Betrayer

Fun game and a great wire to wire win. Ausar in the starting lineup where he should be. I don't care that he can't shoot. He was absolutely disruptive and such a difference maker. Loved the all-defense lineup with Stew and Holland in there as well. The future is bright if you can teach just one of those two to shoot at an average rate.

That was the only place he was ever going. His favorite team, the French connection with Parker, his camp wanted SAN the whole time. Everyone called it before the draft. Just a few grams lighter on those lottery balls.

Maybe the refs thought JB was disrespecting the game by starting a G League player in Moore Jr instead of the 4 other legitimate candidates on the roster.

Duren’s defense is terrible. Put Reed back in.

Before the game he said they’re going to keep that spot “fluid”. I guess they wanted to prove that point by playing a guy who has no business in the rotation let alone starting. Dumb. You have 2 guys who should’ve been starting regardless of Ivey’s health in Beasley and Ausar. Even Sasser or Holland would have been interesting options if you wanted to go a different way and try some things out. Starting Moore is idiotic.

Wow. They're starting Moore. This team just isn't serious.

Sam and Bryce were talking about this on Game Theory the other day. Basically they said that the draft is only stacked at the very top and the rest of it is so bad that they're having trouble making their draft boards beyond the early lottery. They have no idea who to put in the late first. Just something to keep in mind as the Pistons will probably not be in the top 5 unless they get crazy lottery luck. Too many teams like Wizards, Hornets, Raptors, Nets, Pelicans, and Jazz are tanking hard this year and a couple more (Miami, Chicago) might join them.

Broken bone is definitely the best case. Watching it live I thought his knee got blown out by that reckless dive. 3-6 months, which is better than the full year you usually see with ligament tears. Hopefully there was no damage to the surrounding structures. As for the team going forward, you're forced into a starting lineup change. When Ivey missed time previously JB started Beasley. Last night he closed with Ausar though. Maybe this opens up the door for more starting lineup changes to balance things out a bit. Start Beasley in place of Ivey and Ausar in place of THJ. You move THJ's spacing to the second unit since you're calling up Beasley to balance out the (theoretical) shooters and you can also have Holland backing up Ausar so you don't have two non-shooting wings on the bench sharing time on the court. As far as Ivey's contract, I think you basically punt that until next season now. Omari was saying the same thing on his podcast this morning. They'll want to make sure he makes a full recovery and all that. Ivey isn't a max guy, so they'll probably just deal with his contract in his final year instead of extending early this offseason.

Stop me if you've heard this one before: KD tries to lead a super-team and...

Curious to see how this plays out. Injured rental who going to want a huge new contract in the offseason.

Ausar for TJH is a good start and I think there's very little chance that Harris gets benched anyway. What you lose in perceived spacing from THJ you get back in many other ways on both ends with Ausar. Something has to be done about Duren though, because he's a real problem. His on/off point differential is staggering no matter which other center you put in there, and this starting unit can't keep digging a hole every game. If you factor in his turnover problem, I'm not sure you lose much offensively with him getting benched anyway. Dunks are nice, but it's not like he's giving you any spacing like Stew could. The org has to decide who the backup big man is - Stew or Duren. That guy stays on the bench in his future role and the other guy gets moved. Maybe they've already decided and that's why Duren is a starter until they move him...?

I probably would've brought Cade back when it got down to 7 pts. Take out Moore and let Cade run with Holland, Ausar, Reed, and Sasser so they can have a creator on the floor for the last 5 minutes. Starting lineup needs a change. Duren, THJ, and Harris - at least two of them need to be shifted to the bench for some combination of Ausar, Beasley, Stew (or even Reed). My guess is they're waiting for the trade deadline because those 3 starters are also the ones you're most likely to include in a deal.

Wow! That was a game! If you would've told me that they'd have a better win % in December than November when looking at the schedule a couple months ago I would've told you to lay off the drugs. Cade better be an All-Star lock. @Deleterious I'd call it 6 on 3 because Duren might as well be playing for the other team when he's on defense most nights. The defensive rating is 120 when he's on the floor and 111 when he's off the floor. That's an insane 9 point swing. It's not because Stew has turned into prime Ben Wallace either, because it's the same story when you put Reed in there. Pretty much any way you slice the numbers, they're better when JD is on the bench. And on the other end, his high turnover percentage isn't helping the offense either.

Del and I have been commenting about this starting lineup for a while, but it really needs to change regardless of these wins. Here are some interesting stats I heard today: Starting lineup allows 123 pts. That's 4 points worse than the worst defense in the NBA (Utah at 119). You can't have Duren, Ivey, and THJ together. Tobias is also a neutral to weak defender. It's great that Cade is becoming a better defender and taking on matchups like KD and Lebron, but that isn't going to cut it and his workload is too high on the other end already.

It's always fun watching the Lakers lose. Nice to see the team win on a night when Cade was struggling a bit. He still found ways to impact the game, but the bench was phenomenal, especially on the defensive end. Reed with zero points, but 5 stocks. Then again, maybe we should give that 1 pt to him for the technical he drew on AD. Holland with a nice game as well. Beasley doing his thing as well, of course. As far as when we'll see them stop clenching up during crunch time...when you're the 6th youngest team in the NBA, that's going to happen.

The duo that should have been if the NBA didn't put in a few lighter ping pong balls that year for SAN.

I'll let someone else do that. If Markkanen was the final piece, then yeah, but he's not. He's not a #1 or #2 option on a contender. He's a #3 and we still need a #1b or #2 to put alongside Cade. Once you have that guy, if you add Markkanen then you've got something, but it's not worth moving all your assets just to get an 8th seed.

No way. That's what you trade for an All-NBA player, not a 1x fringe All-Star. For that, you get a first and a prospect, as Del said.

Predictable loss to a bad team after stealing a win against Miami. Starting lineup needs a permanent shakeup once guys are healthy. West coast trip coming up, so things aren't getting any easier.

Good to hear day to day about Stew. That looked like it could have been bad.

Just came here to post this as well. Some good film breakdown of Cade's assists.

Thanks for posting this. Good stuff. I think the Pistons biggest role in trades will be as a facilitator for other teams rather than a buyer of a particular top player. I know fans don't wants to hear that, but they freed up cap space for a reason and in the offseason Trajan talked a lot about taking on contracts for assets.

Yep. Been saying this for 2 years now about Ausar. His most used play type last year was corner three because Monty never figured it out and put him in the worst possible scenario on offense. Hopefully JB will figure it out sooner. Not only should he be used as the screener, but let him be the DHO hub as well like the Warriors do with Draymond and the Pistons are trying to do with Duren (5 turnovers yesterday).

Yep. You know I've been on that bandwagon for a while now. His defense was outstanding (5 stocks, point of attack defense, weakside rim protection, rebounding), and he just knows how to make himself available on offense with cuts and smart plays even though he's a bit raw on that end. Blew a couple easy ones early otherwise his numbers would have been even better. That dunk was (almost) ridiculous. This game also shows why Beasley should be starting. Having that pure shooter who can do it off the catch and off of movement is just a huge benefit to Cade and the team. It's no coincidence that Cade got 18 Assists tonight with Beasley in there instead of Ivey. I'd hate to bench Ivey and reduce his trade value, but if they aren't planning to trade him then that's the answer. EIther way, the starting lineup needs some changes because it's been bad this season.

Sounds like the whole thing was just to free up a little extra cap space going into trade season. I'll judge this move when I see what they do with it.