Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 20: The Possible Market for Blake Griffin, Draft-Day Trade Scenarios, and Christian Wood’s Future

Episode Date: October 25, 2020

This episode explores the potential trade market for Blake Griffin, analyzes some spoken-about draft-day trade scenarios, and ends by speaking a bit about Christian Wood's future (or lack thereof) with the Pistons. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, everybody. My name is Mike. I'm here with Tommy. Welcome to another episode of Drive into the Basket. So, first things first on the agenda today, we finally have a probable start date for the NBA season. I believe that is December 22nd, looking to play a 72 game season ending before the Summer Olympics. Summer Olympics are sets begin on, at this point, on August the 9th. Of course, on 100% of this is subject to change, depending on how the, hopefully we're saying the remainder of the coronavirus situation is going to play out. Unfortunately, you never know when a vaccine is going to be available, how it's going to work and when it's going to be distributed enough that it's really, you know, we can finally put the situation behind us.

Everybody is hoping for sooner or rather than later. You just never know in these situations. But that's the projection right now. The NBA wanted to start late just to give themselves the maximum chance of having as many fans in the stands as possible. At this point, humorously, I mean, if Canada's regulations don't change, They're looking at having the Raptors play in Louisville right now, which would be pretty amusing. It happens in Major League Baseball.

He had the Buffalo Blue Jays this year, which was, I think, pretty funny. But that's what we're looking at. So it's great to have a potential start date. It's nice that they're not pushing it back to January to February, which were considerations. And given that the season is starting, I believe, about 10 weeks late. is sets to finish about six or seven weeks early. You're cutting 10 games out. It's depending on whether or not there is an all-star game,

and that's not certain yet, because, of course, if you don't have a widely distributed vaccine by that point, there's no point in having an all-star weekend if you can't have fans there. The season may end up being very, very slightly more packed in. If there's no all-star break, then you can spread it out and then probably just have the typical interval between games. So we'll see about all of that, all of it's subject to change, but it's good to have that finally set out. And the draft date, as we know, is November the 18th.

So that's not too far away for a draft that has always seemed to be very far in the future, especially for Pistons fans. By the time that rolls around, it'll have been about eight months without any Pistons basketball. So all that having been said, we're going to move on. to our first subject today, which is Blake Griffin. So a lot of you may have seen, or rather it per seen, whatever, a quote from Zach Lowe's podcast, the low post. Zach Lowe, I've said on this podcast many times. I think he's the best in the business as far as NBA analysis goes. Whatever the case. The quote from that show, he was talking with Bill

Simmons a bit. He said about Blake Griffin, enough people have asked me what I've heard about Blake Griffin and how he's looking that I think Detroit is going to have a market for him. Now, that's the quote that's really made it out there. The second sentence of that quote is, I don't think it's going to be strong, but I think there's still interest in what he can do to help you win. So the issue with Blake Griffin now is basically what do you do? He's a guy who could still have an impact on a team if he came back looking as he did two seasons ago, but does a team like the Pistons really want an impact player that's going to help you

win games, you know, if you want to be fully in the rebuild and not. not basically be straddling the line like the Pistons tried to do for such a long time. Or not really tried to do. They tried to win, but they were straddling a rebuild because they were never really good enough. But you don't want to be in the middle there. So obviously, I would say if the Pistons are committed to rebuild, you do want to move Blake, even if you just get a year of salary relief in return. But there are some complications to that.

So Tommy, what are your thoughts on the matter of what? should be down with Blake Griffin. Yeah. I mean, the first thing is that we have to see, like, how much the loss revenue affects the salary cap and if that is a factor, because Blake is still one of the highest paid guys in the league entering a contract that just ever increases. So teams are still going to have to, like, kind of weigh that as a factor

because you have to make room for him, basically, on your books. And there probably aren't too. many teams who are like a Blake Griffin away from winning. But I think, I mean, I was surprised initially when I read this line about Blake Griffin having a market because I figured he's paid too much and he's had too many injury problems, but I guess people are optimistic that with this much time off, this amount of rehab and he'll be able to play and contribute to a team that's trying to win. And to your point, yeah, if the Pills.

Pistons want to give themselves the best odds at the top pick, they probably should try to move him because if Griffin does come back healthy and if Wood is healthy and the Pistons managed to re-sign him, that could be an issue because even though there probably aren't too many teams that are going to tank, the only one I can think of is maybe Oklahoma City if they can find a way to move Chris Paul after the great showing he's had this season, which the contract he's on, that's still unlikely, but maybe it happens. happens, there is still incentive for the Pistons and any tanking team to be, you know, that worst team in the league because if you get pushed down by teams jumping you in the lottery, the worst team is still going to, I think the worst you can get at that point is fifth. And in the case of the, like the Warriors were the worst team this year. They jumped up to second, but let's say four teams had jumped them. The worst possible they could have had was fifth. So it's worth it for the Pistons to explore trades where you move on from Griffin.

You're probably not going to have fans in the stands this year. So that's probably not going to be a factor for the Pistons as they try to figure out what the best plan of action is for these next few years. The issue with me for me is a lot of teams are not going to be able to make that the money work. I know that there were some suggestions, but a lot of them brought back, like,

players who would still help you win. And that's the other thing. There are a lot of teams, there are not a lot of teams who have assets that the Pistons would want that would be, like, long-term assets, like very young players, who can still make that money work.

So how do you feel about it? I think that there are going to be a lot of complications. inherent to making any Blake Griffin trade work. As you said, there are the salaries. For any team that is above the cap, which is almost everybody, in order to trade out, basically the maximum amount of salary, like if you're trading out, let's put it this way. So the maximum amount of salary you can take back in a trade is,

if you're a team that's above the cap, and especially given how much salary you're going to have to send out to take Griffin. So when it comes to that, the maximum amount you can take back is around 125% of your outgoing salary. Again, it's different when you're sending out lesser amounts of salaries, but we're talking a team above the cap that's going to have to send out money to take back Griffin. So in that case, just to take back Griffin's salary, you're going to have to send out about $29 million.

and that is a lot of money. It's going to make it very difficult to match salaries, especially given that your better teams out there tend to be very top-heavy in terms of salaries. You're paying a great deal, a very large share of your salary cap to your best players. So it's going to be tough for the Pistons to find a suitor who can properly match salaries

in a way that would even benefit the Pistons. Like you don't want to take back, for example, an overpaid guy who has multiple years left. unless you're getting an asset in the process. I don't think that's likely for Griffin. But we can get to that. We can get to that later. So that's just going to be hard.

It's going to be hard if the Pistons are rebuilding to get a deal that's going to benefit them in the sense that you get some salary relief and it's a guy who's not going to make your team better. Who knows? Maybe you get a guy who's just a building block for the future. It's just very, very difficult to match salaries properly in a way that benefits both the team that wants to get better and the Pistons, the team that is rebrand. the team that that is rebuilding right now.

Even throwing that out the window, even if we're not concerned the difficulty in matching salaries, there are the complications of Griffin himself. Number one, there's an injury. They're the injury concerns. And like, for example, people point to Tobias Harris's contract and say, man, that's an awful contract.

Would you rather have paid Tobias? And unfortunately, at this point, if you look at the last two seasons, and if you're a team that wants to win, the answer is yes. Griffin had that really good season. but then last season just got completely wiped out. A guy who is paid roughly the same amount and is available and healthy 100% of the time has more value than, you know, even if he's two-thirds as good as Griffin.

You know, a guy who's available and healthy all the time is more valuable than a better player who is available and healthy, maybe half the time. And Griffin has been available and fully healthy about half the time has been with the business for about half of his possible games. The rest of the time, he's either been out or he's played injured. So that's a consideration. Basically, if you put this guy on your roster, when he's not playing, he provides zero value. In a way, he actually provides negative value because there could have been a guy who was taking up his salary cap space,

who was on the floor and helping you up. So that's definitely a concern. And also, it may be a particular concern for any team that's going to take back Griffin, is going to take Griffin and they can take back more salary than they send out. Who knows maybe they put some of the luxury tax with the current economic environment from the lot of the owners. Yeah, you got to worry about that. You have to worry about if he's really going to be around.

But even past, if he's going to be around, Blake Griffin is a very difficult fit on any roster. So teams play very fast-paced, a very fast-paced game. Now, I mean, some players are very good at ISO, but, it's generally about you know a lot of three-point shooting of course just a lot of passing a lot of very quick offense Blake Griffin plays kind of an archaic style he's a guy who does a lot of his work

down in the low block either scoring at the basket posting up or drawing double teams and kicking it out to an open guy in the perimeter and unfortunately that means he plays very slowly now also your offense basically needs to operate around him You need to give him the ball as much as you possibly can because once you kick him off of it, he is an extremely highly paid spot-up shooter. And he's decent at that.

He's not an elite spot-up shooter. It never has been. Of course, we don't have much of a sample size because then we really started shooting threes a couple seasons ago in 2017, 2018. But if he doesn't have the ball a lot, then you're not getting anywhere even remotely close to his salary value out of him. And just the issue with Blake is that he's not, you know, he had a great 2018, 2018, 2019 season with the Pistons, but he's not that kind of superstar who you can say we're going to run our offense around him and probably be like a really high, high caliber team. You're still going to prefer the ball to be given to other guys who can play a faster-paced offense and so on and so forth. So that just makes him, it just, and like, all right, so with the clippers back when he was much more athletic, he could, you know, he was a very effective role man for a time with Chris Paul.

And he was good, you know, you could cut. He could do whatever. because they move very quickly off the ball. The guy was insanely athletic. It's not that guy anymore. So there's an opportunity cost for fielding him, which is that you have to play around him. And it's very hard to find a good fit for him.

It's not like an issue of a guy, like a wing, you know, who can shoot threes and create offense. And it's like you plug him into any team and any offense, and he'll work out. So, I mean, and that was the issue with the Clippers when they maxed Blake Griffin originally. it's very difficult to build a team around him. You know, for one, you need to have four shooters around him, for him to really, you know,

for him to be maximally effective these days. And so, you know, and that's, that's it, that was like the, the brain trust for the clippers, the front office, they're very capable people, did not want to keep Griffin. They wanted to let him go. Steve Ballmer was like, I don't want a tank right now. So we're reassigning him. And he changed his mind, of course. But, I mean, that was a reason not.

just this contract, what they traded them away. It's, I'm sure, I mean, Balmer alluded to it shortly after the trade. So it's just, it's really tough to find that fit. You combine with finding that fit on a team where, you know, really makes sense for the pistons in that team to make a trade. I don't know. You know, I think it's going to be difficult to pull off. So, and I would say that though there may be a market and people, basically what's that flow, I think, was saying was that, you know, this is a guy who was a very good player a couple seasons ago. And there will be some teams. And I think that he left out, you know, if Griffin comes back and is healthy, you know, I think that's a necessary thing for any trade to occur.

If Griffin comes back and looks healthy, there will be teams that think, you know, who knows, maybe this guy can help us win and maybe then they make that trade. But I doubt the Pistons get any assets back in the process. I think basically the best Pistons can hope for is maybe, like, maybe a really a draft pick like really low in the first round like you know 25 to 30 who knows these are going to be the good teams that are wanting to trade for him they're not going to have high draft picks a lot of them you know some of them don't have any draft picks to trade like the rockets but i think maybe the pistons get back some some salary relief for 2021 2021-2020 and they get you know who knows maybe some a flyer on a prospect or two so that's the issue with blake

and he's not a value positive player at this point at all. And if he can't stay healthy, his contract is terrible. Everybody knows that. But there's also, you've got to wait and see because Blake Griffin played worse last year than anybody has ever, ever, ever seen him play before. He came back from injury and he was terrible. And that's never happened in before.

And then he went back and had another knee surgery, his fourth on the same knee. I don't know. That's where I think we are. Any other thoughts on the matter? Yeah, we were looking at some of these like trade scenarios and one of the things that came up is you don't want to bring on like a contract of similar value even if there's an asset attached. If it's if the big contract coming back is a long one because Griffin will be off the books in two years. You don't want to bring on like a three to four year contract of similar value.

So that's one thing that you want to kind of keep in mind is that we're one of the very few teams that is. below the salary cap and that'll be very helpful when it comes time to, if we do end up drafting like good players and we need to start using our cap space before they need extensions, it would be very important to not have money tied up in guys that we just brought in to get rid of Griffin's money because that kind of defeats the purpose of getting rid of Griffin. Yeah, I would definitely agree. There's, I mean, you can never rule out the possibility of another team doing something very ill-advised.

Like, who knows? I mean, I'm not, I don't think this is likely at all, but it's like, who knows? Maybe James Dolan says, hey, I want Blake Griffin, and we've got a bunch of cap space. And then if I'm, if I'm Nick's fans,

I'm looking for the closest, you know, cliff to jump from, but, but stranger, you know, things have happened. Of course, like, I hate to put it this way, but the Pistons, you know, it was a bad idea for them to trade for the Pistons to trade for Blake Griffin.

I thought that from the beginning. I still think that now you had a desperate GM who did it. I firmly, believe that you had a desperate GM who was desperate to save his job or president of basketball operations or whatever it's you know that was his title I believe so it's not on the question that you get somebody who does that you never want to bank on it though I mean I'm not I'm not making I think that as a possibility the other thing you know that people bring up it's like who knows

maybe he'll opt out of his final deal that is 39 million dollars you know or rather uh 43,000 short of $39 million. That would be unprecedented. Who knows, maybe Blake's super competitive, and he's like, you know what, I just want to go on a short contract to a team and win. Who knows how long his body will hold up. I don't think there's any reason to believe that his health problems won't get worse.

The guy put an enormous amount of work into his body just to stay healthy for three quarters of the 2018-2019 season. But, you know, again, Stranger Thirteen, things have happened. Some guys are incredibly, incredibly competitive and are willing to give up a lot of money to go to a good team. For those hockey fans who remember Tamis Salani and Paul Correa going to the abelanch in 2003 for peanuts as far as salary is concerned, didn't get them anywhere. They didn't win a cup there, but yeah. So of course, in that case, we're talking single-digit millions, of course. We're not talking probably before.

would be a salary difference of like of of more than $30 million a year or something. So yeah, so that's where we stand with Griffin. Again, I think what Zach Lowe to repeat is an excellent analyst and really has, is, you know, really has a lot of familiarity with what's going on in the NBA behind closed doors. I think what he meant is that don't rule a Blake Griffin trade out of the question. and if teams look at him this upcoming season and say he looks good and we just have to make a move and we're going to take this risk. I think the chances of him being traded in the offseason are pretty low.

So we can bring that on to some potential draft trade scenarios. And that's one that's been brought up. I know Bill Simmons brought it up on that very same podcast. Not that I think personally that Bill Simmons is a very good, source for basketball analysis. I think the guy is more just a talking head who thrives on controversy. But it's been brought up in a lot of places that Andrew Wiggins and number two for Blake Griffin and number seven.

What do you think about that one, Tommy? I don't like it. I don't think the second overall pick in this draft is all that high, is worth all that much, rather. It's still kind of banks on, you don't, we don't need Wiseman. I don't want to take Wiseman. think it would come down to that. It would be whoever's left over from Anthony Edwards or lamello ball. I know that there are people who are really high on lamello ball who would make that

trade just because they want lamello, if he's still available. Even for Anthony Edwards, I don't know that starting off your rebuild with Andrew Wiggins is a good idea. Ever since we traded for Griffin and as we've tried to remain competitive the last few years, one of the big arguments for it has been, we have to establish a culture. And I've kind of diminished that. It's like, well, that's just, that's not that important, you know, because this team that we've been fielding in the last couple years, they're not made for the future. They were kind of made to be good right now, but they nipped it in the bud, and that's, that's fine.

But now that we are essentially starting over, it is important to set a good culture. and I think you can bring in vets that establish good habits, and they demonstrate good work, I think, and I think that's really important for a young team. But bringing in a guy like Wiggins, even if you did get Anthony Edwards, who's a lot of his issues in terms of, like, what might he be, are very similar to Andrew Wiggins.

People question his work, I think, his love for the game because of what they see on the defensive end. You know, they see settling for jump shots. They don't see him going as hard to the basket as they would like him to. And I think that's a dangerous way to start a rebuild. That's one of the reasons why one of the guys I like this year is Tyrese Halliburton, who is, by all accounts, a very high character guy. He's gotten the leadership potential in his draft profile from some of the people who have

to him, he's very well spoken. That's the sort of thing that you want from a guy who's starting off your rebuild. So potentially taking in Anthony Edwards and Andrew Wiggins, I think that's dangerous. So even if it does get us out of Blake Griffin's contract, and even if Wiggins still has that potential, maybe the Warriors make us look stupid. And that Golden State Warriors culture really does a number on him and he actually plays up to his potential, I don't think the pistons are the team that are going to get that out of him. So I don't think trading for him is all that worth it this time. I'd say it's a non-starter because I wouldn't do it if I were the Warriors. So there are a few factors here. Blake Griffin, I mean, you compare his

health right now. Nobody needs to talk any further about Blake Griffin's health. Andrew Wiggins, I think, sure, he has been pilloried and fairly so for just being just selfish and kind of dumb on offense and really lazy on defense. And in general, just playing to well below his contract value. I mean, the max contract he was given by the Timber Wolves was certainly, that was highly questionable. However, now he's on the Warriors. He's no longer really a guy who's going to, primary guy is going to be counted upon to create office. offense. He's playing alongside the best shooter of all time. He's playing alongside certainly two locks for the Hall of Fame in Steph Curry and Clay Thompson. I think Draymond and all of a sudden

done will probably, though he's not for his ballot, I think especially if he wins another championship will be a Hall of Famer. They've got a great, you know, if you said culture, I'll say it at Golden State, they have a great culture. Sure, Draymond is, you know, definitely a hothead, but, you know, he's a leader over there. He doesn't put up with anybody's crap. Curry and Thompson are just, by all accounts, great teammates. You've got an amazing coach. Steve Kerr, I've said this before on the podcast. I think the guy is very underrated.

He has played with a lot of talent, but the guy is also just an excellent offensive coach. It's also a good defensive coach. So when you have Wiggins who can play, it can be the number three guy on offense with Steph Curry, who attracts an incredible amount of attention on the offensive end, because you can't give him six inches of space or he'll shoot and any shot he takes is a good percentage shot.

And, you know, you've got Clay Thompson who always benefits from Curry's presence. If they're on the floor together, then you've got to be basically assigning three guys to watch the two of them. You've got Tramond, who's who's excellent at running into offense. He's a great passer. You know, they could still benefit from him becoming a good shooter because he's a really bad shooter. But you put Wiggins into that alongside really good players and a good,

culture under a great coach and he's the number three guy on offense. I think he's in a good situation and he could do better than you might think. He's a talented score. Of course, a lot of a lot of the points he puts up are a little bit empty. He's definitely a ballstopper, but I think he could do well there. Also, he's extremely healthy. The guy has barely into double digits, like barely past 10 games and to miss to injury in his entire NBA career thus far. He has now played I believe five seasons, or is it six? I think six. So, you know, he's averaged about two missed games a year. I think he's a better value for the Warriors than Blake Griffin. He's also a better fit. As we said, Blake Griffin has to be played around. And Steve Kerr's offense really centers around prolific

ball movements, a lot of offball screens to get favorable matchups and so on and so forth. Guys are moving very quickly. There's a ton of passing. And Blake Griffin, doesn't fit into that system. You have to play around them, and you have to give them the ball as much as possible, and you don't really want to be slowing that down. You can say, oh, yeah,

you know, you can pass the ball out to Thompson Curry, and that's true, but why would you take the ball out of Curry's hands if you don't have to? I would rather have the ball in Curry's hands than in Griffin's hands. And if you're putting them on the floor together, then you've got to play around Griffin. I don't think that's a good fit for them. But again, also, you're trading away,

there's no guarantee, but you're trading away the probability of close to a full season of healthy Wiggins to, unfortunately the probability, the strong probability that Griffin will miss significant time throughout a season, if not become injured and miss the rest of the season. And then, though the Warriors have ownership that is willing to pay a grapple of money, they are a repeater tax team, which means that they're going to be paying, I believe, $4 of tax for every dollar of sale. over the luxury tax line, or is it above the apron?

I'm sorry, I've got to brush myself up on those rules. And Griffin is paid about $7 million more per season than Wiggins right now. The Warriors, for a salary cap, that's going to be around $110 million, and a luxury wine that I believe is $132, if nothing changes, are at $149 million in salary right now. That is a gigantic payroll. This would boost them on its own, assuming nobody else went over besides Wiggins would boost them to about 155 thereabouts. And that's just a lot more money.

Also, when you're that far above the salary gap apron, it really restricts what you can do with your, you can't use, I mean, they're not going to be able to use their biannual exception, but you can only use your taxpayer, mid-level exception and so on and so forth. So, and I like what you said, Tommy, I don't think there's anybody really special in this draft in the high end. Those of you who listen to our draft series know that I'm not very high Olimilla. I don't think he has a very high ceiling as a score. I think he has a very low floor. I think that Edwards has potential as a star level, highly athletic, creative offense on the offensive end. But, yeah, there are the attitude problems. and I've got definite bad attitude fatigue from washing drum in all those years.

Yeah, I think it's very important that Anthony Edwards ends up in the right situation. And I don't think Wiggins and Anthony Edwards, like I just said, I just don't think that's a good way to start our rebuild. Oh, I absolutely agree with you. Also, you've got three years of Andrew Wiggins in that situation rather than two, or very low probability of one, if Griffin, ops out in his final year. And, you know, I think that the chances of Andrew Wiggins spontaneously becoming like a good

number one option are zero. And if you put him on a team without talent, then that's what he is by default. So I think that that trade is bad for both teams. Another trade that's been brought up is the possibility of parlaying number seven into Boston's 14, 26, and 30. Boston just doesn't have roster space for three first-round draft picks.

Boston has ended up with multiple draft picks that they can't really fit more than once. I think it was in 2016 when they had, I believe, three first rounders and I don't think that didn't really work out well for them. They were trying to trade for Jimmy Butler. It didn't work out.

They tried to trade ball George. But the GM of the Pacers, I believe that was Kevin Pritcher, didn't want to trade him within the conference. So in any event, it would be a great trade for the Celtics. They get a higher pick and for whom they have roster space. And they've got to get rid of a couple of these picks somehow, you know, for better value in the draft or whatever. I think this is a bad trade for the pistons.

It's tempting to look at first round picks. I think this is just kind of a quirk of the human brain, I suppose, or just those of us who've been in sports a long time and see first. round and say, awesome. You know, first round, great. It's a first round pick. In reality, number 26 and 30 are really very close to the edge of the second rounds. And we now look at second round and say, well, that's not so great. The number 31 pick is actually worth more than the number 30 pick in its own way. The, and yeah, it's true that most second round picks don't become NBA players. Most of them wash out after, I think it's about, 25% of them, they'll go anywhere and 50% of them wash out by the end of their first four years.

I'm not sure if those statistics have changed in the recent past. But an advantage that second round picks have over first round picks for the team controlling them is that they have complete control of the salary they want to give as long as it's about the minimum. So you can basically you can give a player one guaranteed year and then a second and third year or is the second, third, and fourth year over. You want to do it because I believe you can give four years can be. partially or completely non-guaranteed. Whereas with the number 30 pick, you have that guaranteed salary structure. So, you know, and the difference in who's going to be available at that point is not very significant. So at the end of the first round, just your chances of finding really good talents are pretty low.

Your chances of finding players that will bust are, is pretty high. So 26 and 30 just aren't really worth a ton. you've had a good number of players to have, you know, successful players who have been drafted in the last, with the last five or six picks of the first rounds in recent years, but it's not something to bank on. And if you get somebody who sticks with the team, it's more likely to just be a role player. And the pistons don't need role players right now. They need quality talent. 14. Like, the way I see this draft, I'm not sure if you disagree with time, the way I see this draft is that it is weak in the sense that there's no really like sure star caliber talent.

Not that there isn't talent available in the top 10. I think that there is good talent available in the top 10. I think once you get outside the top 10, things get considerably hazier. And your risk in dropping from number 7 to number 14 is who's going to be available at that point. So you're really giving up a lot of control. And so you're dropping that amount. You're getting to like less sure thing talent.

I think, again, I think there is there is pretty good talents, you know, respectable talent in the top 10. once you're draft there, you don't know who's going to be available. You're getting into the more boom or bust talent. And your reward is two picks that will, in the realistic best case, in the realistic scenario, get you, you know, maybe one or two role players. I think the Pistons have to bank on. I have to look at number seven and bank on getting some actual foundational talent here.

Yep. I agree completely. 26 and 30. I mean, even 14. I feel like there are players at 14 that are working. that are worth, you know, taking a look at. Like there are guys who are kind of on the rise, like Sadiq Bay and Tyrell Terry,

that would probably be there at that point. But I really like the crop of guys that will be there at seven, you know. And that's kind of been the theme of this draft. It's like a lot of, it seems like a lot of these higher teams are, like, looking to trade down. There's just a lot of pressure that comes with, you know, making these top picks and, you know, might just be like a GM trying to preserve his job, you know, getting some, maybe some guaranteed

talent instead of one of these high-risk prospects like Ball or Edwards. But when the Pistons pick at seven, there's a pretty good chance that at least two of Killian Hayes, Tyrese Halliburton, and Devin Vassell will be there. And I'd be pretty happy with any of those three guys. Whereas if we make this trade, you know, the only guy who would, would be really worth getting excited about it. Fourteen who might still be there would be a guy like Terry, Sadiq Bay, and, I mean, if you want to get crazy, maybe Pocosowski, Tyrese Maxi, but all those guys just have significant hangups,

and I don't think that that's a risk that the Pistons should make. I mean, it's worth mentioning that the Pistons only have like eight guaranteed roster spots. Maybe that's a factor. Even in like Griffin trade discussion, like maybe you package a lot of guys together just to move Griffin and make the salary match. But I don't think the Pistons need to look to use the draft to get their roster spots up. So I don't really see much incentive for the Pistons here. Yeah. Oh, and a slight correction.

Tommy has noted that I'm a little bit behind the times. Apparently Lewisville is no longer an option for the Raptors. But nonetheless, you know, barring changes in the policies of Canada with coronavirus, I believe they have no choice but to place somewhere in the United States. So, yeah, in any event, I agree with everything you've said. I think the Pissons will really look to find a point guard in this draft. I don't think at this point it really makes sense of them to find somebody who can't lead the offense. They just have a desperate lack of guys that, you know, the guard positions are on the wings,

who can really lead an offense. and there aren't really many wings in this draft who can be relied upon to do that. Or at least people who are available at 7, like maybe Anthony Edwards is the one I can really think of. And maybe Denny Adjia, though he doesn't really have, he doesn't really have the athleticism, I think, to do that. But I've been wrong before. I said the same thing about Luca Dant, which I was like, I don't think he has the athleticism to be an NBA superstar. That's really neat, you know, an NBA star.

I thought it was more of just a high floor player. You know, of course, FDia wasn't really playing at a very high level in Euro League, whereas Donchich won the MVP at like age 19. So it's a big difference there. But, I mean, it's not out of the question that you drop to 14. And, I mean, Hayes and Halliburton are off, you know, off the board. 99.9% chance, I would say, unless, like, one of them breaks the leg or tears an ACL or pops and Achilles in the meantime. As things stand, yeah, Hayes and Halliburton would be off the board.

And it's not into not out of the question that you find a situation where, okay, we're at 14. Hayes and Halliburton are off the board. So is Terry. So is Cole Anthony. I don't like. I know you like him. But, you know, he's one of the top point guards in this draft for what's that that's worth. So he's off the board. Terry's off the board, along with Hayes and Halliburton, and in Lameleball, of course. And then it's like, well, you're shit out of luck, so sorry, you know, pardon the language. And, you know, maybe even Melodons off the board. This is an unlikely scenario, but it's not out of the question that you're left with a choice of players that, you just don't like it. So, you know, it's like, sorry, there's nobody who you, in whom you're really interested.

So, yeah, I really just don't see that happening. I know you had another draft scenario you'd like to explore. Yeah, this is one of Bleacher Report. Right. I know that a lot of people don't like Bleacher Report, and honestly, most of their trades, I don't like either. But, like, for the last couple of years, I've really wanted to do this White Side and Anthony Simons for Griffin Swap.

And I thought, I mean, now that White Side's a free agent, that's out of the question. the trade was Portland receives the seventh pick and the Pistons received 16, 46, and Anthony Simons. And Simons hasn't, he hasn't made much of a name for himself. He's been in the league, I think two years, and I think he's got two years left on his deal. But I find him very intriguing. He's kind of stuck playing behind Dame and CJ, and that makes sense.

They're both very good players. But I think if you give him the opportunity on the Pistons, I think he could break out because there was, I think, at one game in the end of his rookie year where Damon C.J. sat. And I think he won the game pretty much almost by himself, scoring like 37 over the Spurs or something. There's just a lot of potential there. And Portland, they do this a lot where, like, even when they have these lower picks, they never draft for fit. They just draft the best player available. And this is kind of what happens at that point.

Simons is still very young. I think he's only 20. He was like 18 when he entered the draft. And so what this trade would really be is, you know, the 16th overall, maybe you look out on a guy like Terry or Sadiq Bay or somebody like that being left there. But it would be Simons for essentially one of Hayes or Halliburton. And honestly, I think maybe that's a trade that you make. I'm not sold on Hayes. Like I'm so up and down on him.

And I think I've said exactly that before on the podcast. but Halliburton has his concerns with athleticism. I really like him as a complimentary player, but I think Simons has lead guard potential. So what do you think? I know you're lower on Simons than me. Yeah, I'm significantly lower on Simons than you. I looked at the game to which you're referring.

That was a game against the King is, you know, 37 points is 37 points. But the Kings played their starters, you know, about an average of 15 minutes each. It was a game where they mostly played from the bench, with Marvin Bagley, but leading the way a guy who's awful on defense. I believe it was probably other Bogdanovich or Yogi Farrell, who was guarding Anthony Simons, neither of whom is particularly great as a defender. Nonetheless, yeah, I'm just not hot on Simons.

I was not impressed with the sophomore campaign, which he was, this past season, he was quite bad, mostly fell out the rotation, or at least was, was, was, was, was, superseded by Gary Trent, I believe as far as third guard status goes, behind C.J. and McCollum. He did play in the playoffs. Didn't really do grades, did okay, but not great. I just don't think he's worth dropping. I don't think he's worth dropping to 16 for Simons. I think he's got talents. I think he's kind of more of a guy who would be involved in a more minor trade. So, yeah, I'm just not too hard. I understand that. Yeah, it'd be a risky move. And I just, Pistons finally got, you know, a relatively high draft pick in a situation where they're actually rebuilding.

I mean, they've had number seven a bunch of times, I think, or in that area. But this is the first time where it's like we're going into next season. We're probably, you know, rebuilding. And they have a lot of, really a lot of team needs. And I think having that primary ball handler is going to be, I think that's going to be, I think that is their number one need right now. Of course, what they need, their primary need right now is just guys who can reliably create offense.

That's their first, second, third, and fourth need right now. The Pistons have died on offense constantly over the past decade, constantly. That is where they have lost is on offense. And that's primarily been, you know, being without, I mean, the Pistons have had a tremendous number of problems. I mean, they've just, I mean, they've had problems across the board on offense, but just lacking star-level creators at point guard and on the wing, I'd say, is, you know, that's their biggest problem right now. So I just, I just don't want to drop when they,

you know, of course, leave it to the Pistons to finally be bad in a year in which this draft is, you know, in which the draft is so weak. It's like, you know, why couldn't you guys completely collapse next season when you have any, what looks to be an extremely strong draft? And that's one of the complications of the upcoming season. But yeah, I really just don't want to drop and risk getting somebody who's just risk not having access to the guys the pistons wants. I agree with that that Hayes. Hayes in a strong draft would probably be going, I would expect in the low teens. But, well, the low teams, I mean, like 12, 13, that range. You know, in this draft, I think he's, if he can fix his left-hand issues, again, I've said in the past, I think the guy could be a top 10.

point guard, which would really be a win for the Pistons. But, yeah, I think he's really their guy. However, I think it's worth noting. Yeah, the Pistons, it's also highly unfortunate. They have only one pick in this draft. I think, given the current economic environment, there's been a lot said about the possibility of picks being sold. A lot of these owners, like, you look at Tillman for Tittah, for example,

hated by Rockets fans because he's, you know, cheap. And some rumors came out reasonably about him actually forcing the Rockets to trade Chris Paul. Because he thought it was the worst contract I'd ever seen. I think Chris Paul was still hard enough firmly out of hand in it to. Who knows? Whatever. He's really disliked by Rockets fans. He's also disliked outside of Rockets fandom because the guy seems like a real sleaze bag.

But I digress. His business is, for example, he's all in a hospitality. any entertainment. Those businesses are not doing well right now, thanks to COVID, you know, for obvious reasons. So it's not just Hamets, it's other owners who may be willing, who may be looking to sell picks, both for the money and to, and to maybe avoid the guaranteed salaries. So I think it is, I would say it's almost a certainty that the Pistons will buy a pick, probably, you know, who knows, maybe even two this in the upcoming draft. If not, in the first round and certainly in the second round.

And as you look at Tom Gores, as far as I understand his business, it's, it really hasn't been hard hit at all. I could be completely wrong. So don't quote me on that. But also the guy has a ton of money. The Pistons wanted a G-League team in Detroit. The Drive said no. So he went out and bought the Phoenix Sun's G-League team from Sarvers,

the son's owner who is, you know, quite frugal. put it that way. Sun's fans would say cheap. So, and he'd say what you will about Tom Gores, and you can say a lot about his disreputable business practices and so on and so forth. The guy is willing to spend money on the team as much as it takes.

So I would expect the Pistons will end up with more than just this one pick. I would be shocked if they did not. Of course, that second pick, you know, could come from the Celtics. You know, they don't have, the Celtics aren't really a poor team by any means. But I'd expect they would get, another draft pick, if not a couple. But of course, you're not going to buy like the 16th draft pick that would be extremely unprecedented.

You know, if you're going to get one in the first round, it's going to be at the tail line, I think more probably in the second round. So, yeah, though, just to transition from, you know, what the pistons, where they are right now and what they really need to juggle going into next season as far as hopefully getting a strong pick and a much stronger draft is how is this going to look. a couple things. You know, one is Christian Wood, who's definitely a hot topic amongst Pistons fans right now. And increasingly around the league, actually, as fans are on the, I'm sure teams

around the league are looking at him and saying, you know, can we get this guy because he could, you know, he could be good. There's been some talk and this has always come out of James Edwards from the athletic. I haven't seen it from anybody else, but just rumors that the Pistons don't, I think the most reason way you put it was the Pistons don't intend to be a Dormat next season. I would really like the Pistons. I know a lot of fans were not. I really like the Pistons to be a Dormat next season.

I know Tommy, I know you would do. Because that gives you the best chance at a high draft pick. Like if you are the worst team, I believe you are guaranteed at least the fourth pick. Or is it the fifth pick? Fifth pick. Okay. Well, fifth pick in next year's draft still quite good.

Looks to be quite good. That draft has a ton of talent at the top. So, yeah, I hate to put it this way as a fan. And it would suck watching this, most likely. But, you know, for our best possible few, future and, you know, and for a Pistons team that has constantly not looked at, at giving, you know, sacrificing in the present of all teams in the league, you know, since, for a long time, you know, under Tom Gores and before him, apparently under, you know, after

Davidson died, under his widow who, I don't know if this is true or not, it's set just one of the Pistons to win as much as possible to pump the value of the team because she was planning on selling. Again, so if it's true or not. Pistons, more than any other team of the past decade, have not been willing to sacrifice in the present for the sake of the future. So for a team that's, yeah, if you're going to sacrifice in the presence, do it this year, be awful and get a high pick in what's looking to be an extremely strong draft. So, yeah, I would like to see the Pistons be a dormant. James Edward is saying, you know,

I'm hearing increasingly that the team wants to be at least somewhat competitive. And it's like, I really don't see why you would do that. You know, unless you, get an incredible talent unless, you know, you draft Killian Hayes and he turns into a superstar or something like that. Even if he does turn into superstar, you don't have the pieces. You just don't have the pieces. You keep, you get that somehow a superstar on this draft and you have Christian Wood and cool, then you still don't have the pieces. So sorry, unless somebody on the team makes an incredible leap. You kind of have to at least have one more high draft pick. So, you know, I know, you'd be, you know, you'd be just disappointed as I am, if the Pistons.

choose to go out and try to focus it all on winning instead of, instead of on being competitive. You know, it's just your chances, if you are not a huge market team, your chances of executing a successful rebuild on a very short-term basis are extraordinarily low. Like even Dallas went in on, I mean, I think their rebuild was three years. They managed to pick up, Donchich ended up being even better than people thought. And, you know, even having, for example, Dennis Smith Jr., whom they used to pick up Porzingis, that was an awful trade for the Knicks. But, you know, that's just how it goes sometimes. Yeah, it was, I always just laugh at that one because that was such a, that was just such a weird situation.

Because, like, after that happened, everybody was just saying, well, nobody else knew that Porzingis was up for grabs. But, I mean, that's the kind of crazy move that has to happen for a team to take the next step. Like, the Mabs, they almost, they took. the clippers to six, I think. And that was while Porzingis had significant injuries. And it shows like the importance of these drafting these young stars and putting a good team around them quickly because even if you like hit on one pick really well, you have to incentivize them to stay there or else we'll dip out to Los Angeles or Florida. So I don't. Yeah, agree completely. I mean, just a winning team.

They don't want to stick in an organization that's not making big moves for the future. And I was reading a thread in the Orlando Magic Subreddit where they were kind of coming to terms with the fact that they are very mediocre. Their best players are all over 25. Their young guys don't look to be that special. And it's like, well, that's what the Pistons are trying to avoid now. And this goes back to the whole, I think the Pistons will buy more draft picks. It's because our organizations finally seems to understand that the best way to win and to get value out of the draft is to go all in on getting high picks and development staff.

And they brought Weaver in because of his reputation as a good drafter and a guy who can project what a player will be. So I don't think that the Pistons would squander that by trying to be good. And that's why I think the idea of, like, I saw DeRosen to Detroit because he doesn't like the Spurgers. What a joke. Yeah, he went out there and said that's not true. But, you know, the mere idea was ridiculous of coming to Detroit. That's exactly it.

It's like there's just, I don't see the, I would be extremely surprised. Let me put it that way. I would be extremely surprised if the Pistons made win not moves. When they, the last 20 games of the season, they weren't bad. Like, we had a lot of close losses. And I think that was, I think that's like the best case scenario. It's very hard to straddle that line of, all right, we want to be competitive, but we still want to lose.

But those last 20 games were kind of like the best case scenario. It was fun to watch Christian Wood, involved before our eyes. But I would just be very surprised by that. Yeah, you don't want your team to be like, oh, well, I'll say first, like about, you draft a superstars. It's not only about keeping him around. It's just that if you draft that one guy and you don't have the rest of your pieces, it's like, okay, now you've got a situation, like, I don't think Devin Booker is a superstar, but you've got that kind of situation where you've got a very good score, and nobody next to

them. I mean, it's like, congratulations, your team still sucks. Only now you don't, well, the son somehow managed to suck enough to get the first overall pick, but, but yeah, you don't want a team that's going to be absolutely terrible. I mean, that is really tough on the players. Like the Red Wings were horrible last year, and just the players described it is just awful. It was very difficult for them.

And so you don't want your team. I agree with what you said. You want your team to be competitive enough to not be getting wiped out every game. But yeah, unless you either get extraordinarily fortunate, like you just, you have one guy and you have amazing development for the rest of your guys, or you're a really big market. Like you're the Lakers who are mismanaged, but it's like you get three number two overall draft picks in a row,

or was it four, I can't remember. is DeAngela Russell, Lonzo Ball, Brandon Ingram. Am I missing anybody? I don't think so. 15, 16, 17. Who was their draft pick in 2018?

I think. Yeah, I don't remember. I'm definitely missing. I'm blanking there. I'm definitely missing somebody here, which is pretty bizarre to me. Whatever, we've been recording for about 53 minutes here. but that might be it.

Anyway, I mean, they were able to parlay all those high draft picks in Anthony Davis and LeBron James came in free agency. The Clippers were willing to parlay a bunch of assets and the Paul George and Kauai went and it's on there. And they already had some other guys that accumulated through trades, particularly to Chris Paul trade. So just the pistons are not really in great position to do something like that. I guess, you know, it does suck, but there aren't very many super attractive free agent destinations.

It's not that Detroit is particularly bad. I don't think it's really worth looking at it like that. It's just that there are some destinations that are really good, like the LA teams and New York and Miami, and you can even go with teams like the Celtics, you know, who have just a, you know, they're just a really proud, fairly well-managed basketball franchise, but the Pistons aren't one of those teams.

But as far as, you know, as we're thinking about how next year is going to look, yeah, you've got to think about Christian Wood. I don't think it'll be a big factor, but I know it was a lot of fun to watch. He could be a good player in the future. I'm a little ambivalent about him. Of course, you're saying, you know, where's he going to sign? You know, he's going to stay with Detroit. Is he going to sign with one of these other teams that have cap space, like the Knicks or the Hornets or the Suns?

I don't see him taking the mid-level exception because I think he can just get more money than that unless he's just really, really intent on winning. Even if he does, it's not going to be to the Warriors because they'd have to dump a lot of salary to give him the full mid-level exception. have to dump, I think, $20 million with a salary, maybe a little bit more. If they keep that draft pick, otherwise if they're trading it, they'd even more salary in the team. So I just strongly doubt is going there. But I'm ambivalent, in part because he might help you win games. I know I'm, like, really going, like, to extreme dormat, extreme dormant pistons here. But also, I've always been a little bit worried about his attitude. Like, his bigger issues, his issues before this last.

last season why he never managed to stick with the team, including the Pelicans, for me, played pretty well down the stretch of the 2017, 2018, 2018, 2018, 2019 season and just got waived. I've always been attitude. Part of that goes into work ethic, but part of it, I think, just goes into just his overall attitude. And I was worried about that throughout the season. And I think a team that gives him, I think he's a guy who's really going to always want to get his on the court, and especially if he's already been paid and doesn't really need to

play nice for the sake of a better contract. So, yeah, I'm very wary of his attitude. I think a team that gives him a multi-year deal may end up regretting it. Like other guys like White Side, for example, just bad attitude. But also, you never know if he's a good,

if he's just a good stats and a bad team kind of guy. You had, for example, Julius Randall, who after the Pelicans traded, or excuse me, after the Pelicans failed to trade Anthony Davis and said, okay, we're just going to pretend to play you now, because we don't want you to get injured and hurt your trade value. Julius Randall got a much larger role in the Pelicans' offense, and he had a fantastic, like, last 24 games this season, I think, or 26.

The Pelicans lost, like, most of those games, and he looked great, but in fact, when you put him on a good team, it's just his empty stats. So he's just a ballstopper, and just he's just an empty stats guy. Do you know if that's Christian, but? No, no, no, many notes. So I'm ambivalence. I wouldn't be too sad to see him go. Yeah, I mean, I really want to keep him.

I'm kind of like the opposite, honestly. I feel like, I mean, Pelicans fans, after seeing how good he was for the Pistons in the last 20 games, they were kind of upset. He was part of the reason he was let go is because they took on so many players and picks back in the trade for Anthony Davis and they had to make room.

And he was the guy that got let go. But the only one that really rubs me the wrong way is when he went on Instagram live for like a minute, he's like, where should I go? The rest of it, he's really just following the teams with Cappspace on his Instagram. I know this is like... Yeah, that's...

You don't want to be too much. Yeah. And he, I think he just wants to get paid. I think the Pistons will be the team to play him. And I don't think he'll boost our win count that much. Like we mentioned before, there really aren't that many teams that are tanking this year. So I don't think it'll be that hard for us to lose the most games.

games and get that high draft pick and get good odds for a guy like Cade Cunningham or Jalen Green. So I'm hoping that the Pistons keep him. I think he should be our number one priority this offseason. Yeah, I mean, it's fun to watch him play. I give me that. And you always want to have a reason to watch the games. But there's also that I've gotten the idea that basically what he said, of course, this is all based on what he said on social media, like I want to win and so on so on so.

forth. You know, who knows? Maybe the guy is just very motivated to be on a winning team, and he could sign him for the full MLA with a good team. I don't think the market forum is going to be like super high about the MLA. I'm not just going based on what Bobby Mark said. But I don't see any team handing him like significantly more than like $12 or $13 million because that would just be a big risk on a player with such a small body of work. So in any event, that'll be the end of this episode. Thank you all for listening. We will catch you next time. Thank you.