Official Detroit Pistons thread

[Cody_Russell]

Interested to see what happens to Dwane Casey in the offseason. Very nice guy, but the Pistons might need a new voice to get over the hump… and well, significant growth and change with the roster. Ime Udoka perhaps 🤷♂️

Pistons are very close to locking up the #1 odds position in the lottery. Basically done.
Of course it doesn’t change the odds for Wembanyama, but at least the Pistons can’t fall out of the top 5. Maybe get a starter at #5… which would still suck if the Pistons drop that far down. Really could use luck and Wembanyama.

https://www.tankathon.com/pick_odds

[jaadam4]

I really hope we get the #1 pick. The Lions and Pistons would
carry the town for awhile.

[froot loops]

Even if they get the #1 pick, they seem to be aimless. Maybe when Cade comes back next year they get much better, but I have my doubts. The NBA is truly a men's league and they are just too young.

[jaadam4]

Agreed but they'll have 3 talented mf'ers.

Cade, Wembanyama and Ivey are some of the best talents we've had on any team from a skill level in any year let alone on one team. It would be something for sure.

[Futureshock]

Froot is right here. The team has talent. They just seem like they don't have any semblance of how to play team defense or the value of limiting the opponents opportunities by boxing out, rebounding and cutting down their turnovers. You just can't be bad defensively AND rebounding. I remember one sequence where they gave the opposition 5 tries until they got a three. Terrible.

I hope they mature and it brings out the wins, but IDK. There's tanking and there's this. I like when the team tries hard and just can't win because of the lack of talent. They're losing to teams that are resting 3-4 starters.

[ghandi]

They have lost 20 of their last 21 games...I guess you can call it tanking, but they are just flat out bad.....Its only a 14% chance to get the first pick...Odds are higher they get the 5th pick.

[klondike]

They were at least exciting earlier with some high scoring exploits and OT Donnybrooks but lately they've just been bleh! Time to see if we get lucky now.

[froot loops]

This was always the possible pitfall of multiple seasons of tanking to get a savior. Sometimes you just becomes so bad that a doom loop develops. Regardless of what they get in the lottery, there needs some sort of changes to get a veteran framework on the team.

[chemiclord]

The problem remains that tanking is the only way out for a ton of teams, the Pistons included.

The pitfall of a "veteran framework" is where the Pistons were; in a constant fight for the eight seed, not good enough to win in the playoffs but not bad enough to get the critical "superstar" (or two) that is essential to win in the current NBA. You get stuck in a loop that isn't any more satisfying than this one.

In other leagues, teams can leverage draft assets to make a push for established players to help take that next step, but there really isn't enough draft assets in the NBA to do that reliably. "Fuck dem picks" doesn't work all that well when you only have two granted to you any given year. If you blow it on one of those trades, say goodbye to any first round pick until 2026.

[froot loops]

It was obvious they needed to tank, but they absolutely, royally suck right and will suck next year even if they win the lotto. And the next year.

[Mainevent]

Yeah, the best vet they have is Bojan who is bad defensively and on the wrong side of 30. Burk is decent but not a leader, he's more JAG. They really need Cade to come back and take a big step, and Duren to take a big step, and Ivey to take a big step. And everybody needs to figure out how the fuck to play some defense.

[froot loops]

The disease of tanking is if you get off to a slow start the next season, 20 games in you are thinking about tanking for the next draft.

[chemiclord]

Ideally, you get the "young superstars" then build a veteran framework around them. That's where a lot of these "Process Redux" teams tend to fail, and where the Pistons look to be failing right now; pinning their hopes on the next lottery, and you wind up in a point where you can't build anything because there is no structure for these 19-20 year old guys.

[Mainevent]

Yeah, everybody liked to joke about OKC's perpetual rebuild, but they've generally been competitive outside of two years. The Pistons are on year 4 of absolute suck.

[chemiclord]

Well, the issue with OKC was they got absurdly lucky, got the transcendent players they needed... but kept running the team like they were in tank mode.