Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 163: 2022-2023 Player Reviews - Isaiah Stewart & Alec Burks

Episode Date: August 25, 2023

This episode takes a close look at the 2022-2023 seasons of Isaiah Stewart and Alec Burks. 

Welcome back, everybody you'll listen to another episode of Drive Into the Basket. I'm Mike, your host, and I hope you're all doing very, very well on this Friday. First off, apologies for the late post date. As many of you know, I typically post on Wednesday mornings. In the event, travel has sort of got in the way, travel, and poor planning on my part, hence me posting on Friday instead. Hope some of you will catch this in time for your Friday commute home. In any event, let's get right to it.

This can be another episode on the season. and review series. And today we're going to be talking about Alec Berks and Isaiah Stewart. And, you know, I realize as I'm recording this, that I'm still doing the season reviews. I only got a couple left. That would be for Jalen Duren and Jaden, Ivy, both of whom I might give their own episode, haven't figured that out quite yet. But it's 25th of August and preseason is only about six weeks away. So pretty excited. This has been an extremely long offseason. Hopefully the offseason will start, well, it's been as long as the last two, but, oh, actually, no, excuse me, two off-seasons ago was shorter. That was the, that was the abbreviated off-season. Whatever the case,

this all goes just to say that I hope that the Pistons off-seasons will be getting shorter and shorter in coming years as they are playing well into April and May and so on and so forth. And that eventually, hopefully in the not too distant future, we're not going to be worrying too much about lottery odds and goodness gracious me, please spare me the big borderline agony of needing to watch games late in the season and be stressed out as if the patients are going to be able to lose or not. I hate that. I really truly do. Anyway, I'm feeling pretty good about next season, but we'll talk about that at a later date. So let's get into the analysis, shall we? So we'll start with Isaiah Stewart. So Stewart had a bit of a truncated year, only 50 games played, 47 of which he started.

He had some shoulder issues this year, which ended his season very prematurely. Pistons probably could have brought him back near season's end, but there was a combination of, hey, we're tanking, and we just want to lose games, and also why rush him back? I would imagine these are the two factors anyway. Obviously, I don't know behind the scenes, but yeah, so why rush him back? Give him time to recover, and I'll be back next season. Though I would guess if that's the case, then Stuart, who, as we all know, really just wants to be out there. and played basketball like anyone else, probably more than the average NBA player even. And Stewart's a highly motivated guy. It was probably frustrating for him. But in any event, yeah, so 50 games played. 47 games started, 28 minutes per game, and he averaged about 11.5 points, eight rebounds, 1.5 assists on 44, 33, 74 shooting. Split his time almost evenly between power forward and center. He started the season at center, then moved to power forward in early December after a period of injury. and for those first few games, he was playing power forward on offense and center on defense

because he was out there with Marvin Bagley, and the Pistons very well may, excuse me, Dwayne Casey, very well may have plans for that to be the duo in the starting lineup would be Stuart and Marvin Bagley from, you know, from the beginning of the season versus what we got, versus that awful, incredibly short, unathetic front court that we got. I'll talk about that in a moment. So in any event, Stewart ended up playing, yeah, power forward on all. offense while Bagley played center on offense and Stewart played center on defense while Bagley, of course, who was absolutely horrible defending its center, whereas Stewart's pretty darn strong. They had that arrangement. That only lasted three games until Bagley ended up in the bench,

and Jalen Duren ended up starting at center, after which Isaiah was playing power forward on both ends. And if I recall correctly, spent the vast majority of the remainder of the season playing power forward. He missed, again, a lot of the time, a lot of time in the late season. due to a shoulder injury that's happens in early to mid-January and it kind of cost him quite a bit in the way of performance, at least on offense in particular late in the season as well, particularly as a shooter. And Stewart really drastically changed the way he played on offense, even when he was at center early in the season. He just took a Tom Moore 3s and I mean he had been a primarily interior focus center. Well, you know, it's the effect of about, if I remember correctly,

about, you know, somewhere between 85 and 90% attempt rate, percent of his field goals, excuse me, were from the interior in his first two seasons. And even when he was at center, I mean, he was being used chiefly as a floor spacer. It was doing some center things, but Isaiah just isn't really all that great at those, unfortunately. Again, talk about that in a bit. So kind of hard to pick apart his stats at center versus power forward. Unfortunately, you know, statistics, statistical interfaces aren't quite that robust.

but let's talk about his early time at center. I mean, if you go and look at just some really, really basic statistics, like for example, and these tend to be, well, have been accurate, in my opinion for Stewart in his first two seasons, like defensive field goal differential, which is how opponents shot versus their own individual averages against him in the various defensive zones, well, not the various defensive zones,

like restricted area inside of six feet, instead of 10 feet. And so, you know, the three-point line and so on. Those were, if you look at those right now, they don't, you know, for this last season, they don't look particularly good. That's in part, or they don't look as good. That's in part because it's just different, him playing the vest, you know, the majority, or excuse me, right around 50%. You can't remember one of them. I think he played a little bit more at center, but time of power forward. He's just not as strong defensively that position. And his time starting at center, he was in a lineup that emphasized all. of his weaknesses. So when he started the season, again, I don't think that the Pistons have been

planning on doing this. I think that Bagley was going to be starting alongside Stewart. Again, just playing center on offense, playing role man, primary interior finisher. Bagley's strong in those while Stewart basically just shot threes, which is what he did alongside Duren. And then Stewart would, you know, be the interior guy and spare us needing to watch Marvin Bagley try to play defense at center. And don't get me wrong, Bagway, still pretty bad on offense at, uh, on the perimeter, but not nearly as bad as he is at center. He's still real bad, but not even close to his pet. So instead, we got treated to a front court of Sadiq Bay, Blamondonovich, and Stuart. Bay managed to decline for reasons that still remain entirely unclear to me, like completely

inexplicable from serviceable defender the season before to horrendous defender in this last season, what was his last, like, 60% of a season with the Pistons. Boyon, of course, is a pretty bad defender himself, and it just left Stewart and the team in Stewart as well in a bad position. I mean, the three of them, you had the most undersized front court in the NBA without a doubt, the least athletic front court in the NBA without a doubt. It was just the problem in all sorts of ways. And it caused problems for Stewart defensively, and Stewart is generally a strong interior defender with just a few weaknesses that can be issues, but, you know, for the most part, he's a pretty darn strong interior defender, or just a pretty darn strong center, a defender at center,

rather. But where his weaknesses why, and I apologize if you've heard me say this before, are, I mean, they're athletic in nature. Basically, if Isaiah Stewart had the leaping ability of, like, an Anyuka Kong move, then he'd probably be, you know, perennial, all defensive team Canada, but he doesn't. I mean, he's got great length, and he's very strong. I mean, he's got very subtle lateral mobility, particularly on switches. However, as in terms of his foot speed, he's slope, he is not explosive at all, and he is not a good weeper.

And when he was playing alongside Boyan and Bay and Ivy, who, I'll talk about this and, well, again, I haven't decided if I'll do a full episode on Ivy, but I'll talk about him in the next episode or two was arguably even worse than, boy on, probably even worse than Saddica. Ivy really struggled on defense. The upshot was that Stewart was surrounded by three bad defenders, like three genuinely bad defenders. And Stewart's, you know, where it's going to start causing him

trouble is if he needs to relocate a significant distance in the interior, because he can't get there in time to both do that. I mean, he can't both relocate and jump to contest a shot. So he'd find himself needing to just chronically relocate

to stop one of his, you know, the sieves, the three sieves around him, he's put it that way. Basically a lot of penetration got through. He just, he had to put out a lot of fires, put it that way. And if he had to dash out, you know, dash from a significant distance of the way, significant distance away, pardon me, to get to the basket, to get in between a guy who had gotten past Ivy or Boyan or Bay and get between that guy and the basket, he wasn't going to get there in time to also jump and challenge. And again, Isaiah is a very, very poor leaper.

So he'd often just get scored over. Also, I mean, Stuart, another one of the manifestations of those athletic weaknesses is that if somebody gets by him, he's not going to be, he's not one of those guys who can kind of turn and sky and block a shot from behind. So, I mean, if he's, like, there are instances in which, like, the average player might have been able to, the average center might have been able to do a little bit differently. Like, you get there a little bit late. A guy gets past you.

Still, you have a little chance to fly in and contest a shot. even if you can't block it, Stewart can't do that either. So basically, he was just put into a situation that really emphasizes weaknesses. Stewart, on the whole, is a very strong interior defender. He is a pretty darn strong, straight-down rim protector. He is a strong paint protector, and he is a strong switch defender. But this situation just emphasized all of his weaknesses. So he struggled at defense and center, on defense at center, rather.

He is susceptible to that. Again, it's his athletic weaknesses that are really, that really put a ceiling on in the NBA. I love Isaiah. Not everybody needs to be a star. He's not a star. He's a role player. That's fine. Fast majority of NBA players are role players. And, you know, I love what he brings in terms of his mentality, his professionalism, his work ethic. And he's definitely got some assets to offer on the court as well, needless to say. So, and then when he moved to power forward on defense, so I've seen sort of a, you know, some questions as to, well, you know, Isaiah is a really good switch defender, you know, why can't, you know, why can't he be a strong defender of power forward?

So it's not all about switch defense. I mean, when you're playing a perimeter defensive role, it's not just going to be, oh, here, like my opponent has switched on me and he's going to try to isolate from the perimeter on in. There is a lot of chasing guys through the interior, chasing guys around screens, stuff like that. That's where Isaiah's poor foot speed, poor explosiveness kind of came to hurt him at power forward. And so the, the, the result was that he was more just kind of an average defender at power forward. I mean, he's still had his assets. He's still a very smart defender. He's long. He's great at contesting shots. But off the ball, it's, yeah, it's not just switch defense. It's standard

perimeter defense. And if you make Isaiah try to cover ground through the interior, for example, and you saw this with Golden State, like, if you want to see a good example of this, and I'm not comparing Stewart to Horford, and I really dislike that comparison because Horford has things that Isaiah never will. In terms of his basketball IQ, for example, and his passing ability, Horford's one of the smartest players in the league. Even now, also age like, I think 36 or something like that, Horford is more athletic than Isaiah Stewart, who was in his third season in the NBA. But you look at what Golden State did with Horford, basically just make him chase guys through the interior, and he's likely to get there late.

And Stewart suffers from that. He has to go under every screen because he's never going to be able to chase guys around screens and so on. So he has his weakness as a power forward. He also cannot play really a lick of weak side rim defense, man. What's wrong with me today? Keep tripping over my words. Basically, he is not going to come out of nowhere to sky and block a shot. He's unlikely to even come out of nowhere to contest a shot because he's just, he doesn't have that explosiveness. And he's, again, just a pretty darn poor leper. All of this is to say that on defense, he did not have the impact he had had in his first two seasons. You know, that is what it is. It was a combination of circumstances really acting against him during his time starting at center. And then it power forward him just not

really having the tools to be more than kind of an average guy there. Now, as we look to offense, so as I mentioned, Stewart really changed up the way he played on offense. He became much more of a perimeter shooter. And it was kind of a mixed bag, but not because he was bad as a shooter. So he started out slow, like in his first five games or so, and then picked it up, you know, long before his shoulder injury in early to him in January, which really kind of put a nail into his season as far as his shooting went. I mean, he never just, you never got it got it back together after that. But in the 30 games prior to his shoulder injury, he shot close to 40 percent,

around three and a half wide open ketch and shoot three-pointed times per game. It was skewed a bit because he shot 52 percent in November, but he shot 36 and a half percent in December. And that's a solid mark. That's, of course, when he was, chiefly when he was starting a power forward. And his role pretty much was to just take wide open, standstill threes, and try to attack the occasional closeout, and maybe try to get the odd offensive rebounds. But I believe in Isaiah Stewart shooting. I believe in Isaiah Stewart shooting since he was a rookie in the league. I think he's got the touch. I think you'll get there. I think Isaiah will ultimately be a high 30s guy on chiefly wide open threes. So I know it could

If you just would have looked solely at his splits on the season and C-33, it might look a little bit depressing I would look at the period in particular in which Yeah, slow start, whatever, you can say what it is about that That slow start was only about five games and then after his injury Things really went off the rails But after that slow starts and for a very significant part of the season He was shooting pretty well

I don't expect he got a really routinely shoot 50% in a month but I think that he's going to be a genuinely reliable standstill, you know, wide open catch and shoot guy. So, you know, that's obviously big assets. With Isaiah, I think it's more, it's less that, you know, oh, hey, look, he can do this. I mean, it's going to make him really valuable. I think in just viewed in the lens of how limited he is on offense, I think it's more just that he has to do it to avoid being a negative because, you know, the guys obviously got no off the dribble game. That's not a huge issue in itself, but his handle is pretty poor. He's not going to be

attacking guys off the dribble, even if he can beat them with his first step, which can't, because he doesn't really have much of one. And can't play above the rim, kind of just like an average finisher. And if you're below the rim finisher, that makes things pretty difficult. Can't really play on the role super well. It's hard to get him the ball. Again, he can't catch Wobbs, not a strong finisher. So he's got his weaknesses on offense. And that shooting, I think, is going to be really key for him. And again, I think he'll get there. In terms of his overall offensive impact, Despite the fact that the shot was there for most of his season, he only played 50 games, this was a 30-game span.

Again, the majority of the rest, he played with the shoulder injury. You know, Isaiah has his issues on offense. I just listed them. And I believe his shooting is actually more valuable at center. Now he does have his share of offensive limitations at center, again, finishing, role man, et cetera. But if you play him at center alongside for the shooters, then, you know, you've got a solid spread offense.

he's still strong at setting screens and he finds ways to be useful and if you just absolutely cannot leave him open or anybody else in the court open at the 3.1 then that's a valuable characteristic and the shooting at power forward is more just okay well he can fulfill this bare minimum requirement from just about any perimeter player

if you've got to be able to shoot and even if he can shoot in the high 30s I mean that's solid but the fact is that the guy even then will have very very little just very little to offer even as a shooter because Isaiah is not beating anybody from off the ball. He just, he does not have that mobility. Basically, when he's going to get shots is when he is left open.

He's left wide open, and he can just basically catch the ball and shoot it without any contest from a set position. Just the poor offball mobility, you know, he's not going to be, he's not going to be exploiting into an open lane. He has trouble even attacking closeouts because his handle is just pretty poor, and it's likely that the defense is going to be able to get there and reset relatively well. just because it's going to take him a fairly long time to get to the rim.

Obviously, he can't elevate at the rim either. His touch at the rim is, you know, off the drive is sort of meh. It's not the greatest passer. He's, you know, he's a willing passer, certainly. There is nothing selfish at all. Like, Isaiah Stewart is in the, like, 100th percentile, unselfish NBA player. They guys don't care about doing anything,

but making the right play for his team. But there's not really necessarily much there either. So it's just there's a significant, an opportunity cost, playing at power forward, of not being able to give it to another guy who's going to be more mobile. And again, that's, that's just, it comes back to that being Isaiah's biggest limitation, it's just as his athleticism. So on offense, didn't have the greatest season either. I hope that ultimately he'll end up being, just primarily playing back up center with maybe some spot minutes of power forward, because I just, I just don't see it for him at power forward.

So on the season, though, I mean, kind of development season, try and do things. You know, I'd give give Isaiah, you know, like a solid, you know, B minus on the season overall. He didn't produce super well on other end. Again, at center that was largely just horrible circumstances. And, no, just give the guy B, why not? You know, he had his injury to contend with also, and he was playing power forward. It was just circumstances, bad circumstances at center and then put, you know, played in a position, a starting position, you know, not only that position, but also as a starter, which is not really all that ideally suited. But he went out there and played his typical brand of extremely high effort basketball, high effort team for first basketball, did all the things off

the score sheet you could expect of him just in terms of just working maniacally hard. And yeah, I've always, I will always really appreciate Isaiah Stewart and I'm glad he's been, you know, I'm happy about the extension. I think it's a good price and I'm glad he's going to be on the team. And again, he's a role player. He'll fit in wherever the team judges it best. And, you know, we'll see where that is. I feel like unless James Wiseman really works out, which I know there are a lot of doubts about. I have a certain amount of doubts there. I'd say Stewart's future is probably just his backup center, which is fine by me. Okay, let's move on to Alec Berks.

So Berks, 51 games played, a game started, 22 minutes per game, averaged about 13 points, three rebounds, two assists on 43.5, 41.5, 81.5 shooting, 60% true shooting. and Burks came out of almost sort of nowhere. Though, I mean, like, Berks has always been a, I mean, he's a decent bench gunner. He was dumped from the Knicks as part of the deal that also brought Nerland's Noel, and I believe a couple of second round picks in order to open up space to sign Jalen Brunson after Brunson had, oh, well, my goodness, you know, my father's the assistant coach, are you really going to, you know, tell us that a father can't discuss his son's, you know,

can't discuss his son's basketball future with him. You know, and if he makes it known that maybe the contract of this size could conceivably be offered, you know, by the New York Knicks for which you, you know, for whom he works, surely there's nothing wrong in that. Yeah, in any event, Brunson ended up going to the Knicks in occupying some of the cap space that this deal opened. Basically, the Pistons were largely responsible for that cap series being open in the first place because they took on Noel, they took on Burks and they took on Kemble Walker, which was, I believe, close to $30 million in cab space open for the Knicks. whatever the case. He came out of nowhere, not nowhere, but he came in and he's surprised, basically. He came in and he was an unexpectedly very, very solid bench player.

Had a career year of sorts at age 31. He did miss a fair amount of time due to injuries that were a mix of actual ends. Hey, we're tanking here. We don't want you back in the court, wait in the season. But excellent shooter, very high quality bench guy. Really, for what it's worth the best on off of any major rotation player on the team by a lot at about plus 10. just a guy who was just ideally suited to come off, you know, to come out off the bench and give you good minutes. Strong veteran leader did a, you know, surprisingly somewhat decent job as a creator. He had that game in wait December in which he like almost had the all-time perfect game for the Pistons. He had 32 points. He missed one shot. If you want to look at it from, from Stacky's perspective, he had 117% true shooting, which is, you know, about as good as it sounds. Yes, you can't

have over 100% true shooting. He missed that. first three-point shot really, really late in the game. And I was just wondering, it's like, dude, just leave the game, you know, doing Casey tick, I'm not blaming Casey, but it's like, well, I shoot it. You know, the game is effectively over already. But anyway, just onto his actual performance. Upwards of 50% from 3 when left wide open. It's about 41% when West wide open. MBA.com defines wide open as the closest defender more than six feet away when the shot is attempted. Wide open is 4 to 6 feet. Primarily and above the break guy too, which is great. That's where you most effectively space the floor. He was a top 15 catch-and-shoot guy

right up there with Boyan, which is remarkably consistent. He shot well over 40% in the first three months of the season before tailing off a bit in February. And not just catch-and-shoot guy, he created some offense as well, particularly from the three-point line. He was a 40% pull-up shooter on about two three-point attempts per game. He did okay on low volume when he was asked to create something out of nothing. You know, decent enough pull-up two-point guy when he was left open, though not great when he was contested. It doesn't really attack the rim all that much. Just a pure shooter, pretty much.

376 jumpers versus 58 layups and one dunk, though he somehow managed to get to the free throw line quite a bit. Nonetheless, a shifty, just a pure, quick... Sorry, I think you're hearing... I hope you're not hearing my phone here, but if he did, sorry about that. So, yeah, pure quick stroke. Safe with the ball, doesn't turn it over very much. A decent passer.

Nothing special, but he can make the pass. Can't make the right pass. not the greatest defender by any means, but not a disaster either. His sort of guy is going to help out any bench. And I think the Pistons really appreciated both his elite floor spacing and his veteran presence. He was just a, by all accounts, a solid, steady veteran guy. So not as much to say about him as about Stewart. Obviously, when you're looking at a role player, just chiefly a floor spacer who's coming off the bench at age 30, 31.

And there's just less to say. I mean, Berks is a straightforward player. and he was, I'd say, really up there in the league in terms of bench players. It's not like a six-man-of-the-year candidate, you know, by any means, but a strong bench player. You know, a strong bench player, a strong elite floor spacer. And it's just a steady presence. Played chiefly at Shooting Guard. And I think I just tripped over my words for about the 50th time in this episode, which is kind of pissing me off.

So in terms of his year, I mean, I'd give Alec Berks like a solid, you know, for, given his role, I'd give him like a, you know, a solid A-minus. I know, maybe I'm being generous there, but he did exactly what was asked of him. He came off the bench and spaced the Florida elite level and did some creation as well when he was called upon to do so. You know, maybe inch him in a B-plus territory when you take into account his defense, which really wasn't all that great. So, yeah, somewhere in that range. High B-plus, a-minus. So going into next season, I think it's kind of similar to Boyon.

And, I mean, I'd be surprised if Alec Brooks were, I know, this is more of, kind of like a season previous sort of thing, but he was a valuable player this season to have alongside the team's youth, and I think he will be next season as well. And I've had it asked well, or I've seen it asked rather, well, you know, if the business would move on to Blyon, why not do that and just move Alec Bairx in the starting lineup? And Bers doesn't offer as much as Blyon does. I mean, Blyon is just like a truly elite offball player in a variety of ways, whereas Bers is chiefly just a catch-and-chewkeye. You know, we can do some pull-up shooting. Also, basically, you want to play him next to us. it means fielding Berks at small forward, and, you know, you can do it. It's really just not an ideal

position for him. Just offers a less there in general. But the fit between he and Monti Morris, who doesn't really do a ton of penetration either, attempts a lot of pull-up mid-range offense, is going to be interesting. Well, this actually turned out to be a substantially shorter than I expected episode. I guess that's probably because I wrote down quite a bit about Alec Berks, but because he's pretty much a very straightforward player who just came off the bench and did exactly what was asked him in last season. Nothing glamorous about it, nothing ambiguous about it. I really just blew through that section.

So in any event, that will be it for today's episode. Again, next episode will either be Jaden Ivy or Jalen Duren or the both of them, haven't gotten that figured out yet. But I'm excited to say that we're getting closer and closer to NBA basketball for the 2023, 2024 season. So any case, folks, as always, I want to thank you all for listening. I'll catch you in next week's episode.