20234-24 14-68. Now what? (The 2024 Offseason thread)

[gehringer_2]

38 minutes ago, Betrayer said:

Duren may be a better version of Drummond, but I'm not sure if he'll ever space the floor or protect the paint, and I think you have to do one of those two things to be a playoff Center in today's NBA

This exactly. Today's prototype has to shoot - whether it's a rangy rim guy like Holmgren or a pass and shoot guy like Jokic, Duren doesn't fit a mold anywhere on that spectrum. He's a player for a different era.

Edited April 24, 2024 by gehringer_2

[Deleterious]

People will hate this. But Stewart should have started last year. 

After the trades it should have been

Cade

Ivey 

Fontecchio

Thompson

Stewart 

[Deleterious]

People are right when they say OKC had a head start with SGA.  But that doesn't change the fact they hit on Giddey, they hit on Chet, they hit on Williams.  They found guys like Dort, Wiggins, Joe, the other Jaylin Williams.  Even a rookie like Cason Wallace is playing 20 minutes the other night and about the same tonight.  He isn't lighting the world on fire, but he isn't hurting them either.

 

[RJBrez]

I don’t know what they should do. I think the main thing to solve first, is the front office (See: The Detroit Lions). Until the entire culture changes, no roster move will matter. 
What’s happened to this organization is a perfect example of why I’ll never be on board for “tanking” for draft picks, when A) it isn’t guaranteed all that losing even gets you a good pick and B) you don’t have a front office you can trust to make the damn pick in the first place. 
I understand rosters have to be torn down at some point, but choosing to be a loser year after year eventually becomes a damaging mental hurdle for the young talent that’s been chosen to “turn things around”.  The Pistons have been a dumpster fire of bad decisions for over 15 years now. You can’t just flip a switch and decide “we will try to win again”.  They don’t know to win. The culture is garbage under Gores. He’s destroyed what was once my favorite team in all of sports. I used to watch every second of every game and now I can’t stomach more than a few minutes. 
Sorry for the long rant. But I guess my overall point is that this once proud organization is now so poorly managed that they make me want to vomit. Yay another mediocre lottery pick to be botched by Gores and whatever fool he overpays to come here. They have no hope. The fans have no reason to care or be excited that things could get better. Next year will be the same tired crap that’s been force fed to us for the better part of two decades now: “If the young guys develop..bla bla bla”. 

[casimir]

2 hours ago, RJBrez said:

I don’t know what they should do. I think the main thing to solve first, is the front office (See: The Detroit Lions). Until the entire culture changes, no roster move will matter.

Preach.

[gehringer_2]

3 hours ago, RJBrez said:

Until the entire culture changes,

I guess in this case, 'culture' means mostly incompetence.  I don't feel the Piston FO matches the WCF Lions FO in terms of treating players as chattel and seeing the fans as marks - but what they certainly share culturally is total lack of competence building a team. The Piston roster has been such an assemblage of incompatible misfit toys that any fan grabbed at random from section 109 to replace Weaver certainly would have done better.

[Motown Bombers]

3 hours ago, RJBrez said:

I don’t know what they should do. I think the main thing to solve first, is the front office (See: The Detroit Lions). Until the entire culture changes, no roster move will matter. 
What’s happened to this organization is a perfect example of why I’ll never be on board for “tanking” for draft picks, when A) it isn’t guaranteed all that losing even gets you a good pick and B) you don’t have a front office you can trust to make the damn pick in the first place. 
I understand rosters have to be torn down at some point, but choosing to be a loser year after year eventually becomes a damaging mental hurdle for the young talent that’s been chosen to “turn things around”.  The Pistons have been a dumpster fire of bad decisions for over 15 years now. You can’t just flip a switch and decide “we will try to win again”.  They don’t know to win. The culture is garbage under Gores. He’s destroyed what was once my favorite team in all of sports. I used to watch every second of every game and now I can’t stomach more than a few minutes. 
Sorry for the long rant. But I guess my overall point is that this once proud organization is now so poorly managed that they make me want to vomit. Yay another mediocre lottery pick to be botched by Gores and whatever fool he overpays to come here. They have no hope. The fans have no reason to care or be excited that things could get better. Next year will be the same tired crap that’s been force fed to us for the better part of two decades now: “If the young guys develop..bla bla bla”. 

The Lions didn't solve the front office, they solved ownership. Unfortunately for the Pistons that's going to remain unsolved. 

[gehringer_2]

1 minute ago, Motown Bombers said:

The Lions didn't solve the front office, they solved ownership. Unfortunately for the Pistons that's going to remain unsolved. 

correct.

[NYLion]

20 hours ago, Deleterious said:

People will hate this. But Stewart should have started last year. 

After the trades it should have been

Cade

Ivey 

Fontecchio

Thompson

Stewart 

They aren't benching Duren. He's one of their core players, they're going to give him opportunity to succeed. I'm not a big fan of his but that's what they should do if they're intent on developing or trading him for that matter. Him coming off the bench would be detrimental to both options.

[Deleterious]

20 minutes ago, NYLion said:

They aren't benching Duren. He's one of their core players, they're going to give him opportunity to succeed. I'm not a big fan of his but that's what they should do if they're intent on developing or trading him for that matter. Him coming off the bench would be detrimental to both options.

And that is how you get Drummond 2.0.

 

[Deleterious]

 

[gehringer_2]

25 minutes ago, Deleterious said:

 

TBF to LCA, a few of players in the arena survey noted that the only thing wrong with LCA is that it was empty -- no-one likes playing in an empty arena. The Pistons report 'paid' numbers that are  fantasy wrt who is actually there.

Edited April 26, 2024 by gehringer_2

[Shinzaki]

1 hour ago, Deleterious said:

 

They used to say Jacques Demers had a five year contract with a three year act...

Hope that isn't the case here

[Betrayer]

Apparently Stewart made some anti-vax post this morning and then his account was deleted afterwards (I'm guessing Pistons PR team gave him a call).

[Deleterious]

That never ends well.

[Deleterious]

Sam took a flamethrower to the Pistons organization.  

https://theathletic.com/5441967/2024/04/26/pistons-offseason-nba-draft-cade-cunningham/?source=emp_shared_article

Quote

Edwards: Before we get started, do you want to vent at all about the Pistons’ season?

Vecenie: I mean, I think the less we say about it, the better, right? It’s really difficult to have organizational success when you’re the worst-coached team in the league and also have what I think is a front office living on borrowed time. I don’t think Monty Williams had any great answers necessarily, given that Troy Weaver and Co. built a roster without any two-way players, without much shooting, and relying on a significant number of extremely young, defensively-questionable players.

But I thought Williams’ rotational choices throughout the year were egregiously bad. He routinely would play over 10 players in his rotations, including all-bench configurations that boggled the mind. It felt throughout the season like this was just a grand experiment for him and that he never found any of the answers he was looking for. He’d start players who weren’t good enough to be in the NBA, like Killian Hayes, over significant long-term investments like Jaden Ivey. Offensively, there didn’t seem to be a cohesive, overarching principle in terms of shot distribution or a modern offensive scheme. Nothing he did felt like it had any rhyme or reason. It was just vibes.

I mostly felt bad for the players, many of whom I think will go on to have successful NBA careers. It just didn’t feel like they were well-positioned for success. Cade Cunningham particularly had it rough. The lineup Cunningham played the most minutes with this season was alongside Ivey, Isaiah Stewart, Ausar Thompson and Jalen Duren. None of those players are guys that teams are remotely worried about as shooters, giving Cunningham precious little space to attack the midrange on his drives, an area he particularly needs some room within to thrive. I don’t think it’s an accident that lineups with Cunningham and Simone Fontecchio actually found success, as Fontecchio’s gravity as a shooter was immediately evident. Lineups with Cunningham and Bojan Bogdanović also found success, as the Pistons scored 117.7 points per 100 possessions when they were out there together. The issue was that Bogdanović was done defensively by the end of his time in Detroit, and they also gave up 128 points per 100 possessions, per PBP Stats.

Seriously, the only thing that matters for the Pistons this offseason should be putting Cunningham in a position to thrive. He’s the only player on this roster who has genuinely proven that he is a significant long-term building block for the organization. As much as I love Ivey’s athleticism, he needs to grow on defense and figure out his decision-making tree. As much as Duren has shown flashes, his lack of defensive growth this season was a significant issue. Thompson has so far to go offensively that it’s hard to totally trust him. Cunningham is the guy here, so the Pistons need to do everything they can to find guys who can shoot and defend to put around him. That’s why I liked the Fontecchio and Grimes moves at the deadline, and why I’m intrigued to see what direction they go in this summer. I think they have a future NBA All-Star in Cunningham. They just need to help him.

 

[Deleterious]

The Tobias Harris stat line after 3 playoff games.

35 minutes per game

8 points per game

7 rebounds per game

39% from the field

27% from three

0 FTA's

[casimir]

33 minutes ago, Deleterious said:

The Tobias Harris stat line after 3 playoff games.

35 minutes per game

8 points per game

7 rebounds per game

39% from the field

27% from three

0 FTA's

He won't have to worry about playoff stat lines as a Piston.

[Betrayer]

10 hours ago, Deleterious said:

Sam took a flamethrower to the Pistons organization.  

https://theathletic.com/5441967/2024/04/26/pistons-offseason-nba-draft-cade-cunningham/?source=emp_shared_article

 

Everybody can see this. People have been talking about it all year. The question is, can Gores swallow his pride and his wallet enough to fire the guy after he spent so much time making sure everyone knew he over-ruled Troy to bring him in? He trotted Monty out there like he was taking championship victory laps.

I guess we'll see what happens with the POBO. Maybe that's why Gores is bringing that person in - to fire Troy and Monty for him because he doesn't have the guts to do it himself.

Someone else said this, but the slow trickle of stories coming out now about Monty from the beat writers is reminiscent of how it was with Bey right around when he was moved. Even our guy JEIII, who notoriously doesn't like to burn bridges, has come out and said a lot of bad things about Monty. Maybe the beat writers already know something we don't. I can only hope that's true.

[casimir]

10 minutes ago, Betrayer said:

Everybody can see this. People have been talking about it all year. The question is, can Gores swallow his pride and his wallet enough to fire the guy after he spent so much time making sure everyone knew he over-ruled Troy to bring him in? He trotted Monty out there like he was taking championship victory laps.

I guess we'll see what happens with the POBO. Maybe that's why Gores is bringing that person in - to fire Troy and Monty for him because he doesn't have the guts to do it himself.

Someone else said this, but the slow trickle of stories coming out now about Monty from the beat writers is reminiscent of how it was with Bey right around when he was moved. Even our guy JEIII, who notoriously doesn't like to burn bridges, has come out and said a lot of bad things about Monty. Maybe the beat writers already know something we don't. I can only hope that's true.

Here’s a fun thought.  What happens of Drunk Uncle Tommy misses on the president of basketball operations hiring.  If he’s afraid of firing Weaver and Williams on his own, how does he handle firing the president if it becomes obvious that it was a mistake hire?

[Deleterious]

Two weeks and not even a whisper.  Makes me think they are waiting to talk to someone still in the playoffs.  

[Betrayer]

49 minutes ago, Deleterious said:

Two weeks and not even a whisper.  Makes me think they are waiting to talk to someone still in the playoffs.  

JEIII was on a pod saying that he wouldn't expect anything until mid or late May.

[Deleterious]

KOC wrote an article saying league sources are telling him there is a real possibility Jon Horst takes the pistons job. 

Supposedly, the two coach hires for Milwaukee were not his choice. So he has lost power there.

[Betrayer]

15 hours ago, Deleterious said:

KOC wrote an article saying league sources are telling him there is a real possibility Jon Horst takes the pistons job. 

Supposedly, the two coach hires for Milwaukee were not his choice. So he has lost power there.

Sounds like he'll feel right at home here since the coaching decisions will also not be his choice.

[Deleterious]

This is the first time since 2005 that either Steph, LeBron, or KD did not make the second round.