my analysis of the initial roster for this year’s Detroit Pistons. As far as my expectations for this team go, I do not see us doing anything more than making the playoffs as a 7 or 8 seed and getting knocked out in the first round. Honestly, I hope we miss the playoffs, then we can enter the lottery and maybe get a decent pick in next year’s draft, although I am sure we would end up getting the tenth pick, which we seem to always get in the lottery. Like I said before, as long as Blake Griffin, Andre Drummond, and Reggie Jackson are on this team, we are not going to be competing for anything meaningful. I predict we will finish just below .500, at around 39-43. We have the potential on this roster to do better, for sure, but I have a hard time buying into the idea of us surging well past 41-41 for a spot as the 5-seed in the East. My biggest hope for this season, outside of trading our “Big 3,” is that the young talent that we have on this team gets to play a lot, and hopefully really take some steps forward in developing. That would really bring some hope and optimism back to Detroit basketball.