2019-20 Timeline Review & Preview: The Detroit Pistons

 

For the Pistons, this was a very bleak season in more ways than one. They had a bad case of the injury bug, which caused their best player Blake Griffith to play only 18 games and in those games, he played horribly. Probably their only decent looking young star, Luke Kennard only played 25 games. They traded away their, “franchise” player, Andre Drummond for the equivalent of two loose cigarettes AND on top of all that, they fell two spots in the lottery. So yeah this was a pretty horrible year to be a Pistons’ fan, or coach, or player, or employee.

Dwayne Casey (still love you Dwayne), really had scraps to work with on a nightly basis trying to have a decent team in place but he was fighting an uphill battle all season. I mean when three of your top five players in points per game each played less than 26 games, then yeah you can tell the pain he went through.

So yeah, this season I think the front office just said, “screw it” and blew the team up, I guess they decided that they only wanted to be stuck with one bad contract. Two of their former starters were waved and they made some moves to get future 2^nd picks, so I guess that’s cool. But anyway, lets dive right into it and talk about the franchise that’s living in Spain, but the S is silent the Detroit Pistons.

 

A live look at the Pistons' front office: 

June 20^th – NBA Draft

 

The Pistons originally had two picks in the 1^st round however, they ended up trading the 30^th pick to the Cavaliers in an earlier trade. They had the 15^th and 45^th picks and selected Sekou Doumbouya (PF) and Isaiah Roby (SF) respectively. However, after making some trades, the rookies they ended up were Jordan Bone (PG) and Sekou Doumbouya.

 

Preseason:

 

Trades:

 

June 21^st – The Pistons trade Jon Leuer to the Bucks in exchange for Tony Snell and the 30^th pick (the draft rights to Kevin Porter Jr.)

 

June 21^st – The Pistons trade the 30^th pick (the draft rights to Kevin Porter Jr.) to the Cavaliers for a 2020 2^nd round pick from the Jazz, a 2021 & 2023 2^nd round pick from the Trail Blazers, a 2024 2^nd pick from Miami, and cash considerations.

 

PS – I know they got a lot of picks but KPJ was pretty good in his rookie season so do you think the Pistons would’ve liked him on their roster?

 

June 27^th – The Pistons trade the 45^th pick (the draft rights to Isaiah Roby), a 2020 Jazz 2^nd round pick, and a 2021 Trail Blazers 2^nd round pick to the Mavericks for the draft rights to Deividas Sirvydis (why the hell did they do this trade?)

 

July 8^th – The Pistons trade a 2024 Miami 2^nd round pick and cash considerations to the 76ers in exchange for the 45^th pick (the draft rights to Jordan Bone).

 

Signings

 

July 6^th – Detroit signs Markieff Morris to a 2-year $6.56 million deal, with a 2020-21 player option.

 

July 7^th – Detroit signs former MVP, Derrick Rose to a 2-year $15 million deal. At least he’s still getting buckets.

 

July 17^th – Detroit claims Christian Wood off waivers. He was a really big surprise for them since Drummond was traded, he started 11 out of 13 games and averaged 23 points & 10 rebounds (I rounded up) on 56% from the field and 40% from behind the arc (on 4 attempts a game).

 

October 22^nd – The season starts.

 

November 11^th – Blake Griffith plays his first game of the season; he missed the first ten games of the season.

 

December 21^st – Luke Kennard plays his last game of the season as he suffered a knee injury. He only played 28 games.

 

December 28^th – Blake Griffith plays his last game of the season as he suffered a left knee injury. He struggled in his 18 games played and this trade just looks worse and worse with each passing day.

 

Midseason

 

Trades

 

February 6^th – The Pistons trade their “franchise player” Andre Drummond to the Cavaliers for John Henson, Brandon Knight, and a 2023 2^nd round pick.

Well damn, was this the best offer that they got? I mean he has a player option this offseason, why did the Cavs trade for him? So many unanswered questions, so little time.

 

Important Notes

 

February 18^th – The Pistons bought out and waived their starting point guard Reggie Jackson. He was traded to Detroit from the Thunder in 2015 and then signed a 5-year deal with them. He later signed a contract with the Los Angles Clippers on February 20^th.

I never really had an opinion on him, he was always meh. He was overpaid but I don’t think it was that bad of an overpay. In his 299 games with Detroit, he played 29 minutes a game and averaged around 16 points, 3 rebounds, and 5.6 assists on pretty poor efficiency (42.5% from the field and 35.4% from three on 4.4 attempts.)

 

February 21^st – The Pistons bought out and waived Markieff Morris, he played just 44 games for them. On February 23^rd he signed a contract to play for the Los Angles Lakers.

 

Oh, you didn’t know? – From the beginning of this horrendous year of 2020 till when the league was suspended, the Pistons won only 8 of their 32 games played.

 

March 11^th – The league was suspended.

 

Preview

This picture was taken from basketball reference.com, if you want more information you can click the link https://www.basketball-reference.com/contracts/DET.html

Looking ahead to the future, I’m stumped, I mean what are they going to do? They’ll have nine guys on the roster so in free agency, they would need to try and get bench depth, hopefully, try to sign younger players as this team is DESPERATE for any sort of young talent. But their major concern in free agency is resigning Christian Wood. They need to get him on a long-term deal so hopefully more than three years. But it now begs the question, how much is he worth? I would say between $8-$12 million a year. Also, Sekou Doumbouya’s performance in his 38 games played leaves a lot to be desired but they’re hoping that he will continue to develop. 

They also have the option of trading guys like Rose and Kennard in exchange for other players and future assets, but I would try to keep Kennard because he’s a great shooter and he’s still young and can develop further. I believe that the Pistons might get a decent return for Rose if a championship contender wanted to trade for him.

Now moving onto the draft, unfortunately, they dropped in the lottery and moved down from the 5^th pick to the 7^th pick. Now with Blake Griffin still on your roster and assuming the Pistons can resign Wood, I think their holes are at point guard and power forward position. So, I can see them going for a guy like Killian Haynes (PG) or Onyeka Okongwu (C). Either of these two options will have to ability to be mentored by great veterans. Haynes can sit behind and learn from former MVP D-rose or Okongwu can benefit from learning from Blake Griffin as he is also small enough to slide over and play the power forward position.

The Pistons are stuck between a rock and a hard place, I don’t think they can do much until Griffin’s contract expires, it's all up to the front office to draft right.