Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 179: The Monty Conundrum

Episode Date: January 4, 2024

This episode features an impassioned loss of patience with the team's astoundingly awful head coach and opines on the very, very frustrating loss against the Jazz, the disheartening blowout loss against the Rockets, and the relieving win against the Raptors.     

Welcome back. Everybody will listen to another episode of Drive into the Basket. My name is Mike. You probably know that already. And I hope you all are having a good, well, I guess it would be day, unless you're going to listen to this very late at night. It's about 11 o'clock here, and I'm planning to post this just as soon as I finish recording it. As I've said, I typically post on Wednesdays. But if there's a game on Wednesday nights, I'll often just kind of feel like waiting until the results of that, well, after that game, if there are any takeaways from it. There were certainly takeaways tonight, to say the least. And so let's talk about that. Now, we probably noticed we've been listening to this for a while. I don't often get into vent mode. Like last episode was about as close as I get to it. I just, I mean, based on, I just try to, in the course of just my daily life, just try to maintain equanimity. It's just kind of something I value in part because I had some issues when I was younger and I could be a little bit volatile.

That was something I was always ashamed of. I also just think it's a positive quality. It's not for everybody. It's not necessarily. I'm not preaching it as a quality, but whatever. Enough about that. I'm getting a little bit angry in this one. Just be forewarned.

It's not going to be like kind of screaming or anything like that. I'm just very upset at the results of this game and just the persistent problems, or one problem in particular, that just continue to plague this team. So, yeah, I'm sure that a lot of you are probably pretty upset, or certainly very upset, I would guess, about the way this season is gone. probably very upset about the way this game against the Jazz went, and probably upset about the way the game against the Rockets went, though that one was never close.

So if you're feeling really bad about this season, my suggestion is to watch, once you can do what I do, always give it a shot, which is, you know, watch old clips from inside the NBA, which I think is just a fantastic show. And for me is a real pick-me-up.

Excuse me. And I look up, this is a good one, inside the NBA, roast Lakers versus Bucks being $699, Rockets, Clippers, locker room drama, Charles Barkley's Phoenix Suns rant, Charles Barkley Diss's ESPN, Chuck's bracelet story, and so on and so forth. Inside the MDA is just a fantastic show. Those guys have just such great chemistry, and it's always good for a laugh for me. I've watched those videos probably about 10 times each.

So all that aside, I want to just give a quick plug to the blog. I've been writing for the last a month or so, it's driving to the basket.substack.com. I've just been putting out what I feel are very in-depth post-game analyses. They actually take me generally about, they've got video and just, I feel like go really in depth, and they actually generally take me about two hours. So thank you to those of you who are reading them and give me positive feedback. That really means a lot to me. And, yeah, it's just nice to know that people are reading them and would like to,

I would love to hear from any of you about thoughts, you know, how you're enjoying them and how I can, you know, how I can improve. So let's talk this game against the jazz. So I'm pretty angry about it. I've already said that. Let's look at what you get. Everything goes right for the business on offense, pretty much. You get a highly efficient night from Cade with, you know, 30 points, 12 assists.

Granted, of course, it helps to have, you know, you get a lot of assists when two of your players, especially Blyon or shooting the lights up, nonetheless. Did I have some turnovers to play badly on defense, which has been kind of a theme lately and as an issue. An issue I don't really understand, but I feel like the offense still outweighed it tonight. you get what this roster desperately needs from Boyan and from Alec Burks because way too much of this team shooting hopes were invested into those two guys is way too much. But you've got to combine 53 points, including 13 of 24 from 3. You get a pretty good game from Jalen Duren.

Just your team is scorching hot. You lose anyway. Personnel is part of it. Injury is a part of it. Like you're missing Isaiah Stewart, who, as I've said, is a terrible power. He's certainly not a good power forward to say the least. We're starting power forward in the entire league, I would say. But, you know, better than playing Isaiah livers at 36 minutes.

So, but injuries are a part of it. Coaching is a big part of it. Everything went for the pistons on offense, except for their coach. Again, the roster sucks, but Moni was the difference. He's been the difference in a lot of close losses. Coaches are meant to be the difference in the other direction. You know, they are meant to be the difference, you know, where you have a close game, but you win because your team has better managed than the other team

or at the very least your coach is competent. and makes the right decisions. Needless to say, that didn't happen. It hasn't happened all season. And I'm, of course, extremely sick and tired of the Pistons playing under coaches who cannot even be competent as on-court coaches. Basically, they don't at least not hurt their team. Every single coach that the Pistons have had, well, all three of them over the last 10 years or so,

has actively made his team worse. Of course, you know, he who shall not be named, whatever. That's what I call Stan Van Gundy. You know, he had one decent year and one kind of low averageer, and then two terrible years. He didn't get the most out of his teams, teams that he himself built. Casey, great locker room guy, by all accounts,

great guy overall. I was outdated and rigid and unimaginative and got Wes out of his teams. Monty Williams is, I mean, as bad as Van Gundy was the last two years and that was an incredible perpetual frustration for me because there's nothing that bugs me more in sports than bad coaching than the guy who's in charge

and as supposed as a professional being paid a lot of money and why can't you make good decisions? Like, you're doing things that are obviously bad, even to fans, just because they're professional coaches, doesn't mean they know best. Same thing with general managers, as we can see with Troy Weaver. And this being Detroit, I mean, you can point at one of the all-time examples of that,

Matt Mellon, who was an executive and was absolutely and utterly, hideously bad at his job. And you get coaches like that, too. Why has Monty Williams been so bad after he was competent in New Orleans and in Phoenix, limited but competent? And he's a complete and utter disaster here. Is he trying to get himself fired? hit his head really hard in the summer, who knows? But, you know, we've just got more of it. So, let's look at this game. His rotations were idiotic. Needless to say, the all-bench lineups,

which he's repeatedly vowed to not use anymore. They just, they come back almost immediately. Like, he vowed after the Celtics game to not use them anymore again. Like, you know, I think it was James Epper, who was asked, Edwards, excuse me, who was asked on Twitter, you know, have you asked Monty about the all-bench lineups? And he said, yeah, we asked, we've asked him a million times and he just keeps saying that he's not going to use them. He said it again. After this Celtics game, it took him nine minutes in the game against the Raptors to use it again. They showed up against the Rockets. They showed up tonight, nine minutes in. These bench lineups are idiotic. They are not going to succeed. I mean, no ifs, ends or butts. No lineup. I mean, number one,

it's incredibly, it's extremely rare to have a coach who regularly does this who sends out all bench units. You generally want to keep some of your starters out there for the sake of having better players in the floor, especially when you have like a bench. unit that's as horribly deficient as this one. You know, part of it's in the realm of absolutely no penetration. You know, zero guys who can really run an offense and can break down a defense or anything like that. Killian obviously can't do it as a disaster as a scorer. Marcus Sass was considerably better. As a score, he's worse as a passer. But just neither of these guys can do it. And the front office just said, well, we don't feel like signing a third string point guard.

It's just, I mean, most teams don't even play a 10-man rotation. But Monty Williams wants to play as Tedman rotation, even though some of these players suck, and he wants to put them consistently out on the floor, these bench players at the same time. It's idiotic. He does it anyway. Why? Your guess is as good as mine. So, you know, just take note. I mean, Monty Williams has been remarkably insincere with fans and media. This coach, you know, who had his reputation of being a good guy, does not care in the slightest bit about being honest with you. Generally, you can, I mean, coaches aren't entitled, you know, aren't, you know, we're not entitled to them really telling us a ton, but it's nice when they're a little bit transparent and they don't go out and lie to you on a

regular basis, which Monty is effectively done, pretty much. I mean, it's just a symptom of his, just general lack of give a crap about just about anything. Now, the thing is, you can avoid putting Killian Hayes in the forum, basically guaranteeing that you can lose your minutes. He just, Monty Williams has gone from burying Jaden Ivy in, in the rotation, or at least in the usage, chart and just not using him. That's a very talented young player who clearly can offer a lot and doing it for absolutely no reason. He's moved on from that to giving Ivy that role, but refusing more or less to have him on the floor without Cade, with whom he has literally played almost all of his minutes since coming into the starting lineup, even though it would make more sense to stagger them,

but he just won't do it. So Ivy will generally come out, you know, maybe with about five minutes left in the first half, and then Cade will come out close to the end of the first half, and then Ivy will end up sitting for like nine or ten minutes, you know, while between the time that Kate is on the courts without him and then when Killian is and then when Kate checks back in. Like tonight, Ivy was off the floor for more than 11 minutes after he checked out about seven minutes, so it's about seven and a half minutes into the first quarter. You had Killian on the floor for a lot of that time. Killing is hopeless as a lead handler. I mean, again, you were actively harming your team by doing this. Let's see what else. Yeah. He started livers. Livers,

I'll remind you, arguably the worst player in the MB this season, the worst rotation player, worst guy consistently getting minutes. He played him 36 minutes, third most of the team. Ivy played 22. Wivers, who sucks on offense. It was a minor miracle that he got 10 points tonight. He's been incredibly inefficient all season long. He's not going to provide you really much of anything in the half court beyond three-point shooting, which he does a bad job at. He was one of four tonight. So, Wivers, who sucks on offense, and for whatever reason, who knows, maybe all this is the cumulative impact and repeated injuries. He can't really play defense anymore. Again, he's super unathletic, provides hardly anything in the way of offball movement. Ivy does, needless to say. But I guess

this is why we have livers and why Monty Williams insists upon using him. Like, you know, he played in the last minute of the game against the Raptors, again, arguably the worst player in the league, in a situation in which the Pistons were desperately looking for a win. And he was terrible. His chief, like he was, I mean, this was after in the Celtics game in the pre-refer. game. He was comically bad and played for half of the second half of the second half and then was first man off the bench to play when, when Ivy fouled out. So yeah, he got to despite that, and despite being terrible all season, come and close the game against the Raptors and his net contribution was two shooting fouls. But yeah, apparently if you're Monty Williams, this is why

we have Isaiah Livers to make bad plays at key moments of games. So, you know, what do in this situation? Is Alec Berks is doing super well? For all I care, move him up to small forward and play Ivy there. Ivy, who had a bit of a rough defensive game, but is going to probably provide drastically more than Isaiah livers, nonetheless, because he's enormously better on offense, even though the person's doing well on offense, and he just provides more to his teammates on offense as well. And if you don't want to go with a three-guard lineup, because you prefer to have more size than that, why not play assar Thompson instead of livers. Yes, Assar does have major issues in the half court because he can't shoot, but livers can't exactly shoot this season either, and he's been utterly terrible on offense

from an efficiency standpoint. He has just been absolutely awful. Meanwhile, Asar, Asar, is the better defender, by far. Asar is the better rebounder, by far. He's the better passer, by far. And he just offers enormously more outside of offense than Wevers does, and the two are roughly equal on offense. So your options are, you can go with your rookie, who is the superior option, is going to give you more of a chance of winning, and you'll also get the ancillary benefit of giving him some warning minutes in a lake game situation. Or you can go with Isaiah Livers, who is going to give you less of a chance of winning. And you're also going to, you know, miss out for what it's worth on giving your rookie those useful learning minutes. So this should be a

pretty easy choice. It's win-win, on the one hand, and lose-lose, on the other hand. But if you're Monty Williams, you apparently go with lose-lose-lose. It's just Isaiah Livers. Isaiah Livers, very, very likely to be off the team at the end of the season, about 25 years old. And I just, I just cannot emphasize this enough, arguably the worst player in the league this season. Does Monty Williams care? Nah, why care? You know, why try to do the thing that'll give your team a better chance of winning. You know, why try to do the things that make sense? Let's look at Killian Hayes, who should not be playing in the first place, because Killian Hayes is terrible. He's in season four of his contract, yeah, he missed most of his first season, but in season two, he was one of the

worst players in the league because his offense is horrible. In season three, he was one of the worst players in the week, because his offense is horrible. He should not even been lined up to have minutes at all. The front office should have signed a third string handler in case of an injury to one of the point guards, which of course happened with Monta Morris. So that, that you have that guy who can at least handle the ball reasonably well on the second unit. But I wouldn't be surprised at all if Killian, you know, if they just had to be Killian or Sasser because they wanted to see what they had in Marcus Sasser. Because this front office constantly wants to see what it has and, you know, in players,

even if, you know, whether they're reclamation projects are just guys like Sasser who didn't, couldn't even do this in the NCAA or 23. And it's very unlikely that you're going to find another gear against the drastically better defense as you'll face in the NBA. Or, you know, see what they might still have in Killing, give him another chance. It's like, oh, we want to turn the things. corner this season, but we're still going to do this kind of crap. It's like an addiction that they have. Like, yikes. But Killian should not be playing. I mean, Killian is awful. He is just absolutely brutal as a scorer. Marcus Sasser has shooting upside, as scoring upside. You know, we've seen it. It's been

inconsistent, but he was a great shooter in college, and he's had times when he's been great, great with the Pistons. And he presumably has a future with this team. And Killian, very likely does not. So, yeah, it should have been Sasser in the first place, but Monty Williams won't do that. and we'll talk more about that later his not so great record in terms of actually focusing on player development and what is basically a completely lost season in which development once again is what you hope for you know is what you hope for development in first place but it's it's really you know the key measure of success in this season again but let's look at it so should have been playing in the first place uh inexplicably moni williams put him on the floor for two key defensive possessions uh the last possession that the jazz had in regulation and then a you know a key defensive position

late in overtime. He inexplicably did this, despite having Assar Thompson on the bench, Assar Thompson, who was already a very good defender. In these situations, you're not worrying too much about the offense, you know, which is Sarah is rough on offense. So is Killian. The only Killian has over him is better free throw shooting. Assar suffers there. But again, this was the last possession of the first half. Excuse me, the second half. It was the last possession of the game. You're not worrying about what Asar can do on offense. You just want to stop the jazz. And late in overtime again, you just go with the guy who's good hunt defense. You'd do.

badly need to stop. But not if you're Monty Williams. And let it be reiterated that Killian Hayes is not a strong defender. Like when play slows down and he's harassing somebody in the interior, when when that player is not moving very fast, then sure he's good. There's no doubt about that. He works hard. He's got good hands.

When a guy is actually in motion, which you're inevitably going to get in an inbound play in this sort of situation, killing has a hard time keeping up. In ball screens, he sucks. And again, you're almost certainly going to see a ball screen action for somebody to get shot, you know, late in the game like this. One of these things is going to come up in which Killian is just not a good defender. Killian comes in. He promptly screws up a switch and gives up a wide open three to Lori Markinen,

who is one of the best three-point shooters in the league. And then late in overtime, he, within a one-possession game, he fouls, I think it was Jordan Clarkson, before the inbound. I mean, he should not have been there in the first place. He just, he should not have been to the game in the first place. He should absolutely never, not at all, there was no sense to this, have been on the floor for these defensive possessions when you have a way better defender available. And the same thing happened against the Raptors. There was a purely defensive possession in which it wasn't Killian,

but Monty Williams chose not to bring out Isaiah Livers, who is not a good defender this season, by any stretch of the imagination, not even an average defender when he could have been an ASAR. But, you know, why bother doing that, I guess? Just along the same lines. I mean, he's basically forgotten about ASAR already. You know, why stop now? So, yep, you bring in your Killian Hayes, even though it's utterly point less than he's far from the best defender you have, and he screws up both times. And the fact that he got even a second chance after completely screwing up the first time, it just really typifies his career. You know, it typifies his career, excuse me, it typifies his time in Detroit, which is basically we're going to give you chance after

chance after chance after chance, even though you have been horrible. And then now you've got a coach who really likes him, you know, even though Killian, again, really bad the previous two years, not good this year, continues to get chances, even got to start at the beginning of the season over Jaden Ivy. And like Keith Smith, he wrote what I thought was a mostly good article about what he thought the person should do moving forward. There are a few things I disagree with. But I think on the whole, a pretty good article in which he said, well, if Monty Williams is not going to stop playing this guy, you should trade him in order to get him away from Monty Williams. And I completely agree because Moni does not seem to be able to help himself. Out of that, well, if you subscribe to

the idea that Moni's trying to get himself fired, which I know, I'd, I, you know, I'd, I've said, I think it's amazing that we've gotten to this point where there seems to be a body of evidence to support that that may actually be the case. I mean, if that's true, then, you know, then, you know, maybe that's why he's using Killian or maybe he's just outrageously incompetent. Again, doesn't seem likely given that he wasn't like this in Phoenix and New Orleans, but who knows, whatever the case, get him away from Monty. He's horrible. Play Marcus Sasser instead. The fact that he was in there for those two defensive possessions over ASAR is such bad game management. I don't even know what to say.

Well, I've already said it. You know, it's just unbelievable. There was, of course, also the characteristically terrible late game offensive management from a coach who has throughout the season in close games lost control of the offense in the late game. Tonight in overtime, the offense boiled down to Bleyan and Burks, just creating difficult jump shots off the dribble, most of which they missed. And that effectively froze out, Cade Cunningham, who is,

needless to say, the team's offensive pivot and its best offensive producer overall. Yes, Berks and Boyan were shooting really well in regulation, but these are primarily offball players who had most of their shots created by their teammates. And in any case, you really want to run an offense that's going to give you the best chance of creating a good opportunity on an income possession, and definitely not an offense that's going to hand the ball to two primarily offball shooters and say, you know, just please get us points by taking jump shots off the dribble. and it's going to be an offense that includes Kate Cunningham. But apparently this sort of basic common sense coaching is just too much for Monty Williams.

We already talked about Ivy. Ivy, who had to fight to even get a suitable role from Monty, despite the fact that he's a very important player for this team going forward and it desperately needed his help, you know, what he can do on offense. And I think that him getting that role, sorry for the throat clearing, I think that him getting that role may have been the doing of Tom Goraz, assuming that he was being above board in terms of him having discussions with Monty Williams about rotations. And of course, that press conferences, you know, I know, yeah, it was just, it was

completely incoherent. But if they had been having discussions and given the abruptness of Jade and Ivy finding himself back in the rotation and finding himself with a significant role, it's entirely possible that Tom Gore has said, you have to do this. You know, what you're doing makes no sense. And we need Jade and Ivy. So, you know, again, then refuses to have him on the floor without Cade. and then tonight just buries him in the rotation. Delivers again, sucks, but Monty doesn't care. Ivy's father came out with a tweet that said, smartest, random man on the room strikes again.

It's, you know, if you believe that Monty's not, like, trying to get himself fired or being incredibly lazy or whatever, and just thinks that he knows best and, you know, in the mold of, you know, I'm going to do what I think is right, and that's that. And this player X or player Y are just doing this or doing that, even if it would make sense. Sorry, it's just not a moment. my plans of the Doc Rivers variety.

Yeah, you know, that's a pretty apt description in that case. Let's see what else has been happening lately. Wiseman over Bagley, despite this team, you know, sure, you want to see what, I guess, what Wiseman gives you, though, he is starting for a remarkably low point. And this is for a team that hopefully wants to win some games. You've got to think that losing all of these games is not so great for the youth, not so great for the roster. It's not good.

It's humiliating. I mean, if you care about the fans, it's just awful. And you've got to think that putting in Bagley over Wiseman tonight probably very well could have made the difference. James Wiseman is not merely a project, but a project's project, as project-y as you will ever find in the NBA. And this team is constantly losing. You know, Wiseman basically, I mean, he's just the latest laughable nonsense that, you know, just happened to beat with the Pistons. I mean, he's the kind of player who, if he didn't play for the Pistons. and if they hadn't traded, you know, a decent rotational shooting forward, the likes of which

they could really use right now in exchange for him, he would be good for a laugh because he's just, he's incredibly bumbling on the court. In the game today, I counted, I think, 12 really prominent mistakes he made in the first half in 10 minutes. And in the second half, I mean, the best that could be said about James Wiseman in almost any game was he was not bad. It's not that he contributes. It's just, oh, he didn't, he wasn't, he didn't go out there and just be a complete and utter dumpster fire, like just a horrible train wreck. So, I mean, it's not being solid. It's just not being terrible. That's how low the standard is. And this guy's consistently getting minutes. The occasionally shows flashes. And then he reminds us that he is fully capable of being a

complete and utter dumpster fire. And the flashes are, okay, well, maybe at some point in the future, you will be able to be, it's like, you know, what do you think James Wiseman could be? I'd say that it would be a success at this point if he could be a third string caliber center. So it's like, okay, well, maybe someday in the future you will be a reasonably solid player, hopefully, but that's far away. And again, Bagley is not a good player. Bagley is much less bad than James Wiseman. I mean, Bagley is at least as fairly good touch on the offensive end, even if he still can stretch the floor, which is always going to be a key thing for him in order to stay in the league, because right now in offense, he's basically glorified traditional big. And on defense, he's still a disaster. He still has just horrible instincts in the interior. He's worth a lot more on offense than Wiseman. And he is worth considerably more on defense, too. I mean, Bagley is just a below-par NBA player. The common state of the default state of the average NBA player is NBA player. You know, for better or worse, some of them are bad NBA players.

Some of them are good NBA players. Most of them are average NBA players. Wiseman's default state is incredibly below NBA standards. You know, but we're just going to do it anyway, even though, you know, we want to see what we have with them. How much is the front office involved in that? Who knows? they're certainly not involving themselves and making Monty Williams make better decisions elsewhere. But, I mean, are they going to, they've already waived the white flag on Bagley, I think.

And given that the Wiseman trade was really edgy, are they willing to admit defeat on that as well as Isaiah Stewart going to come back and be the backup center, even though it'll push both of their projects out of the rotation, projects who should not have been relied upon this season at all in the first place because they completely deprived the pistons of center depth in a season in which the front office is like, oh, we want to win more games. And again, like I've said, oh, but we also want our projects. You know, we love our projects. And we're not, you know, we're just going to try to occupy a middle ground that's just going to be absolutely lose-lose because we're not going to prioritize fielding like reliable rotation players. And Isaiah Stewart can do that. It's like, we're not going to do that.

We want to try to develop these projects, even though both of them are almost certainly hopeless. But whatever the case, back to Monty Williams. He's a complete an income poop of a coach who is not only a complete, just completely horrible, whether it's deliberate or not, whatever. He has been stunningly incompetence, and I would say, like, I haven't been watching a ton of games elsewhere in the NBA, but I'd be shocked if he's not amongst the worst coaches in the league at this point. But, I mean, something else he's doing is in the course, again, of a season in which the Pistons are, I mean, the prospect of winning a lot of games, I think, is thanks in part to him. Also, thanks in part

to the roster, which was remarkably poorly built. It's just, like, the prospect of winning a lot of games is very low. This, again, is going to be another season in which, for better or worse, is just all about development. What Monty Williams is doing is prioritizing the now now by use of bad players who will help him lose games and also ignoring a certain amount of development. Like, it's absolutely dumbfounding how bad he's been. But let's look at Monty's quote-unquote development record in this season. I mean, he's finally moved past burying Ivy, again, possibly because of intervention from Gores. But he's, yeah, again, still refusing to ever let him play weed handler to help him develop that skill. And again, I don't think

Ivy's ever going to be a good weed handler. I think he's best as a secondary handler alongside a guy late Kate Cunningham. But, you know, at least hopefully to help him improve with his boss, you know, with his handling skills. But he won't do that. Again, plays Killian instead. Sasser gets DNPs in favor of Killian. And he was getting DNPs in favor of Berks early in the season. When Burks had been absolutely terrible, Berks has had three good games in a row. Great. Asari is left. I mean, this is also like worst of both worlds. He was put into the starting lineup when he was very unready.

Again, Asar has excellent defensive upside. Very smart player, hardworking, makes good connected passes, exceptionally weak in the half court. Worst guy in the NBA, worst shooter in the NBA who's taking any significant number of shots. Can't really drive handles pretty loose. It was just not ready to be in the starting lineup, especially if he was going to be, I mean, there was just, Jayland Duran already there, who is an on-shooter.

He put Killian Hayes in there, who's definitely not a shooter. But Assar realistically shouldn't have been in the starting lineup in the first place because he was just not a good fit there, and because that's really asking a lot of a young player who is coming in as raw as he is. Though he did his best and did well in some circumstances, but even you look at his stats, his stats aren't going to show the drain he exerted on the offense. And the offense was basically with the starters, just in general, the offense was basically at its worst through that period when he was on the floor.

But at least you're coaching him a little bit, you know, even if you, you know, you shouldn't have him in the starting lineup at all. Then you kick him into the bench and you just decide that you're not going to coach him anymore. You know, you're not going to do what's necessary. Basically, you're not going to make any effort to do your best with this. Like the guy, again, super raw on offense, you are not going to make any effort whatsoever to use him to the admittedly small number, you know, small amounts that he can contribute in the half-court offense. You're not even going to utilize him in that capacity. When he's on the floor, you're not going to utilize him in that capacity, you know, for his benefit, for his confidence,

for his development, let alone, you know, also for his teammates. So he can be somewhat less of a drain. So, you know, he can contribute some value and to such an extent as is possible, which is not really a ton, but is still something, ameliorates the impact of his the horrible spacing, the fact that he's a complete liability and has treble outswear. I mean, you do what you can. You do what you can with him. But not if you're Monty Williams. You basically just mostly plop him on the perimeter and have him occasionally, like, run

toward the basket when somebody is driving, run slowly toward the basket when somebody is driving and try to crash the offensive glass, but in having it on the perimeter, not only you not getting any value from him, he can't provide much on offense, but some is better than zero. You are actively making him the most damaging commodity he can beat in the offense, period, where it's like, okay, stand out on the perimeter where defense is not only will never cover you, but they are very happy if you're shooting. And there are still situations,

especially with the all-bench units in which he ends up taking shots from the perimeter to finish possessions that have otherwise broken down. And, I mean, I think he's shooting south of 20%. That's not a shot you want him taking. You move on to, yeah, we've mentioned Sasser, who's just not getting playing time at all. Duren is being used some.

You should note that in many games, is being used in a comically bad drop defense system that just simply leaves the handler open to shoot basically the handler comes around a pick and Duren just retreats. It doesn't matter if these guys can shoot in the mid-range. It doesn't really matter if these guys can shoot pull-up threes against the rockets. There were two instances in which Duren just backed off as per this scheme against Fred Van Vleet, who is a high volume and pretty accurate pull-up three-point shooter. And so Fred basically just, you know, got his shots, which doesn't make any sense at all.

it's a brainless and broken scheme. What's the point of it? I mean, are we trying to make life easier on Duren here? Are we just running this scheme just because the coach, for whatever idiot reason, thinks that it's the right thing to do? I mean, there's Cade, but, I mean, how much of it is really development when it's basically he's being asked to carry in constant, take the ball and score sets and spent much of the first week of the six weeks of the season

being played in lineups with drastically inadequate spacing and hardly any help. again hardly any help in fact in part because Monty completely just did his best to not give Ivy the role that he merited I mean the only player who's getting like straight on development minutes is James Wiseman again is almost certainly hopeless and even that might be at the behest of the fools who traded for him so it's just a mess it sucks I hope you enjoyed that rant I don't know I don't really know what to say about it let's move on so you did get a win against Toronto you had all the advantages granted but a win is a win as a win. It's important for these players. It's, of course, was, I'm sure, relief to a lot of us as fans. And then you saw in the next game against the Rockets, you know,

kind of what was up against Toronto, the Pistons had all of the advantages. At number one, Toronto had made a trade earlier in the day that it basically gutted their rotation in that, I mean, he was Anirnobe, who is, you know, one of the best defensive forwards and, you know, a pretty good score, one of the best defensive forwards in the league. And, yeah, like, I think an 18 point per game score. A pretty good three-point shooter can create some offense. And then you lose presses to Chua. I'm sorry if I'm butchering his name. I constantly forget how to pronounce it. Who is a rotation player, not a particularly good one, but a lot better to the alternative. Amalekai Flynn, who's not very good, but again, better than the alternative. And the Raptors

end up needing to turn to Thaddeus Jones, who is completely washed up. Auto Porter Jr., who is completely washed up. And Jalen McDaniels, not to be confused with his brother Jaden, who plays for the Timberwolves and is one of the best three and D guys in the league. Though I haven't looked at him a little while at how well he's doing from three, but nonetheless got a big contract that may end up working very well for the Timberwolves, whatever the case, much, much better than his brother. These guys between them, I think, had, you know, if you multiply the number of games, the Raptors had played by three, which is about 90.

These three guys have been DNPed in about half of those games, and they just get small minutes in every other game for the most part anyway. they all average, I think Jalen McDaniels, who again has been DMP in many times, weeds the three of them with about 10 minutes per game on average in the games he's played. These are horrible, horrible bench players, and the Raptors had to field them. And, you know, the all bench units for the Pistons actually kept their heads above water in part just because the Raptors were extremely shorthand. The Raptors were also playing in a way game on the second night of a back-to-back.

They had played away the night before against the Celtics. It was a very hard-fought game that they lost. by two. So they were playing in the second night of a back-to-back after a really, you know, hard-fought game they flew to Detroit. This was the third game they were playing in four days. And that's like these are almost the conditions for a scheduled loss. The Pistons had every advantage there was and they ended up winning the game by two in part courtesy of some horrendous late game management. And you know, part of which is just this team being a mess, but part of which again was just absolutely, it was just really, really bad coaching.

But a win is a win. Of course, you move on. the next game against the Rockets. And blowouts like that are always a possibility for a kind of roster which won his first game in 29 tries under the circumstances I just went over. And I think the reality in most circumstances for the Pistons in most games is that if Cade Cunningham does not have a very good game on offense and he did not against the Rockets, you know, whatever sometimes you have duds. Just I think the Pistons, if they don't get a big game from Cade more times than not

are going to get blown out. That's just how bad things are between roster and coaching. I mean, there are some things Cade, for the most part, has been very good. I mean, in his offense, is outbalanced. His defense, which has been this season befuddlingly bad, far worse than it was when he was a rookie. And he's a very smart player. I don't know what that's about. But, of course, he's been very, very good on offense. He, like, I've, I've, I'm, this is not an I told you so. Like, it's just you've heard me say this before. If I, before or rather, if you, If you listen to the show for a while, I continue to think that he has a superstar ceiling, a super smart player who I believe will be able to score at all three levels.

He's definitely improved as a three-point shooter. His last, like, 18 games overall have been very good on offense and, like, very good by any standard. And, like, he's really playing more calm and in control. He's not making the kind of really bizarrely bad passes he was making earlier in the season. he's just playing the brand of high IQ basketball that he played in his rookie season. And he's the most efficient, you know, after a slow start this season in which, again, yeah, he just started slow, I think, that his way over from missing almost an entire season cannot have helped things. He was also playing in a terrible lineup and, you know, in a terrible roster, excuse me, in terms of spacing in lineups by Monty Williams that were basically inviting failure on offense. ends like in a system which is basically K, take the ball in the pick and roll and run really basic sets into the interior against multiple coverage that everybody knows you're going to be able to do.

Everybody knows you're going to do. Now those sets, whenever he's in the pick and roll, he draws multiple coverage because whereas defenses were in part willing just because he was so inefficient and was just so unwilling to penetrate. I think he was really avoiding contact. Who knows, maybe it was just still slow at the time. They were willing to play him man to man to a degree, though the lack of spacing, of course. really hurt him. Now they are not willing to play a man to man. He really attracts a lot of attention, which really opens things up for his teammates. So he's been very good for the most part. That should absolutely be mentioned. Now, that's definitely a plus unquestionably. He does give away

a certain amount back on defense where he has been very bad, and he's still in that positive, but for the best and sake, that needs to improve. And again, I don't know what the cause of that is. At times, he just looks exhausted. I don't know if he's disengaged to some degree on defense, that would be a problem because you just don't want any player doing that. Ivy has been good. He's had a couple of tough games, but he's been good. I mean, he's been strong on offense. He's been surprisingly good on the offensive boards where he's just, every time there's a shot, he dashes into the interior. He's fast. You know, he's, he jumps high when he gets off two feet. And, you know, he's been good. He still has his struggles on defense.

I'd say he's definitely improved this season. Do I weigh this at the feet of Monty Williams, I don't think so. It's basically what Monty ultimately did was just bury him and not really hold other players accountable who were playing really, really bad defense. I think this could just as easily be this sort of improvement you hope for from a second year player. And this was a second year player who openly said that he knew he had been bad on offense in his rookie season. I think this is before Monty Williams was hired. And, I mean, he's a hard working player who's going to work hard to improve and be the best player he can be. But, yeah, he's had some impressive offensive games.

He is of late, really got it together as a three-point shooter. You saw a tenet against the jazz. What he can do even as a motion three-point shooting guy, and that's a very, very good skill to have for a player who has no trouble getting open. And I think that he is going to be a solid off-ball player. You also see him when he's allowed to taking the ball in stride, basically attacking. Well, not basically.

This is actually what's happening attacking from off the ball. And I think he's going to be a fine fit with Kate Cunningham, you know, under good coaching, of course, which is obviously, I mean, it might shock you to hear me say this. That's me being facetious, but they don't have good coaching right now. I felt like Dwayne Casey was never really going to be imaginative enough to use them well in conjunction. I hope that the next coach would do it. I kind of assume that the Pistons would hire a competent coach. Again, whatever, I don't want to talk about Monty anymore.

So other positives? Again, Berks has picked it up lately, and I'm trying to think, like, the K. Duren pick and roll has been doing well. I think Kevin Knox had one good game. That was nice. He did a surprisingly good job on Pascal Seaccom in that game. He actually – Seaccombe shot about three out of ten. It's actually not about – shot three out of ten from that game. He did have two shooting files, but shot three out of ten.

Knox did on Seacum. But, yeah, Seaccombe shot 11 of 14 against every other piston. Three of ten from Knox. Knox can be a solid role player. Excuse me, three out of ten against Knox. but Knox can be a solid role player if he can ever get consistent from three. He's looked a little bit less low IQ this season. I mean, that's been an issue for him too, not just the shooting,

but the fact that he tends to not make great decisions, especially on defense. He makes his share, a fairly large share of blown coverages and blown rotations, but he's looked better at that this season. It's just all about three-point shooting. He can provide very good explosive cutting. He knows to when to move off the ball. He's athletic, very athletic, plays above the rim. and he can finish pretty well in those cuts.

And he doesn't try to do anything he can't do. Like, I like that about Kevin Knox. He shoots threes, he cuts to the rim, and he attacks in transition, which he's pretty darn good at to, because he runs the four very well, and he can elevate very well when he's got a full head of steam. He can elevate pretty well when he doesn't have a full head of steam. But again, it all comes down to the shooting

and making decent decisions on offense. Beyond that, maybe I'm missing something, but, you know, those are positives at least, though, obviously, for Knox. That's a very meager positive. So I'm going to go from here to answering some listeners submitted questions. As always, just want to say thank you to everybody who submitted questions. Really appreciate it. So number one, if Cade ends up as a number two long term, so a second option on offense,

which, you know, what pathway do the pistons realistically have at acquiring a true number one option? So you kind of, at this point, most likely have to just hope to hit in the draft. that's about it. Guys like that exist in drafts. They sometimes exist outside the lottery or in the mid-watery at the very least, and the pistons hopefully won't be picking in a high lottery for much longer. But hate to say it, but that's your best route. I hate to say it because this team obviously needs more now side rather than upside talent. And generally those are upside guys, though occasionally you take a guy you think is just high floor and he turns out to be much more than that. It's extremely difficult to trade for a number one. I mean, just a guy who can be the number one in the championship team. I mean, it's just real. hard to acquire those guys. They don't exist in free agency anymore. Maybe you take a guy in free agency who just turns out to be way, way better than you thought he was going to be, but that's unlikely. I mean, you look at, like, in trades, maybe you get a guy who ends up being way better than you thought he would be like Bridges, for example, not Miles Bridges, McCall Bridges, who plays for the Nets. But even he's not, you know, he's not a true number one. I mean, he's definitely impressed for the

Nets, but that's a guy you might just want to be number two, if not number three. I mean, I think you'd be a fine number two guy in a championship team if you were playing behind a superstar. Yeah, so very small possibility of finding one of the draft, but I think that's where you have to, that's what you have to hope for. We are past the era in which you can sign a game-breaking player in free agency. Maybe it'll happen someday again, but, you know, you can't bank on that. So you're going to have to balance that if you're the front office, and if you want to get some more high upside talent at this point, you desperately need to balance that with getting some guys who can.

help in the now game ready players. And even then you still want some better and, you know, reliable veteran role players. So number two, best way to utilize his SAR. And I'll go over here as well, you know, was he the right pick? So best way to utilize his SAR on offense, have him set a lot of off ball screens, have him cuts of the basket a lot, you know, have him go in for, for Eliups. And I just have him moving off the ball a lot that at least makes his defender follow him, rather than just leaving him wide open to the three point line. Just have the guy moving and have the guy just doing whatever he can do, whatever little he can do, which again, I think is just screening is going to be a lot of it, and you can run him on the pick and roll. You know, you might get an advantage

there, and he's very, very athletic. You can get the ball to him pretty easily above the rim. And we saw that when Monty Williams said in this game against the Pacers, I think we're going to use a Sarmoor in a screening role that lasted for two plays. So do that. Again, just have him moving around running routes, ideally not roots that destroy your spacing, like routes along the baseline, just have him always looking for cuts, have him always looking for offensive rebounds, just crashing the board's hard, anything he can contribute. And absolutely not the way he's being used right now, which is basically here, Assar, just go be a spacing liability, which is just completely inexcusably lazy,

like beyond ridiculous. So was he the right pick? I think he was the pick who made sense for the pistons, unless they wanted to trade down and take a win now player like Taylor Hendricks, who has not really seen much time with the Jazz, though granted they have a pretty full forward rotation. I've seen it asked, couldn't the Pistons, like, you know, buy low on him? He was a top 10 draft pick. The Jazz are not just going to trade him away just because they don't have space in the rotation for him.

They're not going to sell low on him. Danny Ainsh does not sell low on anybody. He is notorious for just setting a price, even if it's ridiculous, and saying, well, if you're not willing to pay that, then, well, call me back when you've changed. your mind. The guy doesn't budge. And that's been to the detriment of some of his teams, I think. Like, when it came to, like, having way too many draft picks and not really have anything to do with them back in the mid-2000s, yeah, whatever, I might be remembering that story wrong. Whatever, it's Danny Age. So, unless the Pistons, we're going to trade down and get, like, a really game-ready player.

And I don't think, I mean, there weren't really many of them that, that's, or any of them, I remember correctly who really would have been useful in that capacity. What are we looking at, like, Grady Dick? I mean, sure, he's going to help you out, your shooting, but I think that's a little bit too role-playery, so to speak. You know, not the kind of guy even you're looking for with the Pistons, even if you're looking for a win-now guy. You could go with like Casin Wallace, who's been better than I expected, but also he's very much a guard and your two best players, two best prospects are guards. Like Anthony Black wasn't really a win-now player, but even he, again, as a guard. So if you're going with the guy who's going to give you the best probable upside in a

draft who's still available in a draft in which there are just not many guys are going to look at and say, well, this guy's game running is going to provide us a lot here, then, and also is not a guard. Then Asar was the pick that made sense. And I'm fairly confident it'll get together for whatever reason. I mean, you'd have to make a lot of progress as a shooter, but I'm feeling fairly good about that for whatever reason. You know, I kind of see a son's, excuse me, Mikhail Bridges in his future. I actually feel pretty good about it. But the issue is that, yeah, he's a project player. and it's fine if you draft him and you are not relying a lot upon him because this team, though I'm sure the front office didn't think this,

because these guys just have this incredible addiction to project, you know, and have from literally the day they drafted Cade. I've talked about that a few episodes ago. If you don't want to introduce a player who's this unready onto a team that really bad we need, more reliable role players and less project. And so they really should have.

have made the team stronger at forward, like period. And then you play him in minutes that makes sense for him. You don't put him in a situation in which he has to play a lot of minutes because this team, you want to have a better team. You want to, like you want to surround your important prospects with guys who can help them be, you know, be part of a functional team and be part of a more respectable team and allow them to run a decent offense and play decent defense. And so as good on defense, he's horrible on offense. And that was known when he was coming out of overtime elite in which against overtime elite opposition,

which is not good. He was a zero level score who, you know, by zero level score, I mean, I mean, he was bad from three point range. He had those last like four-ish games of the playoffs in which he went Nova. That's very much a statistical blip because, you know, he started pretty poor in preseason, got better in the regular season,

got worse again on the regular season and then got better for a short time in the playoffs. Not a good three-point shooter. Very little in the way of an in-between game. Very bad at driving layups in the half-court, strong in transition, but basically bad at everything aside from passing the ball in the half-court. Everybody knew this. So it's a situation in which if you have to give him time in the G-League, then fine, you know, put this guy in position to get his reps.

But don't rely on him. Don't have him be a big part of the rotation. Unfortunately, yeah, I mean, like I said, you put him in just the same. certain number of minutes that are situationally appropriate to the team. Unfortunately, none of that happens. So it's kind of a worst of both worlds sort of thing in that I didn't think you'd have a significant role and the team would also be short on qualified role players. So it's just bad for the team and the now. It's not ideal for development for even for a SAR either. You know, if I think for any young player playing in a, sorry, I just hit the mic by accident,

any young player is, you know, their best area to develop, their best team to develop, develop on as part of, rather the best roster, is one that can operate functionally. I'm not saying this team needs to be good, just that you want to give it the necessities to just the fundamentals. You look at Bluq Adanjich, for example, and of course, Luke is just a great player. But the second he came out of the team, he had shooters around him at all times, and four shooters around him at all times, three, excuse me, and a strong pick and roll center. So, I mean, Dirk was still around in that season, but coming off the bench,

I think he was still around him in Lucas' first season. Yeah, I feel pretty confident in that. Yeah, he was. Because I remember he was one of those. I hope you can't hear my phone alarm. So, yeah, Dirk was one of those guys who, was he and Dwayne Wade who got to play a few minutes in the All-Star game as future Hall of Fame guys who are going to retire at the end of the year.

But they put him into just a good environment for him to shine. That's what you want to do for your young players, for your important prospects. And so, you know, even for Sart Thompson, that would have been a good thing, even though you're definitely not playing around him, because, again, he's just not there on offense. I mean, he could help to ameliorate his lack of shooting by playing him with four shooters, like Isaiah Stewart at Backup Center and just other guys on the bench unit who can shoot. Obviously, that didn't happen. But let's say you play him next to Monty Morris, who is a very capable backup point guard.

and you play him next to Alec Berks, who's shooting like you should, and then you would presumably have Isaiah Liveris doing a decent job of shooting, which is, you know, which he's done, had done for two abbreviated NBA seasons and two abbreviated seasons at University of Michigan, all of them abbreviated by injury, of course. Or like a, you know, capable backup power forward, ideally that you'd signed in free agency because you never should rely on livers to be healthy anyway. I mean, nobody could have seen him being this bad,

but you should never have relied upon him anyway. He's completely unreliable because he can't stay. stay healthy, and even the best of times, even when he's playing well. So in that situation, if you have him on the floor with four shooters, then, you know, it ameliorates, it's still an issue. I mean, but it ameliorates the troubles caused by him being unable to shoot. It just reduces them, doesn't make them go away. He's not a player. You form an offense around to just surround with shooters, like Janus, for example. I mean, if you're going to surround a guy with shooters, you know, you want him to be the center of your offense, a guy who's really capable of attacking.

in that sort of situation. And the SAR obviously is just not there. I mean, he's a guy who's very bad even at just basic drives to the basket. And if he's your primary handler, I mean, he's going to get the Westbrook treatment. I completely get the Westbrook treatment unless he becomes a reliable shooter. And he even is a reliable shooter, like how he is right now is not just too much of a threat. I think he'll improve. But right now he is what he is.

But yep, he's not being put in anything like an ideal situation, even just for good development and building confidence. So it's just the worst of both worlds because he doesn't get that. Again, he's not even being coached by Monty Williams. And yet he's getting significant rotation minutes. The optimal, what is the optimal move to fill the gaping hole with the four? This could move, could be now or in the offseason. Sorry for butchering that sentence.

Maybe you hope for a high floor dude somewhere in the draft, somebody who's game ready. I haven't done draft research yet. I typically don't start until February. Sorry if that may be sound like I take myself too seriously. just something that I just wait until we're closer to March Madness and have a larger body of evidence. But also generally, I put in a ton of work into draft research in, you know, the time before the draft. And I don't really feel like doing it again in the first half of the season. I'd rather just wait and see where the pistons are likely to fall. Also, you know,

I would like to wait and see where the pistons are likely to fall in terms of where they're likely to pick. So maybe you hope for a player like that. Maybe you try to swing a trade, but that really depends on who's available and also the pistons don't want to be making a trade that is not advantageous for the future like you trade for tobias harris for example i don't know if he'll even be available for you know given the sixers have been doing well and why rock the boat and harris has been doing pretty well for them but you have to trade assets for a good power forward and the pistons are not high on those like i mean do you really wants to be trading a future first for just for the sake of getting a good power forward and the pistons only have two they can trade right now

2029 or 2030 and they can trade a swap in the other year but this is the product of Troy Weaver's first major decision being to send out a future first and thereby tie up the team's picks until 2027 and because the Stepping rule they cannot trade one until two years later because they have to be guaranteed to have to not be out be without a first round pick into future consecutive years yeah you just you don't want to do that I would say so So if you're talking about the power forward of the future, then I don't know. If you're talking about just somebody around the fringes this season, maybe that's possible. That'll just depend on who's available and what the price is going to be.

And we'll figure that out closer to the deadline at the Pistons. I think they're limited to we can trade you expiring deals. If you just want to clear some cap space or get under the luxury line or whatever else and maybe like a first round pick or two, you know, maybe the pick they have remaining from the Joe Harris, infamous Joe Harris salary dump. Free agency is extremely weak now. The best power forward, who is not a restricted free agent, who is not heading into his mid-30s, who is not chronically injured, and does not Pascal Seacum, and I'll talk about him

in a minute, is Tori Imprints, that's how weak it is. You can make pitches for restricted free agents like Patrick Williams, but I just never know where that's going to get you. I mean, I think Chicago would choose to keep Williams, who's really improved after a slow start and they need promising youth in any case, you know, whether they rebuild or not, they're going to need that. You don't just want to, you don't just want to send that away just because you're rebuilding. And also, you tie up a lot of your cap space until 48 hours after the moratorium ends. And that means that if you flunk, all that cap space pretty much goes to nothing.

Oh, who knows? Maybe you just use it to take on bad contracts in exchange for modest assets again. I'm going to say that sardonically, because obviously that's not what you want to do. And it definitely hasn't worked out too well for the piston so far. And then, I mean, if Kate keeps playing like this and gets his max extension, then you're going into the next season, or the next season, 2025 with a very modest amount of cap space, or not much anyway, and basically a lot of holes to fill that summer. And just to make note of that on that subject, I continue to see a lot of questions about why did Marvin Bagley get a three-year deal? And I agree that, you know, it's basically betting on him and proving quite a bit. And maybe it's a good value for those

last two years. But also I think it was three years and I think that they gave him a higher than market salary that he wasn't going to get from anybody else because nobody with Cap Space was going to spend it on giving Marvin Bagley $12 million. Nobody with a mid-level exception. These are generally teams that are trying to do something or is going to spend the entire thing on Marvin Bagley. I think that they gave him those three years and they gave him a higher salary to incentivize him to take those three years instead of betting on himself on like a one plus player option. so that they could have him under contract until 2025 when I think they thought they would have used all of their cap space, and then they could just re-sign him with bird rights.

If so, that plan obviously has not been very successful. Yeah, funny enough, I mean, thinking about it with Sadiq Bay, have solved some problems this season as a power forward-sized guy who can shoot threes. Who knows? It's possible. I think he'd be better than Isaiah Stewart, though. It's worth noting that his defense is still awful, which may not make him the ideal option in the first place, but preferable to James Wiseman. Oh, yes. So it's a solid player, I would say, off the bench. In any case, instead, we got the Stewart Project and two project centers.

So, yeah, I won't think too much about restricted free agents. Restricted free agents, either they are good and teams almost invariably keep them, or they suck and they get renounced. So Siakum, and I'm actually adding this after I finished recording the episode, because I completely forgot to talk about him. I said I'd speak about him in a minute, and then I just completely based on it. So Siakum, to me, has a few issues, and this is assuming that he'd be willing to sign with the Pistence in the first place. And number one, he is going to be 30, and there is the question of timeline. He's a, he's an athleticism-dependent player, and he's heading into the age range in which players really start to decline. That's maybe not enough on its own, especially because you

might be watching your cap space go poof. If you don't use it this summer on somebody, and maybe you just signed a disadvantageous contract, a little bit disadvantageous, because you're just not going to be able to use that cap space otherwise. It's not a good idea, or it's not an ideal situation. But maybe you have to do that. If the person's going to do that, I would have preferred that it be an Innobe because of the other issue with Siakum, which is that he is a bad shooter. And that's an issue.

That would be an issue alongside Cade. That would be an issue alongside Ivy. It's the fact that it'd be an issue alongside Cade is a problem. Because obviously you have Duren as well, and you've got two non-shooters in the lineup. Seacum is really at his best as a guy who is the center of an offense. But he is, which ameliorates his issues as a shooter. He's a decent passer. Or not ameliorates his issues as a shooter.

It's just that you have a team that's entirely playing around the fact that he can't shoot. Though right now he's playing with Yakub Pertil, which is obviously not a good situation, because it means you have two non-shooters in the floor, and ideally guys like Siakum, you want to be surrounded by shooters. But the issue with Seacum in that capacity is that he is not good enough to be the center of an offense like that. I don't want to call him budget Janus, because Janus is just a lot better in a variety. of ways, but it's a sort of similar situation where you've got a guy who just needs to be on the ball and needs you to play around him. But whereas Janus is really, really good on both ends,

of course, we're talking to offense here. He's really, really good on offense. Even Janus can run into problems if his supporting cast are not shooting well, or if one of them gets injured, especially in the postseason. So this is to say that Siakum's fit would, in my opinion, be pretty poor. Also, again, in the first place, you'd need him to want to sign with the pistons. Now, again, I know it comes back to the question of do you overpaciakum or potentially watch your cap space go poof if you aren't able just with expiring contracts and assets, expiring contracts you presumably obtain in the offseason. However, that's done. You know, hopefully it's not just taking on cap space, taking on cap dumps, do quote-unquote weaponized cap space and not actually getting much out of it. But in any case, you'd better hope that you have a high possibility or high probability or a decent probability of being able to.

to swing a trade either in the off season or during the season. Because otherwise, that cap space, a lot of it is just going poof in 2025. So in that situation, if it's Seacum or nobody, a tough call. You know, I would hate for the pistons to just spend cap space and a guy who doesn't fit just to spend it. But, you know, it's a real question as far as do you, where's the line there? Where's the line between you just going, you know, you're not spending that cap space in somebody who is not preferable for your team?

and when do you want to do that anyway because it's better than your cap space just going away. And if Ivy continues to improve, you're looking at a big extension for him as well, a year after Cade. And if Duren continues to improve, you're looking at a significant extension for him.

And so cap space may end up in the best case scenario where those players develop enough to get those contracts when they really become really good players. You just, I mean, you're not likely to have cap space, period, anyway. So that's a bridge that, the front office that's hopefully in the offseason and hopefully before the off season being led by a different general manager because at this point I don't think it behoves the pistons to maintain Weaver and let him make more decisions and certainly you don't want a general manager

backed up against the wall with demands for immediate improvement because that's a recipe for him to make panic moves that are not helpful. All right. Finally, trade targets and trade no-goes. Trade targets will depend on who is available this season again at a reasonable price. The only reasonable price. It moves this season for this team are low-cast hits on fringe players. Maybe, again, in exchange for expirings in a second or two. Expirings are not inherently valuable, so it wouldn't be for the, necessarily for the value of those. It would just be for, well, I guess, I guess in a way it would be, because it would allow these teams to clear some space for whatever those reasons are. We won't know more about who's really available until the deadline, because

the deadline, you know, the days before the deadline will really set the price. That's also when players will become immediately available for teams that really want to make moves. Until that it's just hard to say. No go is anybody who's going to be a win now trade. It'll cost significant assets that do not absolutely make sense for the future. Like 100% makes sense for the future. I mean, this is no, in my opinion, reason to make a win now trade just to improve a season that is almost certainly already lost.

And I think there are very few players you could add to this team we're going to make it an actually good team at this point. Like if you can get a player like that who's really going to make a big difference in the future and you can get him for an affordable price. It's going to be hard to swing that trade without losing Jaden Ivy, whom I'd rather not lose right now, then maybe you do it. But yeah, absolutely, I would say, do not make a trade that will lose you significant assets and does not make 100% sense for the future. And I think it would be very, very imprudent for this team to trade their 2029 or 2030 picks, even if somebody reasonably good is available, you know, unless it's just a

can't miss trade because, I mean, this is the kind of trade. If you're making a major trade and giving up substantial future draft capital or that plus a promising young player, you want it to help you get over the hump. You are not doing this as a team where the Pistons are right now, which is a team that still needs a lot of work. And of course, you get an additional first round pick available on draft night, but like which is the 2024 or 2031 is as long as you're under the apron, under the second apron, excuse me, you can trade seven years ahead. If you're over the second apron, I believe it's only six years ahead. It gives you an additional option. Again, do you want to be trading for our future first for a team that is this uncertain in terms of its future, I would say no.

If you do, it better be a pretty darned good trade, though I suppose you could protect it. Of course, you know, if you're heavily protecting it, then that really very significantly reduces the value of the pick. You can put in pick swaps, but you're playing with fire there. So that, I believe, will be it for this week's episode. Again, just want to plug my substack blog one more time, just mostly because I love knowing that people are reading this content and putting so much effort into. So at the very least, consider checking it out.

Again, driving to the basket.substack.com. Also, consider following me on Twitter. I'm actually doing work on Twitter now after avoiding it for a very long time. I'm enjoying the time I'm spending on there, putting out a lot of video content. So I'm at To the BasketPod. That's T.O. Not the number two. So it's T.O. the BasketPod. And as always, you know, would love to interact with you on there.

Anyway, folks, thank you for listening. I'll catch you in next week's episode.