Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 135: Recapping the Troy Weaver’s Regime Thus Far

Episode Date: March 8, 2023

This episode recaps and analyzes Troy Weaver's decisions to date, in the midst of this third consecutive rebuilding season for the Pistons.

Welcome back. Everybody, you're listening to another episode of Drive Into the Basket, part of the basketball podcast network. I am Mike. As you probably know, if you've been listening to this podcast for any amount of time. So we're about 20 games, actually, I think quite a bit less than 20 games at this point. Goodness, I've completely lost track of how many games the business have played. Whatever the case, we're really starting to hit the final stretch run of like the, I would say, third, but three and a half. now rebuilding season for the Pistons. If we take new account that last half of the 2019-2020 season before I get cut off

COVID, which the Pistons, well, more like the last third in which the Pistons were just completely tanking. And then had a nine-month off-season that was completely brutal. So it's a period in which, of course, things are different for the Pistons. They are no longer a treadmill team that's just trying to win at any cost, no longer just trying to make the playoffs, no longer following a kind of an owner who seems to have the philosophy of an owner who seems to have realized the error of his ways, but for a long time felt that this was just kind of like another venture capital product and project in which,

hey, we're going to take this business and we're going to turn it around, establish a new culture, and we're just going to get better and better from there. It doesn't work in basketball. You need the talent. The business never had the talent. I mean, the closest they kind of came to kind of sort of maybe possibly ever having anything that would get them past like the first round was that team from the end of the 2015-2016 season. It was Jackson, KCP, Marcus Morris, Tobias Harris, Andre Drummond, Stanley Johnson off the bench, whatever that's worth. Can't forget Anthony Tolover, too.

But of course, that didn't work out. Jackson got injured. Morris regressed, KCP regressed. Drummond decided halfway through the season he didn't care anymore. And he regressed also. And there was Tobias Harris was the only guy who, actually continue to improve. Pissons had a horrible coach.

Everything fell apart. Even then, I would argue that if everything had gone right with, you know, with the players, the personalities in that team, they were not going to make it past the second round. And the second rounds would have required pretty good health. It would have had to be a mid-seed and not play against the number one and number two seed. So, excuse me. I digress. So I understand it's grown to be a bit of a frustration for a certain percentage of the fan base

who are understandably tired of watching this team just lose 75% of their games. and I think that's perfectly understandable. Even I who would rather be having things go this way, like have the Pistons, or not like they really had a choice this year or last year, or really even a year before that, aside from the end of the season when they just started outright, completely tanking the last couple of seasons,

which they should have. It was the right decision. But, yeah, it gets tiring to watch a rebuild of this length. This season was never meant to be this depressing. Kate Cunningham going out really kind of changed the character of it. And a lot kind of has gone wrong. I mean, of course, Sidic Bay was a player. A lot of us were excited about.

He took a big step backward this season and then got traded. And we just, you know, Isaiah Stewart's had an up and down season. Killing Hayes has had an up and down season. A lot better than he was last season. But he's still had a share of difficulties. We've had some bright spots like Jaywin Duren, Jaden Adi, of course. and, you know, but in general, it just hasn't really been all that great. It's been a grind.

The season for me has not been very enjoyable to watch. It has been a grind. Most of that is just the fact that the season itself has been a grind and less fatigue from watching a third straight season of the Pistons really struggling. I mean, it was new in the first season. It's like, ha-ha, roof her loss is great. You know, the Pistons are fine doing the right thing. And in that second season, which would be last season.

It was like, you know, okay. I'd be okay, I suppose, with the Pistons becoming, you know, abruptly becoming a better team, winning more games. They didn't. Injuries, this certainly didn't help. But, and then it was another time, you know, another season in which the pistons were one of the worst teams. Okay, fine.

You know, down the stretch. Not fun to watch them tank down the stretch again. But, okay, it's what they're supposed, you know, you do that, of course. And it's a second rebuilding season. It's like, okay, you know, two bad seasons. That's just what it is. And, you know, I've been asking for rebuild for a long time. And, uh, cool.

And then this season where it's like, okay, maybe the Pistons will take a little bit of a step forward. And, you know, it would be probably for the best, for them to continue to be just a really, you know, for them to end with a really bad record. So you get odds at higher odds at that, you know, these high picks in the draft that's really kind of the top two or three at this point. And like the draft is always going to be the best place for the Pistons to find, you know, top tier elite talent or get their best shot at top tier elite talent. But it has gotten a little bit tiring. And it's, and it's, it was distressing that that these. last two seasons were capped up by one in which, you know, the team's kind of keystone player, it was a sense of being the team's keystone player was out. A lot has gone wrong. Two best

players in the team have both been veterans over the age of 30, the Boyon and Alec Burks, and so on and so forth. So where I'm waiting with all of this is that I've seen a certain amount of angsts in the direction of Troy Weber. You know, is Troy Weaver doing a good job? You know, wide of the pistons, why did the pistons still have a terrible record for the third year in a row, you know, for his third season. And so, I thought in this episode, I would just go over really from top to bottom what Troy Weaver has done so far. And it'd be great each of his moves. How do I feel about Troy Weaver as a whole?

So I'll just go over that first. I think that he has been perfect. I was a little bit more excited about him in his first season. And basically we're at a point at which, and the Wiseman Bay Trail was a little bit puzzling for me. I mean, like I said, if certain things were true about Bay that he was unwilling to accept certain role, that he was accepting certain money that he had, expecting certain money that he really does. definitely hadn't earned. And whatever else, basically just if you wasn't listening to to coaching staff anymore, that was kind of an issue. Wiseman is a lottery ticket to really, really

overlaps with Marvin Bagley, who's under contract for two more years. And again, you can't play either of them, whatever. I'll get into this when I actually get to the, I talked about this last week, but I'll get into this, you know, that'll be basically the last move I go over. And moves are done this season, obviously, because trade deadlines over. You can sign 10-day contracts. That's about it. You can sign guys to non-guaranteed. You know, you can You can still sign guys, but obviously, yeah, whatever. Pull of guys you can actually sign is pretty darn small and not consequential. So I just, I feel like, yeah, he hasn't been perfect.

And he's certainly been a great deal better than any general manager of the pastons of had since early day Dumas. And this is a controversial take, but I think that early day, you know, early days, Dumas call lightning in a bottle. I have this, this argument. Like, my brother loves to bring this up. He does not, you would agree, not know very much about basketball. So we just will actually bring this up to be obnoxious.

that, you know, that's always, you know, Joe Dumar's a good, good GM. And whatever, I digress. He just, he just does to be irritating. But what I say is that, sure, he won a championship. You can't take that away from him. I think he got very, very lucky early on. I think he caught lightning in a bottle. He put together a group of five players as starters who were drastically more than the sum of their parts.

I mean, you got to be more than the sum of your parts if you want to win the championship. but the going to work Pistons were a great deal more than some of their parts. And then from there, the second they won the championship from there, it was downhill, the team atrophied. I mean, he drafted badly. I mean, Darko gets forgotten, but it doesn't really get forgotten. He gets excused to a degree because the Pistons won the championship that same year. Obviously, that was a big flop.

You know, you have four Hall of Fame players in the top five and the Pistons walk away with the bust, whatever. But he was always a bad drafter. He let that team atrophy. He let the depth go away. He traded away young players even. You know, when you look at, when you look at a follow and, you know, these are bench players, but guys are could follow in Amir Johnson.

You know, for picks, he just, you know, that's not a big deal. But he completely failed to keep the team, you know, to keep the team in depth, you know, to keep like a solid rotation. And of course, it was it was the right thing to let Ben Wallace go because Ben Wallace didn't really have that much left in the tank. And back then, the salary got was very, you know, very substantial. but basically it was we got the starting five, okay, we won a championship, and now we're just going to basically just rest on those laurels, not voluntarily, but rest on those warles,

and just let the team atrophy. By the time 2008 came around, he rightly decided that the team's window had passed and it was time to rebuild. He just won about it in an absolutely terrible, horribly stupid way that I think was much more representative of his skills as a general, his actual skills as a general manager. Like, I'm not taking anything. away from him. He got everything together for the 2004 championship team. But it came, but it came time to actually keep that team well stocked. And then later, much worse, when it came time to actually, like rebuilding on the fly is tough. But he traded the wrong guy. He signed the wrong guys. The Pistons were a mid-wattery team for a long time. He was a terrible drafter. And then he panicked

in his final season and made a couple of completely idiotic trades. Actually, you know, excuse me, a couple of completely idiotic traits and, you know, one just abominably inexcusably stupid signing. We all know who that was. And beyond that, it's, you know, aside from Joe Dumars and Stan Van Gundy, it's been a long time since the Bistons had any GM. But I would, I would rank certainly Troy Weaver in terms of his performance as is better than, at least better than those two, it's been 20 years since the Bistons won a championship. Almost 20 years, the business won a championship. Put it that way. Okay. Now that I've gotten off of that severe digression, I will say about Troy Weaver, get back to what I was saying, that I think we're going to see in the next few years how things go.

It's odd it's possible. Some things will happen that will just not be in the pastons control. Like for example, goodness, forbid, like these injury issues, Kate Cunningham turn up to be long term. I mean, that's a big loss if that happens. I don't think it will. But I'm just talking about scenarios that could be conceivably out of his control where just injuries are an issue for key players, whatever else. But really, it's just going to come down to if he can execute on his long term plans and his next two. years. Development's going to play a key role in that. Of course, he's the guy who drafts the players.

So I would say the jury is still out. I don't blame this season on him. I certainly don't blame the last two on him because the Bissons weren't meant to be good at all. They were meant to be bad. But I don't blame this season on him either. I mean, he assembled a bit of a mess of a roster, certainly. A roster can't play defense. But again, this was meant to be another developmental season. And yeah, I understand that for a lot of people, that's a little bit difficult to watch, but that was just what it was going to be. We've heard that next season is when they really want to start making a step forward. It could be difficult to do so.

I talked about this in an episode a while back about what it's going to take for the business to make the postseason next season, which basically boils down to a combination of a lot of development. You know, drafting, you get a high draft pick. And, you know, maybe some helping free agency. It may or may not be very difficult to come by because it's a very thin free agent class. Most free agent classes are thin these days because all the best players,

rather restricted free agents. agents who, you know, who get new contracts from the team that owns their RFA rights or the really good player sign extensions. So, yeah, I'm just saying it's, it's really going to be the next two seasons. So the next three seasons. So let's get to the actual meet of the thing. I haven't ever been talking for 13 minutes and I haven't even gotten started. So Troy Weaver hired, I believe, June of 2020 right in the middle of the COVID summer. We can all think back to that all of us who were watching the Pistons back then. That was a nine month off season. It was not fun at all.

Basically, just a small number of teams who were nowhere even remotely close to the playoff line, you know, nowhere even close that they were, they were not going to be able to get anywhere close at all. We're basically just exiled, didn't get to play in the bubble. They basically were just told your season is over. The Pistons were, of course, one of those. All the other teams got to go and play at least eight games in the bubble. So, yeah, he came in then. And from there, I believe the entire roster was remade. inside of one year, less than that, actually,

because I believe that the roster turnover became fully complete in the summer of 2021 when Sekui Dumboya was sent off to the Nets and subsequently waved and he's out of the league. I'd still love to hear that story. He was at least on paper a very young player who had a lot of raw potential, very athletic, whatever. Nobody wants him. I got to think that there was a reason why he was dumped and subsequently just never picked up since,

even as a flyer by anybody. But, you know, let's get to it. So move number one. And I'm going to anybody, you can go on basketball reference, get a full list of anybody's trades. But some of them are, oddly enough, in this instance, not actually listed. So if I remember correctly, trade number one. was Bruce Brown to the Nets for, I never knew I didn't pronounce this guy's first name. I know his last name was Musa, and a second round pick by way of the Toronto Raptors.

So Bruce Brown was kind of, goodness, it's going to be one of the players I talk about a little bit longer. Bruce Brown was this, he'd been with Bessons for two years. He'd shown a little bit more potent. He'd been completely shoehorned in as a starter by Dwayne Casey in his working season on a team, you know, on a roster. excuse me, a starting lineup that already had one non-shooter, so two non-shooters around Blake Griffin. Of course, Casey's strategy was here, Blake take the ball and score with it,

so that wasn't as big of a deal, but it was dumb. He'd showed some improvement in his second season, but still was very much a minus on offense, but, you know, a super hardworking guy, you know, with potential as a multi-positional defender. You know, as long as you get a shot together, he could be a valuable role player. But was already, I mean, he came into the NBA,

I think I like the age of 22. So I think he was already 24 at the time. And probably just kind of a low ceiling player is inevitably just going to be, you know, he had a ceiling as an effective role player, bringing on particular teams. He's been good for the nuggets this season, but he's in the absolute perfect position. He has learned to shoot. That's important. He's also playing next to Yokic and Bruce Brown moves well off the ball, you know, cuts well

and so on and so forth. You're not going to find a better player to head to feed a player like that than Nicole Yokic. And Brown just in general, I mean, when he starts, he's the fifth most important starter. He is asked to do very little in terms of, like, actually, actual of his own agency. But he's a good role player there. Detroit Weaver will look at him and say, well, I just want to remake this entire roster. Or, you know, or did he just not see Bruce Brown as a player is worth keeping around, you know,

a relatively low ceiling role player who, you know, on a team that was probably going to rebuilding for the long term. well, whatever the case, Bruce got sent out. And yeah, that was the first domino to fall. Now, how do I feel about that deal? I mean, in retrospect, I feel fine. I mean, Brown couldn't shoot. He really couldn't shoot until this season. Last season he was, was that season before.

He played two seasons for the Nets. But he didn't really become like an actual honesty goodness reliable shooter until this season. He was going to take time away from younger players on a rebuilding team that believe he only had one season left in his contract. You know, it made sense. Was the return great? No, they waived Musa. It was only a second round pick, but that's what you expect to get for a player like Bruce Brown at the time.

So if I'm going to grade, you know, I might as well try to grade each of these. I'd give this one just a solid C. Not a good move, not a bad move. I don't really feel in any particular way about it. I don't think Bruce really had much of a role and much of a role on the, you know, three building pistons. You know, he seemed like a really good dude in a locker room leader. So, yeah, why don't we say C plus? I think it was the right thing to do.

He turned out to be a good role player three who's down the line. He was a solid role player for the next two seasons for a team that required even less of him than the Nuggets did. You put Bruce Brown, you put almost anybody who's not completely incompetent on offense next to two of, you know, two abs to three because the net's had a hardened at one point as well. Absolutely elite creators. You know, you can stand having a player who's not, you know, who's a very limited in capability on offense. So, but this season he is a genuinely solid role player. So moving on, and man, I got to go through these quite a bit more quickly, or this is going to take like three hours to record. So next up, this was actually a trade that was made before the draft, but not executed until after the draft.

And that was trading away a future protected first round pick and receiving from the Houston Rockets, Trevor Reza, as a salary done. and taking on Dilan Wright as well. And eventually, excuse me, this all got folded into, pardon me. So they took on Trevor Areza and the 2020 first round pick from the Houston Rockets. Trevor Reza was a salary dump. And they traded away that, Isaiah, that pick that was originally owned by Houston, and was heavily protected through 2027. That's the longest.

That is the furthest ahead you can effectively trade a pick for seven years. Excuse me, seven drafts. And, yeah, they received Houston's 2020 first round draft pick, which was number 16. So this is what ultimately got the past since Isaiah Stewart. And I really like Isaiah. I've been on this. I mean, I don't think he's like we'd be a high-ceiling player in the NBA. I think he'll be a role player for a long time.

I think he's a great culture guy. He's just a great locker room guy who can be a rotation player for a long time. What I don't like about this trade is that for a rebuilding team, it tied up the team's first-round picks for a long time. because basically how it works in that situation is, you know, you can't, this pick is protected through 2027. So if the pistons for that entire time, we're not going to be able to trade a pick except for on draft night. And we're not going to be able to trade a pick until 2029, period, because basically Houston or whichever team owns that pick, it's now New York. It went from Houston to Oklahoma City at the 2021 draft, and it went from Oklahoma City to New York in the 2022 draft. when a team owns that pick, it's basically until you find at the end of the season,

or until the lottery, or whenever it is, that that pick definitively belongs to you, you cannot trade it, you know, period. So it's basically, then also there is the Steppen rule as well. So basically, even after you find out that it's yours, you aren't guaranteed a pick the next season. Stepping rule says you need to be guaranteed a pick. You cannot be without a pick, period. I'll rephrase that you need, you cannot be without a pick in two future consecutive years. You need to be absolutely guaranteed a pick in one of those years.

So, you know, the Pistons, you know, sure, once that pick becomes theirs, they still, you know, there's no guarantee that they will have a pick in the following season. So once you get to the draft, the clock gets reset, and then you can trade and then you can trade. But it basically means no in-season trades for the Pistons. You cannot make one of these big trades, like let's say the Pistons really, like, are in a good spot next year and they, you know, and they want to, you know, make it a really good opportunity becomes available. and they need to trade some picks, and they don't, just they don't have them. They can't make that trade. So basically the Pistons, Sir Troy Weaver tied up the Pistons first round picks for a long time for a mid-watery pick. And, you know, that may or may end up not being a great thing.

You know, if the Pistons have, you know, one good season, like next season, I believe the pick has protected top 16. So let's say the Pistons are, you know, managed to be the six seed, which would be like a huge coup. Then, okay, the pick conveys. That's not great to the pick and bays. also that's a double-edged sword, but that picks, you know, that frees up your picks. Whatever the case. I mean, you take that into account. You take into account, you know, who Isaiah Stewart is and how, you know, and what he projects as,

then he, whatever, I'll give this one a B, just because I really like Isaiah Stewart. And that grade would drop where the pistons, you know, where we'd find out the pistons, you know, they were in position to make a really good trade, but just couldn't build a trigger because team wanted draft assets, you know, future draft assets. Next up would be actually draft night. So Killian Hayes, Sadieck Bay, Isaiah Stewart. Killian Hayes, like I said before the draft, he was just going to be completely awful. They should definitely draft somebody else.

I'm just kidding. You know, amongst the players who were available at that point. I thought that Killian, Killian was the one that I wanted. I thought he really had a chance to be this kind of high caliber for general, of the business really needed. Hasn't gone as expected to say the least. He's had some bright spots this season, but also a lot of very bad spots. It was horrible last season.

He only played part of his rookie season due to injury, but he was very, very bad in that. So I'm not going to go through and draft, excuse me, grade the draft picks. It's just, you know, that's an entirely grading draft picks when these players aren't developed, like unless players have already flunked is kind of, that's just kind of hard to do for obvious reasons. I mean, you can look and say, well, okay, should have drafted Halliburton. It's like, okay, well, in retrospect, that is clearly the right decision, you know, would him to draft Halliburton.

And for what it's worth, it was one of the B-writers who said this a while back that, yes, Halliburton did tell teams that he didn't want them to draft him, that he wanted to go to Sacramento, that had nothing to do with the Pistons decision to draft Hayes over him. Also in this draft, I mean, that was the COVID draft. You know, you couldn't really, the amount of available data and do the amounts of which you could work out players, everything was drastically reduced. I mean, you could look, for example, at Isaiah Stewart.

You could look at Sadiq Bay, and this is one thing about the 2020 draft. All right, so it was reported first by, it was out of Shams or Woj, said, okay, the pistons are keying in on, on Neesmith at number 16. Anya Smith got taken. Neesmith hasn't been good, Aaron Neesmith. He ended up taking Stewart with that pick. According to Desmond Bay and the Pistons called him twice and said that they might draft him. And the Pistons ultimately went with Bay instead.

And obviously, that was a wrong decision. Desmond Bain has been pretty darn good. But, you know, for most draft picks, you can say, well, they should have picked somebody else who went later. So that's not what I'm going to make this episode about. Another move, and, you know, he took on Tony Bradley and in exchange for a second round pick in that draft that became Saban Lee. Savan was, I mean, another good move. I mean, it's one of these things. If we're going to throw a great at that, it's like, okay, you take on salary, get on the second round pick at this stage of the rebuild and just pull the trigger on a guy.

think you can help you. I mean, that's a hard move to look down on. You know, Bradley, I believe they ended up trading away later on. Okay. I really hope this is enjoyable to listen to. I'm at 27 minutes, and I'm just at the beginning of the fucking 2020 draft. Excuse the language. All right. So, let's turn it to speed mode here. Okay. Next one, trading canard and four second round draft picks to the net in a three-team trade ultimately became the pick that became Sadiq Bay. The four second round draft picks were a little bit much at the time. I mean, seconds still have value. Whatever, beginning of a rebuild, you're trading away Conard, who was up for a new contract,

who did not fit the team's timeline. I mean, that's a trade I'll go back and look at and, you know, then easily regardless of what happened, unless you'd give like an a minus. The four second round picks were a bit much. That was because the clippers were concerned about his injury history. But you trade away, play like anard, get your first-round draft pick, you know, in the teens. That's a good move you make, period.

Next up, tradeaway Tony Snow and Kyrie Thomas to the Hawks for Dwayne Dedman. and then Bio-Dedman. This was a move to open up salary cap space. The fact that Deadman was stretched was pretty puzzling at the time. So, you know, Snow had no future with the Pist and Snow not really an NBA player. Kyrie Thomas just never really get a shot, but apparently it was not good enough to catch on anywhere else. He would play for the Rockets toward the end of that season and score a lot of points for a really horrible team, but he never caught on after that. So goodness gracious, I'm just going to stop grading stuff because it can get a little bit tedious and arbitrary, whatever.

this was a move that was meant to open up cap space. It was completely and utterly befuddling at the time. You took on a long-term, you took on long-term stretch salary from Dwayne Dedman, who in the Pistons are still paying. And at the beginning of a rebuild, it was like what on earth was happening. I mean, the purpose for this would become clear, not long in the future. So, and right, Tony Bradley ultimately got traded for Zaire Smith, otherwise known as the guy whom the Sixers, Brett Brown,

in his only, like, minor stint as acting GM traded away me called Bridges. You know, great move. And a first round draft pick, which they later used to bring on Tobias Harris to play number four option. And then maxed him instead of Jimmy Butler. So in any case, so really the next bit, you know, that move kind of was what it was. And they stretched Zaira Smith as well. Again, free up cap space. And then came the real Whopper, which was Jeremy Grant and Mason Plumley,

getting really all the cab space that had been freed up. So looking back, again, weird move. The move that obviously worked out quite well for the Pistons. I mean, Grant's did not help the Pistons win too many games. He was a good player. He helped the Pistons not be a complete joke of a team. And he also ultimately got traded away for the pick that became J. Lindurne. So cool.

Mason Plumley, good locker room guy, provided some passing, and was one of the absolute worst starting centers in the league in a season in which the Pistons were awful. and ultimately got the first overall pick. So you look back on it. You know, the gamble that Troy Weaver took on Jeremy Grant, which seemed stupid at the time, was actually a good one. Plumley ultimately had to drop 10 spots in the draft to dump him.

But it's tough to look back on these moves and say, well, these were wrong because the Pistons ended up with the first overall pick. Now the Pistons end up with the sixth pick, and, you know, maybe you'll look at things a little bit differently. Fortunately, Plumley didn't really cost all that much to dump, but it was a bit of a befuddling contract three years, and then you paid a dump him after one. But again, you look back on it.

It's kind of hard to say, you know, you look back and you say, well, all of these things, and Plumley played his own role in the business, ultimately having the lottery balls fall in their favor. Oh, yeah, one that I didn't reckon, did not mention was Christian Wood being folded into the Isaiah Stewart trade, but in exchange for enhanced protections on the pick. I had my doubts about Christian Wood back then. Like, during that kind of like half season in which he was looking really good for the Pistons and was a really exciting thing. in on this podcast we were talking about. Oh, is Christian Borgan to stick around?

I was never sold in the guy's attitude. He always noticed that his teammates never seemed to be very, he was always hard on him on the court. They never seemed on the bench to be particularly hyped when he had a big game. His attitude had been an issue before. Talented player, bad attitude. I was kind of a little bit, I was pretty iffy on paying him. Apparently the Pistons gave him pretty low-ball salary offer.

I imagine he would have ended up being traded later in the season if he had signed with him. No, I was not overly unhappy to see him go because the business were not trying to win. I didn't want to see the guy get willing to him money. Okay. And then traded Trevor Areza to the Thunder, got Dilan Wright in return. Dilan Wright in a serviceable guard. I'll talk about him later.

Signed Servetus. Go back to the 2019 drafts. We want to learn about Cervitas. Basically ended up on the team because I don't tell him some as his agent. Signed Jalil Okifor, who was a terrible third center. Resigned Wayne Ellington, who whatever, was a player on that team. Josh Jackson did not work out. Absolutely the kind of move you want to make.

And Troy We would make this several times after that. You take a flyer as a bad team on the potential high ceiling talents. Josh Jackson is not an NBA player, unfortunately, but it's absolutely the kind of move that you would make. Signed Frank Jackson turned out to be a decent player. Goodness, this is going to take forever. I really hope you're enjoying this. All right. So we move on.

Ultimately, in the middle of the season. Okay, trade Derek Rose to the Knicks for Dennis Smith and a second round pick. This was a favor to Rose. I mean, Rose ultimately wasn't going to be on the team. He did not have a future with the team. He wanted to be traded. He was traded the place he wanted to go. And the return was the second round pick that turned into Isaiah Livers.

A second round pick in a strong 2021 draft. You know, a pick in the high 40s. I believe the high 40s in 2020 was nothing to sneeze at. Dennis Smith was a reclamation project. Again, a theme for Troy Weaver. This reclamation project did not work out. And DSJ would flunk out with. with the Trailblazers in the next year.

This year he's playing, he's, you know, playing bad minutes for the horrible Hornets team. But the kind of move you make. Trade its fee, Mikhailuk to, you know,

and it's like a 20, 27 seconds to the thunder for Hamido Dialla. Again, another good move. Dielo doesn't look like things are going to work out. I'd be surprised if he is on the team next season at anything greater than the very small salary. He still can't shoot. He puts a point sometimes,

but he comes with a major cost on offense that you can't see in the score sheet. The idea was that if he can become a shooter, then he's a starter in the NBA. Completely agree. Didn't work out. Still a move you make. Traded Delam right to the Sacramento gangs for Corey Joseph and a couple of second round draft picks. So again, good move.

You trade a player who you're not going to use for another player and some draft capital. And Corey Joseph, of course, went on to become a Pistons legend. Not really, but he was a re, has been a really, by all accounts, a great locker and presence for the Pistons. And you get some draft capital in a bargain. So good move, happy with that. You go into the draft, you select Cade, obvious move. You have to dump Plumley, not ideal, as you drop, you drop 10 spots from the 30s into the 40s in a pretty, actually into the 50s, I believe. In, yeah, from 37 to, I think 52, I think Garza was the return.

Not ideal, lever, solid pick, Garza, Flyer, Balls at Copervita, remains utterly baffling. because, yeah, he was just a bad player in the NCAA with not really much upside. Okay, so you go into the off season. You signed Kelly Olinich. So, solid role player, whatever. You give him three years, a little bit weird. It's non-guaranteed, basically the third year. But you're making the choice here, he's your backup center.

You're making the choice between an athletic big and a guy who can stretch the floor a little bit. He'll least on paper. Unfortunately, Olinic would get injured and didn't really spend much time on the courts. He missed, I believe, more than half the season. This was not a great signing. It was a good signing only in the sense the pistons ended up being bad, and that you were ultimately able to trade him for Boyon down the line. But on the spot, it really hurt the pistons that they did not have an athletic big in the lineup

to play next to Kate Gunning him. Instead, he was playing next to, you know, most of his minutes next to Isaiah Stewart. And to goodness, forgive me, who on earth was the third string center on the team that season? Oh, right, ended up being Trey Wiles. Okay. So this was bad for Cade. Cade, who really benefits from having an athletic big on the team. You know, it's a pick and roll partner.

Isaiah Stewart is not that. And just having an athletic big on your team, most teams have several of them, is very nice. Catch lobs. You know, just be strong in the pick and roll, whatever else. Kate didn't have that. Isaiah Stewart made its life a lot more difficult in the early season until, you know, until the Pistons made a certain move I'll talk about soon. That was from Marvin Bagley. Signed Trey Liles, a little bit weird.

But, you know, solid enough role player to a small contract. I signed saving me to a multi-year contract, which was almost entirely non-guaranteed. excuse me, it was guaranteed for the first and second year, but not a very small salary. And then re-signed Roddy McGruder, whatever, solid, you know, solid veteran for the locker room. Signed Frank Jackson, a multi-year contract. Good idea. Fairly good idea. It was on a, it was a small contract, and Frank looked like he really had potential as a motion three-point shooter.

Didn't get it together. Signed Corey Joseph for multi-year contract. Most people are going to hate this, solid locker room vet. And, you know, it gave some money to D.L. again, good idea. Guy who developed, he could be a valuable player. You dump sacred in Boya and Jolio Loko for whatever for DeAndre Jordan,

cash, and some picks. Again, a little puzzling at the time he said we'd given up on. Clearly, there was something going on there because he hasn't been picked up. DeAndre Jordan went on to become a Pistons legend in the zero minutes he played, and the Pistons got some draft capital out of it. Solid enough move. And now let's

take a quick break to hear a word from our sponsor. NBA fans, it's time to bring the hoop section to the palm of your hand of draft news sports book. official sports betting partner of the NBA. This week, new customers can bet $5 and with $200 in bonus bets instantly. Plus, for a limited time, all new and existing customers to get a no sweat, same game parlay every day. Go to the trafficking sportsbook app today, opt in and place the same game parlay on any NBA game, and if it doesn't hit, you get a bonus bet back.

For example, you could bet on the upcoming tank bowl between the pistons and the hornets. Download the app now and send up with code TBPN. New customers can bet $5 in any NBA and get $200 in bonus bets instantly. Only a drafting sports book and official sports betting partner of the NBA with code TBPN, an major knowledge of the restriction supply so you show notes for details okay and from there it's quiet until you okay here's one that a lot of people don't like i know this so you trade roddy mcgrudor and the meaningless 20-22nd second round draft pick which i believe had a lot of protections on it it was going to be low anyway because it belonging to the nets and they were a very good team at the

time i think no whatever the case i remember this being like a pretty the pick was largely meaningless So Bobo has turned out to be a much improved player this season. However, let's look at where he was at the time. It was found that he needed surgery on another foot. So both feet at this point would have had substantial surgeries on them. He had been absolutely nothing special in the NBA to that point. So basically this was a player who was injured, who is going to need another significant surgery, and was going to be out for the rest of the season.

Kind of made sense for the pistons to avoid the trade. You can say, who is also going to be an expiring contract. With the Pistons have been likely to keep him. I guess the fact he was going to be a restricted free agent, but clearly, I mean, this was a flyer of a trade that they cost very little. Bull Bull was just a, you can argue that the Pistons should have just made the trade and saw what happened. You know, that's a reasonable argument to make.

Nobody could have seen Bull Bull, I think, improving to the degree that he did, however. In the vast majority of these cases, the player just fails out and you don't look back and examine this with the benefit of hindsight. But this season is much improved on offense. Still, notwithstanding the blocks, still major struggles on defense, much better attitude, which he's noted as an important thing. All right.

So February, that year at the trade deadline, of course, we know what's coming here. Trade Josh Jackson, Trey Liles. You trade one of the picks, you trade Sacramento's own pick back to them that you got in the Corey Joseph deal the year before.

And you trade away, yeah, the pick that the Pistons actually got in the drummond deal from Cleveland. So that was the last vestige of him on the team for Marvin Bagley. So Marvin Bagley, another flyer. He's seeing a theme here, a guy who was kind of stupidly taken at number two, but just wasn't working out in Sacramento. You hope that you can take some of that raw offensive talent and that he's no longer a terrible defensive player. It was a good thing for Cade. He wasn't good that year, but it was a good thing for Cade, because Cade finally had a guy who was just a, who was a vertical space, just drawing in the pick and roll could score at a high percentage in the paint. And, you know,

was good for him for the rest of the year. And again, you're taking a flyer on talent. You know, and Detroit Weaver would go on to sign him to a contract that wasn't a huge fan of, but whatever. Again, take a flyer on talent. That's for a very, very low cost. It was basically a meaningless second round draft pick, a potentially decent second round draft pick and a couple, you know, a player in Josh Jackson, who was pretty much done, and Trey Liles, who was absolutely disposable. So then we move on to the summer. Okay. So, yeah, Jaden Ivy and Jalen Duren. So, yeah, I was a fan of the Ivy Pig in number five. He was kind of my 1B after Mathrin.

Oh, sorry. We forgot this Jeremy Grant thing because it's a little bit later on the list. So it traded Jeremy Grant for a 2025 first-round draft pick from Milwaukee. And ultimately, during that draft, you know, at that point, it looked a little bit puzzling. Ultimately, like, I don't know, did he know beforehand that this was going to, that this was how things were going to go, whatever the case. You package that. You basically take on Campbell Walker's contract and send out that pick.

and in exchange you get the, and I think also a couple of second round picks. Yes, a couple of second round picks. And in exchange, ultimately, you get the draft rights to Jalen Duren from the, or basically the opportunity to make that pick became Jalen Duren from the Charlotte Hornets. Like, fantastic move. Sure. Jeremy Grant, a guy you signed for free. Not signed for free, but you got him free enough to trade for him.

You trade him away and, you know, he's basically getting a great return on that investment and that you can now draft to a – I was a big fan of that selection, Jalen Dern. So it came out of that draft looking pretty darn good. And we're getting close to present day now. Only took me 43 minutes. And I'm kind of concerned that's going to be a dud of an episode. But you take on Alec Berks, Nerlin's Noel, and two future second round draft picks. and I really was a big fan of this.

You know, that was, like, Alec Berks is a, you know, we've seen him this season. He is a solid veteran presence, and he is an elite shooter, like an elite three-point shooter. You can always use guys like that. Nerlin's Noel, Jalen Duren insurance, whatever. Didn't go on to play many minutes, but basically you're taking on two solid rotation players from the Pistons, how to use four, and you're getting second-round draft picks in the process. Like, fantastic. Also, Jalen Brunson, you know, you're also helping Jailen Brunson go play for his dad.

That was a joke. I don't think Pistons actually cared about that. But a fun fact there. Resigned Rodney McGruder. Again, just a good blocker and vet. All his teammates love him. And, you know, he's like the 15th man of the roster. Kevin Knox, no multi-year deal.

Again, reclamation project. Have you seen any of these with the pistons before that? The answer, obviously, yes. So Kevin Knox would ultimately be shipped out in the Sadiq Bay trade. He did okay with the business from time to time. It's a three-point shooter and a guy who could just run in transition, but ultimately just remains absolutely nothing special. But low price, whatever, not a bad signing.

It was just, I believe, just for one in one anyway. So cool, good job. Way to go. Signed Marvin Bagley to a three-year deal worth 37 and a half million. This one was a bit of a head scratcher to me in terms of the amounts because the person seemed to be betting against themselves. No team that had the mid-level, full mid-level, was ever going to give it to Marvin Bagley, like for obvious reasons.

No rebuilder was going to do that. And no team that had aspirations of, you know, competing for the playoffs was going to do that. They were going to use it on the player who can help them immediately. So it was a little weird that he got the money that he did. It's like not bank breaking for the Pistons, but three guaranteed years, like you're basically giving him three guaranteed years. He's not a team option for season three. He's getting more than market rate.

This was a little bit weird. So I didn't feel bad about it, but I was kind of surprised. And, you know, again, it's entirely possible Marvin Baggley won't be here in year three. The Pistons, you know, maybe can use him as matching salary. That seems to me to be as likely as future at this point because he really didn't improve much over the offseason. So slightly puzzling, probably less than ideal, but not catastrophic by any means. And I did that one a little bit out of order. All right.

So September traded Saban Lee, Kelly Olinick, and Cash to the Utah Jazz for Boyon. Obviously a great trade for the Pistons. I mean, all the Pistons haven't exactly had a great season, to say the least, but it would have been a complete another farce that Boyan weren't on the team. He was the best score on the team. He's terrible on defense, but he has been. basically essential to the Pistons being able to run something approximating a functioning offense this season. You do not want your young players to be growing up under an absolutely,

an utterly, horribly dysfunctional offense. It's just not good for them. And Boyan, again, has been a leader, and he's been a player who has allowed the Pistons to not be absolutely terrible on offense. I mean, he has been a genuinely very, very good NBA. Just absolutely, like, you can say three-level score. Most guys are not three-level scores. You know, three levels being, you know, able to attack the basket and score there, able to shoot in mid-range, able to shoot threes. And Boyon is legitimately a three-level score. It creates a lot of offense.

Expertly spaces the floor. He's a release valve. You can argue that Dwayne Casey wienes on him a little bit too much. Whatever, it's a different story. But this was a great trade for the distance. And then finally, this brings us to the most recent trade, which I'm not going to go into at length. But that was, of course, Sidique Bay for James Wiseman.

And there were two other teams involved in the trade as well. But that was that was it for the best. Basically in terms of the net result of it. And, you know, if you want to hear about that, I guess listen to the last episode, the previous episode previous to this one. So yeah, that's Troy Weaver in a nutshell. Well, not in a nutshell. That's literally everything he's done.

Basically, you know, for the most part, it has been taking flyers on, like cheap flyers on young talent. You know, cheap in terms of what has been traded for them. or just kind of signing them to cheap contracts. You know, taking on salary dumps for the sake of attaining draft picks. I mean, taking other steps to, you know, to help your team in the moment not be a complete, and utter joke. This would be Grant and Boyon, and in Grant's case, trading them for, you know, trading him for an asset later on.

And, you know, who knows, maybe Blion as well. And just generally maintaining cap flexibility moving forward. and the Pistons could have a lot of cap space this summer. So I think you look at his moves altogether. I mean, there's a little bit of weird stuff, like tying up your picks and Isaiah Stewart trade. And like bringing on Wiseman, you've already got Bagley, signing Bagley to kind of like an oversized, fully guaranteed contract for three years and so forth.

So there have been some blips there, but like just as you look at this in the overall context, you know, and for a team that really hasn't been trying. obviously to win these last three years. I'd say he's done, for the most part, the right things. However, it's going to just depend on the next three years when we see whether what he's done, just in terms of the roster he's put together, is going to work or not.

Not exactly revelation. But what I'm basically saying is, yeah, these last, well, this season in particular is kind of sucked. It's getting old watching the Pistons, you know, be a bottom of the barrel rebuilding team. but when it comes to passing judgment on how he's done as a general manager, say don't do it now on the basis of what's happening now. Do it, I would say we'll have a pretty good idea,

maybe just a couple of years from now. So that'll be it. I hope you enjoyed this sort of rambling and meandering episode. Hope I gave at least some useful insights and drew a solid big picture assessment. In any case, as always, want to thank you folks for listening, and I will see you in the next episode. Thank you.