Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 29: The Problems at Power Forward and the Value of Jerami Grant

Episode Date: January 18, 2021

This episode speaks on the logjam at power forward, Blake Griffin's actual on-court impact, and the value to the Pistons of Jerami Grant, amongst other subjects.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Driving to the Basket. I'm Mike. I'm here with Tommy. We are recording this after a postpone game, that being the one against the Wizards and before another possibly postponed game against the Miami Heat, who have been just ravaged by, if not COVID, then people being put in the health and safety protocols as a result. In any event, we're going to be talking today about a variety of topics as ever. But, mostly about Jeremy Grant, Sadieke Bay, a bit about Isaiah Stewart, more inevitably about Dwayne Casey and Blake Griffin. And one, the episode just by talking about some other, just some minor positives we've seen on the court. Things obviously aren't all bad. There's a lot really to dislike about how the team is being run. But there are some, you know, some promising things to look at as well as far as players' performance

is concerned. So we'll just get started with Sadiq Bay and Tommy. I know you are very big on Sadiq Bay and very happy with how he's been playing. Why don't you talk a bit about that? Casey really seems to like him. He was billed as a very hardworking, very mature guy coming in, and he's played his way into the rotation a lot faster than I thought he was going to. He's kept his end of the deal.

He's still shooting 43% on threes. But like we've seen, there's still a lot of issues with this game. He can't get to the basket still. And that was something that we saw a little bit of union issue in Villanova, but it's really become more of an issue in the NBA. He's just not attacking quickly enough. It was something that we talked about in the, like right after the draft. He would catch the ball, wait on the perimeter for a couple seconds,

and in that time his defender was able to get up on him, and then he'd have to either get to the rim with dribble moves or spin moves. And while that was a lot easier for him in the college game, where he was a lot bigger than these guys. In the NBA, he doesn't have that advantage. So if he lets the defense get set, he has a really tough time getting to the hoop because they know how to play him. And they're able to, like, corral him and stop him. And a lot of times it's led to a turnover because he's not passing out of that very well.

So for Sadiq, I think the thing that he needs to work on now is just making his decisions even faster. He's already improved there. He's not holding it for two seconds and then attacking, but he's not initiating contact quickly enough. If he can get to his man and initiate the contact, get them on their heels, he has a much easier time getting to the hoop or getting to the paint where he can make something happen. But if he tries to attack off the dribble, it doesn't really work as well. And that's a lot of players, but it's a real problem for Sadiq. Still, him being on the floor, seeing as he's a 43% three-point shooter on volume,

he's still spacing the floor, he's still making things easier for his teammates. and he's still taking smart shots, but that's just going to be something that he needs to work on. I know that I'm a bigger fan of him than you. What are your issues with him? I don't really have so much in the way of issues. I think he is, like he, Sadiq was always, in my opinion,

was always going to translate well to the NBA. He was one of the best shooters, in the NCAA in his sophomore season, that being his final season at Villanova. He's smart. He's disciplined. He's a hard worker. He's a good learner.

I just, I think that what we're seeing right now is likely what we're going to get from. I think you'll get improvements in certain aspects of his game. I think it will ultimately become a better passer. He already sees the floor fairly well. You can always see when he stops and gets the ball. He's always looking to make the right decision rather than do whatever, then do something he has decided upon already. Some players you get them the ball, they've already decided what they're going to do,

or it's just automatic. With Sadeek, he has the discipline. and the IQ to take an extra half second before deciding what he's going to do. And I'm not talking in the vein of what you're saying about hesitating before he attacks the basket. I'm saying he has that ability to get the ball

and examine the floor very quickly, make a quick decision. And most of the time it's going to be the correct decision. And that's definitely an asset. Even if he is somewhat open, he'll look around and see if somebody, you know, ideally a good shooter, is more open.

and he'll make that pass. A lot of guys just don't do that. They don't have the awareness to know where they're, or maybe they have the awareness, but they're not really tracking where their teammates are, and they're not stopping to make that split-second decision as to, should I shoot it, or is there somebody else who has a better opportunity?

And some guys are just going to shoot it because they want to shoot it. So, yeah, he's been shooting really well. That should be a surprise to nobody. He was a very high-percented shooter from the perimeter in college on high volume. And he's been playing disciplined defense. he's not, you know, he's got room for improvement there just to tap me into the NBA game, but he's smart. He doesn't make a lot of mistakes.

He's clearly a thinker. He's aware of what's going on, and that's great. As far as his business inside the three-point line, I just, I don't think he's ever really going to be very good at that. He, what he was able to do in college just because it's the NCAA, and by NCAA standards, Bay was big and strong and athletic, which is not the case in the NBA. And the NBA, he's average-sized. and of average strength and probably, as far as burst, probably a little bit below average for his position,

maybe significantly below average. So in college, he would do it by trying to post up, for example. He's tried that in the NBA. I don't think he's ever going to see much success. That's not a good form of offense in the NBA in any event. Tough to be efficient from there, particularly if you're doing post-fadeaways, which is really a lot of what Sadiq has been trying.

I don't think he's going to be a guy who is able to put the ball on the floor and beat anybody unless it's a mismatch. He just doesn't have the burst. You know, in that first step, he's not a very good leaper. And so I think he's a guy who's just going to have to operate on the basis of his offball movements and just his smarts at finding open lanes that are created, you know, that are created just by the offensive scheme. He's not going to find many of those with Griffin on the floor, of course. We'll talk about that later.

But, yeah, as I said before, I think he'll become just a better passer in general. maybe they'll give him some role in the picket, some action in the pick and roll. I don't think he'll remain like a 20% two-point shooter like he's been so far. I think he'll improve. I just don't think that'll ever be a really big aspect of his game. That said, if you get an elite three-point shooter who can play a pretty good defense, then you've got to win. You've got to win even if that's, you know, like the 12th pick.

He was the 19th pick. He seems like a great dude, you know, by all accounts behind the scenes. He seems perfectly content to be with, you know, to be in Detroit. and it's been good to see him get minutes. So, you know, I've been fine. You know, I've been perfectly fine with him. I don't think he's going to continue to shoot 45%. I think he's a little bit below that now,

but I just don't think that. But if you have a guy who's shooting anywhere in the realm of 40% on high volume, then fantastic, you know, two thumbs up. You've got a very valuable player. It would be a plus if he learns to shoot threes off the move. Maybe that'll happen. maybe it won't be even if he's just a good, a really high percentage spot-up shooter

who can play defense, then fantastic. You know, that is a very valuable player at any team. What have you seen from him that you've really liked? I think it's just having that type of floor spacing and that option on the perimeter. I think it just makes things a lot easier for everybody. And we talked about how we liked, how you would envision your ideal offense.

And floor spacing is absolutely just, it might be the single most important thing. in the NBA these days in terms of like building a team. You just can't win with a bunch of guys who can't space the floor. You're just, you make it so much easier for the defense to stop everybody because these are big, big players and they can cover ground a lot more easily. So keeping everybody apart and opening up those driving lanes, just Sadiq's presence out there.

It makes all that a lot easier. So, I mean, and we've seen it. like the offense just looks a lot better. And he plays quickly and then just going back to the defense. I know that he's not putting up great defensive numbers, but I love watching him off ball because for the most part, he's a fantastic off ball defender and just like really, really aware. And I know that he had like one bad possession against the Celtics

and it ended up being a pretty key possession where it was Jalen Brown was on the perimeter and Sadiq was on him. And Sadiq sagged off him just. a little too much and Bronn was able to put up a three to in like it was either like to tie the the game or take the lead and I think that just because people aren't always watching Sadiq, that might have like diminished their opinion of his defense off ball, but in general, like that was just bad timing in a pretty an opportune time, but in general, Sadiq's offball defense is pretty fantastic. He's not chasing blocks or steals. He's just positioning himself

and playing good fundamental defense. So any good 3-and-D player like that is just going to make your team better on both ends. It's going to make it easier for his teammates. Yeah, agreed. And who knows, is he a starter for a good team? Harder to say. You might have a guy at Forward who is better than that.

He hasn't actually seen any minutes thus far, very few at shooting guard. And I think that's a position you can see if we play in honestly. I would rather be starting him than the likes of Wayne Ellington. that's a different story. But either way, I think he'll be a valuable rotation player. I don't think he's a guy who's going to come in. And I doubt, I just don't think he has the ceiling in terms of,

he's going to both put it this way. I think he'd be a very valuable complimentary player. So, yeah, I've been happy about that so far. Like you say, he makes some mistakes. He's a guy I'm perfectly confident. We'll learn from those mistakes. We'll run from every one of those mistakes. So let's move on to Jeremy Graham.

Grant. Now the UNRI was a big fan of the contract. And the idea, well, here's the thing about grants. I think what the issue we have is, was it worth, you know, in terms of value of the Pistons, even if he comes and plays well, is, you know, is it really worthwhile for the pistons to be giving up that much cap space. And also, you know, somebody who's going to eat a lot of minutes and it's going to prevent, excuse me, it's going to provide some barriers to getting playing time for, you know, at least one of the young guys, because four of them play minutes at his position. while with his positions rather because he's playing both small and power forward. He's more of a natural power forward, but he's playing a lot of small forward and Griffin is on the floor. Whatever the case, I've been surprised at how well he has done.

I didn't think that he had this in him, the ability to create a pretty good offense off the dribble and even to shoot some threes off the dribble and you could really do with cutting those really ugly mid-range shots off the dribble out of his repertoire. are those are inefficient for almost anybody. It's no knock against him. Those are just bad shots in a league that's really very efficiency focused.

But I'd say certainly he's, he has, you know, he's looked pretty good. What are your thoughts? Same as yours. I mean, we talked about how this signing was confusing because between Griffin and Seikou and, Sadiq and actually, I'm not sure. who was, but just, we knew there was going to be a logjam of power forwards. And Seiku is the victim of that, but Jeremy Grant has absolutely played up to this contract. And now the question isn't like, you know, do we trade him?

I mean, I guess that's still a question, but it's like, could he be a long-term piece? You know, he's playing, right now he's playing as the number one option on a bad team, but I think he could play like second or third option on a good team. And that's not something you want to just get rid of great signing on. honestly now. I think he'd be getting a lot more hype in the MIP conversation if he hadn't had like a rough start and if he hadn't gotten a little bit of hype in the bubble because the numbers he's putting up on pretty fantastic efficiency, considering where he started. It's very

encouraging. It's a good pickup. And I know that we want to lose, but as long as we play these close games, I don't think it's a huge problem to have like a couple foundational pieces for the future on your roster. I mean, he's what, 26? He could still conceivably play into this team's future. He's not that old. Well, what I would say, here's where sort of the, all right, so when you say playing up through contract, I think that there is, it depends on, value is going to depend on what the

objective of a team is, put it that way. If this was a good team and Jeremy Grant came in and was playing this well, then he would say, okay, absolutely worth the $24 million. He was paid $24 million because, you know, for the most part, you stretch that $4 million in salary for the next three years plus another $3 million further on. I mean, that's largely so that it was partially so that the Weaver could have Plumlee too, but, you know, Grant's really the big money player there. Whatever the case, yeah, he's providing good production for a team that's not trying to win,

and he is providing, he is causing some minutes blockage, and you have to, I think you have to measure that against also. So you've got some minor cost in development for players who weren't going to get the same amount of usage and the same amount of minutes because he's there, the younger players. And also the loss of the flexibility, you know, the assets that could have been gained with that have space. So I think you have to measure it against those things.

This sort of production is less valuable to a rebuilding team that is not trying to win, especially when it comes with those additional barriers. So do I think that it was a good signing that he's playing up to the contract, so to speak? I don't know. I think that's iffy because what he is providing, sure, you know, you have closer games. Who knows how it looked without him on the floor? But is that production, you know, beyond ensuring that the games would be closer, what is that actually giving to the Pistons, a team that will probably not be in position to compete for at least a couple more years? and let's say you have some better pieces.

Hopefully the Pistons get a high pick in the next draft. That would be fantastic. It's a very strong draft. And whoever you have comes in and plays well. And you've got Grant there too. And suddenly there's not close games anymore. These are the Pistons winning enough to be a 30-win team. Then that's far less ideal.

So it's still a signing I don't really like. Just the fact that he is in a vacuum. I don't think it's right to view these things in a vacuum. You have a guy come in and. you know, just the fact that he's putting up good stats, I don't think that necessarily means it's a good signing for a team that's, a team that's not looking to win games. Have I been impressed at how he's played?

Yes. Aside from some wrinkles that I hope will be smoothed out as far as, you know, he has to become a threat on a drive to pass. Otherwise, he becomes considerably more, you know, less valuable in the context of, in the context of an effective offense and also considerably more predictable for the opposing team. He has to stop attempting certain shots that are just going to be low efficiency in any situation. And, you know, things of that ilk.

But aside from that, has he been impressive as a scorer? Yes, I think he's done quite well. Has, you know, he's been good on defense, too. It's just a question, where's the real value there for the Pistons? Sure, they'll have his bird rights at the end of three years, and maybe he decides he really likes Detroit. But at the end of three years, either way, assuming they don't extend him after two, they're going to have to bid against other teams. they're also, who knows, maybe the Pistons are in a position where it's best to let them go. So, and then there's always the question of like, you know, how could things maybe have gone

differently if the Pistons had that cap space available instead to make moves. So I'm just a mum about it. I'm absolutely not willing to say that he's played up to his contract just because, you know, that the Pistons don't, there's not much value to the Pistons right now for his production. And it could wind up being counterproductive next season. Anything else doubt about Grant? I think you make a good point about next year. Yeah, if we end up, it looks like the Pistons will end up with a top five pick.

And depending on who they end up with, if that's Cunningham, Suggs, or Mowgli, you add those guys. And if they play well, yeah, the Pistons probably play a lot better. And that hurts your draft, that hurts your draft position for next year. Yeah, for Romani Bates, I did, you know, possibly. Possibly. I mean, the lottery odds, maybe that's something that they take into account. I was reading an article about how, you know, now teams are not trying to be extremely terrible because, you know, they're factoring in the lottery odds and they kind of, you have to, it's another balancing act. And, you know, maybe we'd be having a different conversation if Jeremy Grant was contributing to a lot more wins. These have been close losses. But for me, a lot of them have been, like, very close.

I still want us to lose games. That's still the. the primary objective for me. So if this team was not number one in the tankathon standings, maybe I would be a little bit more upset about it, and maybe others would be too. But for now, I don't think that's a huge, huge deal. If we start winning games, it'll become another point of frustration.

But, yeah, for now, as long as we keep losing games and we have a legitimate scoring option, who's dynamic enough and helping to create for the role players around him, I think that's all right for development. I think I've been impressed with is, yeah, go ahead. He's not really creating for the role, for the young players around him, no. Yeah, like you said, he's not passing out. He doesn't pass, yeah.

Amongst players with anything in the realm of his usage, he has one of the lowest assist percentages in the league. Like, he is, he just, he really doesn't pass the ball. So, yeah, I just, I don't see the value there for the Pistons. If this were Jeremy Grant putting up 25 points per game, on good efficiency for a team that was in position to even compete for the playoffs, I would say, great, you know, that's, you know, $20 to $24 million, you know, average annual salary, depending on how you'd like to split up between he and hypothetically if that team had also

overpaid for Plumley. You know, great, that's fantastic value for the Pistons. I don't see the value. I still don't. I mean, it's not like you pay this guy and say, well, you know, you're putting up all these points, and so you're good value on your contract. I would say the Pistons aren't trying to win, and it's best if they lose. And meanwhile, you know, you've said in the past, I completely agree, that that signing would have made a lot more sense. I don't think it would. Personally, I still would have said, I don't know if this really makes much sense,

but it would have made a lot more sense in the context of the rotation of Griffin were not there, but Griffin is there. And he and Grant's are the two players playing the most minutes. by a fair margin. And so that presents barriers. And Griffin, we'll talk about Griffin next. Griffin, I think, whatever, I'm not going to say that this is, you know, I was about to say, I think anybody can agree. Maybe not everybody agrees.

I don't think Griffin deserves anywhere in the realm of the minutes of roles he's getting. He's been awful. And in my opinion, just very bad for the team in every capacity when he's on the floor. But, you know, you're not. You've got Josh Jackson who plays minutes at small forward. You've got Sviu who plays some minutes in small forward. Bay plays his minutes at the forward positions. Saku plays his minutes at the forward positions.

When you've got two guys who are averaging 66 minutes between them, it's going to be really hard to find minutes for those young players. So you've also got Grant in his minutes, unfortunately, is also a barrier to those young players getting minutes. And you really, really, really, really do not want to, take these players and make them compete for minutes just so you can hand 32 minutes per game to a decrepit veteran who really isn't helping at all. That's Griffin. That's not the, you know,

this is not the fault of Grants, but Griffin was already there. And Griffin was going to get his minutes unless he were injured. And that's that. So, I don't agree you should get those minutes, but I think, I think it was a certainty that case he was going to give him a leading role regardless. And I think that's going to continue as long as Griffin is able to play basketball. So, So I think that's another cost for the trade, and that further detracts from its value. You know, if we're laying out production, you know, in terms of actual value versus what it costs to have grants on the team. I mean, that's another thing.

So, yeah, so I think that that wouldn't have been an issue if Griffin weren't on the team, but Griffin is on the team. And, you know, if it were just grants, then, sure, you can give Seku all the back of power forward minutes and some minutes and small forward and cool. He's got 20 minutes, but Griffin's there. Now, some of this is Dwayne Casey, but yeah, I think that's another cost. So I remain not a huge fan of the contract. I can't hold it against Grant for playing well. Oh, I'm not holding that against him. Absolutely not.

Yeah, I like him. I know you said that, but I feel like if Griffin wasn't Blake Griffin, I don't think he'd be getting half as many minutes as he's getting right now. He looks terrible. did you want to move on to him really like now? Yeah, so we can move straight on to Griffin. Yeah, it's about a grant. I do like the way that he's like playing hard.

I think that that is good for the team. Like one thing that I just noticed about him watching him, he follows his shot to the basket. He's very aggressive around the rim, and I think that is good for the young players. I like that he does that. I like that we're playing guys who are very aggressive near the rim. I think that's very good.

Yeah, he's. Yeah, Grant's, Grant has been impressed with certainly at using the backboard. D.C. is very, very good at that. Most players are not anywhere near as good at that. So it makes him much more able to score from further away from the basket. And, you know, all credit to him. He's been good going downhill. He's been very effective.

Even, you know, even in isolation, he's been good at it. So all credit to Grant. And I like Grants. He competes on defense. He works hard. I just don't, I still don't like the fact that, I still don't like the contract. And it's not just in terms of dollar value. You're not a big culture stuff.

I know you don't see the value in it. the way that I feel like I see it, I think he's good for that. I think that you could have gotten culture players for a lot less money. I don't think you need to spend $24 million in a lot of minutes per game on a culture player. But, you know, as we've said, this would be much less of an issue if Griffin weren't there. Griffin is there, and Griffin has been terrible. So we'll just segue on to him. Griffin has been awful on both ends of the floor.

There is nothing good he's providing this team. I know the Pistons are trying to lose and will ideally lose, but it that way because you've got to build through the draft tier if you're the Pistons. But, you know, so yeah, Griffin helps a little bit with that. He does not help. But in terms of development, he's bad. He is just a bad player to have on the floor for development.

I can't speak to the leadership he provides off the floor or what he might help other players with off the floor. I don't, you know, I don't put much stock into Griffin as a mentor just because nobody plays like him. He's kind of an archaic player. he certainly entirely obsolete at his own position. I mean, if the guy were able to play center,

he can't because he's always been, even when he was far more athletic, he was a hopeless paint defender. But if he were able to be playing center now, but in the events, he's just, he's completely, he plays an archaic style and also he's not really capable of doing any effectively anymore. In any event, just the guy has been,

in terms of development, here's what you get when he put Griffin on the board. Griffin can only play in one way. That is Griffin playing on the ball and basically sucking possession and making everybody play around him. So it's questionable if Griffin could ever have been really the pivot of a successful team on his own, even when he was fully healthy. Because you can only play in a certain way when he's on the floor. And if he needs to share really with anybody, he becomes a whole lot less useful. But let's look at what he's doing right now.

Basically, in the NBA, you want to be able to run a modern offense. Modern offense being a lot of offball movement and in a scheme that focuses on getting the most efficient possible opportunities for your team, on creating open lanes to the basket, on creating open three-pointers, on creating advantageous matchups for a good score is to beat their opponent off the dribble and score in isolation and so on and so forth. And you see that when Griffin is off the floor. And we also saw that to an extent last season when Dwayne Casey did. a half decent job of running a real offense when you know when griffin wasn't around and actually the last season was the first time since uh 2012 2013 that the pistons that ended the season outside of the bottom five and true shooting percentage i believe they were 20th last season or 21st so what griffin does when you put him on the four okay so he can't play off the ball you know he's it you know used to be a

decent thought of three-point shooter but that's besides the point you put him on the four he gets the ball, the ball stops. You know, he's going to do one of three things. You know, first off, he's going to grab the ball. You know, how it begins, he's going to grab the ball, he's going to palm it. And then he's going to either post up and try to pull his way to the basket or draw a double team and pass. And he's not good at that anymore. He's going to shoot a pull-up three.

or he, and he's not good at that either. Or he's going to call for somebody to come in and do a dribble handoff. Whatever he does, and sure, yeah, sometimes if he catches it a three-point line and he's open, I'll take a three. But I'm talking when he actually just gets the ball on the floor of the offense. But the floor of the offense dies instantly when it comes to Blake Griffin. So he's highly predictable. He stops the ball. Pace slows through a crawl.

I mean, the pistons are legitimately, when he is off the four, We're talking just on off sense. The Pistons are a top five team in terms of pace when he's off. They are 29th and very, very close to 30th in the league when he is on. He completely stunts the offense. He stunts pace. They have to play around Blake Griffin. They cannot play a modern offense.

And for the young guys, not only getting less opportunities to just do things on their own, but they can't play within the flow of the modern offense in which they're going to have to, in which they're going to play for the remainder of their career when they're not with Blake. They can't play in a modern defense because Griffin just can't defend anymore. You know, the defense basically has to account for the fact that he is immobile. So they have no hope of playing in anything approaching an effective offense, effective defense when he's on the floor at all. It is extraordinarily easy to exploit Griffin and other teams have happily and very easily done it.

You know, for example, if you get the guy even cheating slightly toward the paint on the drive, you've got an open, a wide open three-pointer because there is no hope he's going to make it anywhere near back to the thing. He's not going to be anywhere near the shooter when that shot goes off. he can't switch. He just can't really move. You can't move on defense. You know, the most notable example this year, of course, was a Tatum. And it is absolutely beyond me why Dwayne Casey even had Griffin on the floor,

because Griffin is a massive isolation liability. And Tatum is a very capable isolation player. And so basically, by having Griffin on the floor on that final possession, in which, you know, you can say, oh, you know, he was on there for offense. No, he wasn't. I mean, they had the ball with the shot clock off. they were going to take the last shot. Your best chance of actually getting a basket in that situation is getting a steal.

And Griffin's not, you know, whatever the case. They basically served up prime rip to Brett Stevens, who loves his late game isolation plays. But yeah, that was basically just an example of how vulnerable he is, but he gets exploited again and again and again and again and again and again in games because he is just incredibly exploitable. But you want to talk about three-point shooting for the opponent, for example. The Pistons, when Griffin is off the floor, I give up about 36.5% on three-pointers, which puts them right in the middle of the league.

When he is on the floor, opponents shoot 41%, which would make them, by a significant margin, the worst defense in the league, the worst three-point defense in the league. Now, of course, there are other factors that go into this, but the fact is that with Griffin on the floor, it is very, very easy to wrong foot the defense and get yourself an open three. So the young players cannot play in a modern defense either. in terms of just going back to offense, guys can't beat themselves with Griffin on the floor. You have to play around Griffin. And, you know, I question if this would even be worthwhile if the pistons, you know, there's this always open to question, is this worthwhile even on a playoff team? You know, is this a worthwhile cost?

You know, having Griffin on the floor, he has an opportunity cause. You have to play around him. You cannot play this modern offense. It's questionable if that's even worthwhile on a playoff team, if you have other options. but on a rebuilding team like this, absolutely not worth it in any capacity. Like, not at all. You see guys like Josh Jackson, for example, who thrive off of moving and attacking. Can't do that with Griffin on the floor.

Even Jeremy Grant, for example, he has to play more off ball role with Griffin on the floor. He still scores effectively, but it's different. Svea Mikhailuk, who really thrives on getting separation, really did very well last season in the Pistons offense with Griffin out, which depended, you know, in which we're playing that modern offense. guys moving off the ball, constantly moving, getting good matchups, getting spreece separation. And this season without Griffin on the floor, even he's been doing some attacking a little bit off the dribble or just attacking the basket off a pass, whatever else. Can't do that with Griffin on the floor either because the offense gets clogged.

You look at basically all the other major players aside from Dilanwright. Dilanwright has been terrible. Just know ifs ands, he's been awful. He's been awful on offense. He's been awful on defense. He's not a good facilitator. aside from just a couple of decent offensive games early in the season, he has been absolutely dreadful. So he's a guy, you look at him with Griffin, and, you know, he sees no better or worse with Griffin on the floor because he himself sucks.

Sorry to put it to you that way. Sorry, Delon, but he's been bad. He's been awful. You look at all of the other major minute players. Like, for example, when Grant is on the floor, with Griffin, the team is still bad. When Grant is on the floor without Griffin, the Pistons actually outscore, you know, the Pistons have a positive. in that rating. Their point differential is, is positive. And it's about a six and a half point swing with Josh Jackson. When he's off the, when he and Griffin are on the floor, the Pistons run about even. He hasn't, you know, Jackson, of course, has missed some time and it's had trouble getting back

to his previous form. But when he is on the floor and Griffin is not, the Pistons are a considerably better team with Bay. When he's on the floor with Griffin, doesn't play much with Griffin. but when he does, the pistons are a very negative team, and when Griffin is not on the floor, the pistons are again positive differential. With Plumley, they're still a bad team at him on the floor, but the offense actually gets a little bit worse when he's not on the floor with Griffin,

but the defense gets drastically better. Svi has a gigantic swing, and part of this is just that he's been hot and cold, but he's terrible with Griffin on the floor, and he's pretty good with Griffin off the floor. Again, he can just, all these guys can operate in ways, I mean, he's leaving aside Plumley. On offense, all these guys can,

operate in ways on offense without Griffin that are impossible with him on the floor. So, you know, the younger guys get more opportunity. They can play like themselves. They get, you know, the team is better on both ends of the floor. For everybody, but grants, people is, you know, these players, their assist percentages go significantly up with Griffin on the floor because in a modern offense, you don't need to have one guy just, you know, it's no longer the case that you just have one dude trading offense for everybody. It's all about, you know, guys. guys can, for example, let's look at a couple of seasons ago, and there are examples everywhere of this, but a couple seasons ago, the Raptors, for example, became, Kauai became suddenly became a good,

a good assist man simply because he was drawing attention on the way to the basket and passing to open shooters, just driving kick. Tobias Harris has managed to become a decent assist guy, just off the driving kick. That guys, you know, the, the assist totals are to be much more equitably distributed these days because you these offenses are just about creating open shooters or they're getting looks for open people and you don't need to be a good pastor to do that. It's just what happens. But with Griffin on the floor, that doesn't happen, obviously because he stunts the offense. He's basically just a possession-sucking offense-stunting, pace-destroying player now.

So there are no positives to having him on the floor at all. But if we want to look at more stats, the Pistons have the absolute worst true shooting percentage in the league with him on the floor. 24th without him. The second worst offense with him on the floor, without, without him, they're not great, but about 23rd, better than the Warriors. On defense, they're 26 with him on the floor and right in the middle of the pack without him. In terms of net rating, they're 29th with him, and they're 21st, a little bit better

than the heat without him. Obviously, these are numbers that have to be contextualized, but just the fact is he's been terrible on both ends of the floor. and frankly it's i find it really irritating that that that that casey who's all about meritocracy earn your minutes play hard defense and so on and so forth it's very selective because griffin's getting these minutes no matter what despite the fact that it's terrible for the team and the hilarious thing is that casey is doing it you know casey is doing it for the sick of competing despite the fact that griffin on the floor is awful for competing too it's just really distressing it's just ugly

it's ugly to watch so yeah i know i just went on at length uh i know Tommy you feel much to No, no, no, I mean, you told me about these things, like, before we hit record, I was just amazed at those on-off differentials. I asked you to, like, mention those because they're just such a good example of, like, the effect he has. And you talked about that Celtics possession at the end of that game where Tatum attacked Griffin, and it reminded me of that Marcus Smart quote, I have it here. It was Marcus Smart talking about that late game ISO that the Celtics ran. with the Griffin mismatch. And we got exactly what we wanted. We got Jason going downhill against Blake.

And he said he's not the same Blake as he used to be. He used to be quicker, and we just took advantage of that. It's not some secret that Blake is terrible now. It's something that teams are game planning. And I think it's Casey's incompetence that he's still getting these opportunities out there because there's another quote. I mean, if you want to talk about Casey, a lot of people are upset that Seku is getting no minutes.

And this was after, I think, the Bucks game where he played zero minutes. Casey said, Seiku is growing. I'm so happy for him and proud of him. The seriousness of work. I know he didn't get in last night. It's one of those things with Blake Griffin and also Jeremy matched up against Attenacumpo as much as possible. There's only so many minutes. And again, that was more on us than anything else.

There's nothing he's done wrong. He's worked. The kid is the first one in the gym. It's not a matter of Seku is, like, I assumed it had to be something off the court. Like Seku's like lazy or he's not coming in or is something, some issue because there was like some question. because there was like some questions about that last season. But this season, that quote makes it seem like Casey thinks

that the best defensive option for Janice ateda-Gumpo is Blake Griffin, which is insane to me. Oh, yeah, he got knocked. He got cuts to pieces by Janus. Absolutely cuts of pieces. Basically, Blake is a fitting option if you're just looking at post-defense solely because he's one of the few guys

who is going to be able to hang physically with Janus. But Janus spends most of his time moving. And when Griffin is on the floor, Janus is just going to move because Griffin has no hope of keeping up with him. None. He got, this doesn't show up on just the matchup stats. Griffin, the offense, the defense got slashed to pieces when it was Griffin defending Janus. And not only did Seku Kyi no minutes, but Griffin was going out for like 45 seconds at a time or like two or three minutes at a time and then coming back in constantly. Like, it was completely infuriating to watch. And it's just like, you know, for basically, I hope that anybody has passed the point of saying, oh, well, cases the coach he knows better.

We have seen so many, so many instances, you know, including in Detroit constantly, if coaches just doing the wrong thing. It's doing the wrong thing. It has nothing to do with, oh, you know, this is their perspective and this is how they choose to do things. It's just stupid. The way that they go about things is just stupid. This is why coaches are fired routinely.

So the way that Casey did it? No, not good. Yeah, absolutely. Awful. And as far as, and it's just incomprehensible to me that he thinks that using Griffin in this fashion is going to help the Pistons win. And that's the thing with Casey. he is trying to win and he is willing to marginalize development.

For the sake of winning with a team that A cannot win and B does not want to win. He also went on at, you know, and at same press conference said, oh, we need to find a way to get Seku Minutes. It's like you need to find a way to get in minutes. You have not given giving him minutes. You have been riding Blake Griffin who is horrible and who is horrible for everything. And Seku has not gotten minutes because of that. So yeah, it's infuriating.

But it's characteristic of Casey who has a history going back to the beginning of his Toronto days of just doing stupid things. that make no sense. Yeah, just stupid. And this is a coach who has just a long history of very unfortunate and very entrenched flaws that aren't going away. In his final season, when he won coach of the year, I think it was in large part because Muzai Ujiri tried to compensate for those flaws by, A, taking away his crappy veterans,

who we always prioritized over the young players, for the most part, of course, whatever. You don't want to say always, but he always had a preference. reference more toward them. So he took them away, and he also took away the offense, which Casey had been bad at for a long time. And it went to Nick Nurse instead. And the Raptors suddenly had a lot of development from the young players and the best offense they'd had maybe ever and the best season they'd had ever. And Casey won coach of the year. And he went back to his old crappy habits in the playoffs and got fired. And the Pistons just in such a characteristic move for a team that was all just about trying to be just good enough, happily snapped up.

this mediocre, very flawed retread. And now the pistons are stuck with him. They did this, what, like four months after snapping up a retread from the Clippers, who just as with the, you know, the Clippers didn't want Blake anymore, the Raptors didn't want Casey anymore, you know, whatever. It's just, it's unfortunate Casey does these stupid, stupid things. Things he does just make no sense. Let's look, for example, at the rosters he's been playing.

Sure, you know, you're playing Dilan right now because you no longer have any, you know, you don't longer have hayes. You're going to have, you know, we'll call it three veterans plus Jeremy Grant and hopefully one youngster. Instead, Casey has in two games started a five veteran lineup that includes Wayne Ellington. This lineup has gotten absolutely annihilated. It is good for nothing. A lot of what Casey does is good for nothing. But you're seeing these veterans get heavy minutes and what's supposed to be development year because Casey thinks that's the best way to win. So it's just, it's just infuriating to see the pistons once again be unwilling to just commit to a goal.

But I also think that Casey is just the absolute wrong coach. But, yeah, just going back to Griffin's numbers, of course, you have to always contextualize those numbers. But, but they, you know, they absolutely match the empirical evidence 100%. And, you know, I know I'm calling the eye test objective, but, you know, I'm fully fully willing to stay. that's I'm fully willing to declare that I would consider that borderline, if not totally fact, that they match the eye test. And as bad as Griffin's raw stats are,

his actual impact on the court makes him far worse than those. So it's just frustrating. It makes the game's a lot less enjoyable to watch. It's ugly. The minutes that Casey loads into the veterans is ugly. The fact that Seku is not getting minutes is insane. The way that Casey is handling,

the rotations is insane. It's just awful. And I'm left thinking, what is wrong with this organization? They can't even do a simple development year correctly. And it's just infuriating. This is supposed to be a season we could look forward to. I know some people just want the Pistons to compete at all times.

Whatever. I respect that that's what you want in a sports. That is what it is. I think personally, I would like to see the Pistons win a championship. also the Pistons were never going to compete with this roster period. But I would like to see the Pistons win a championship be a good team. That means having the patience to rebuild properly.

So I thought, okay, the Pistons will suck, but this will be a season in which we are primarily watching the future of the team. And if they make mistakes and they suck, that's fine, let them develop. And, you know, cool, awesome. The Pistons are on a different path and hope and so on and so forth. And that has not happened. Instead, I have enjoyed a lot of these games considerably less than I did, even when the Pistons were fielding these completely mediocre rosters to chase a playoff berth

in which they would go absolutely no further than the first rounds, you know, or if they even won a game. I mean, how have you felt about watching these games? You know, just in the light of how Casey has managed things. Oh, I don't even pay attention to, like, I'm not watching for the wins or losses. I mean, I want the losses, so if we're winning, I don't care. I'm just watching the young guys, but it's frustrating when there's like these all veteran lineups because then there's nothing for me to watch because I don't care about

Casey's offense because I don't think he's their coach of the future, especially when Griffin is out there. It's like, this is not how we're going to be playing once he's gone. So what am I watching that for? It's ideally, I would like there to be like two to three young guys on the floor with like a nice mix of veterans and young guys. So you have the stability of veterans with the development that you get to watch from these young guys. So I want like Sadieik and Svi and Josh Jackson, Killian, Isaiah Stewart. and I'm forgetting one, probably Saban Lee or maybe Sadiq. I don't know if I already said him, but like two of those guys are on the floor at all times.

But then there are these moments where it's like none of them are touching the floor and it's just horribly ugly offense because it's Blake initiating. And that is frustrating to me. You know, I understand my assumption is that Casey wants guys to earn their minutes, but I don't think he's doing it to like spur the young guys. I think he's doing it because he wants to win. And it's like, well, this guy's probably not playing as well as this veteran player, even though the offense looks uglier.

It's like, Blake has a little language. It's just bullshit that he has this idea that the veterans are just by default better. And it's bullshit. Even on that note, it's like, you know, he wants to win. He's even doing that the wrong way in a way that compromises development. Yeah, the silver lining is that we're losing games. And that's not by design. It's buying competence.

Yeah, it is. It's just sad to say, I don't know how many wins that the Pistons would get with Blake Griffin. I would be willing to see them get a few extra wins for the sake of getting better development for the players. Yes, we don't know what's going on in practice. We do know what's going on in the games. And it's just ugly. It is so ugly and it is so distressing. I mean, the first two games of the season were bad.

I thought that maybe we would be done with it after that. I mean, we can repeat what we said about Derek Rose, for example. It's hard to say if Derek Rose is worse. He's bad for development in a different way from Griffin. because Derek Rose will come on the floor. And I have no doubt that this is, you know, at the very least case, he does nothing to stop this. I would guess that this is how, you know,

I don't know if this is how he wants Derek Rose to run the offense, but he clearly does nothing to stop it. Rose will come on and do what he does, but just call for a pick and go for his own shot. And the young players don't get to do anything except for maybe it's Stewart setting a pick. So I want a different coach. I just want a different coach. This guy's, I think this guy is bad for everything the pisses are trying to accomplish right now.

Sure, his players often. like him and sure, maybe he's good for development in some ways, but I think that the Pistons can easily get a guy who is who is good for development. It doesn't make so many stupid mistakes. Casey is a known quantity. He's a completely known quantity. He is known to make stupid decisions and do a lot of things wrong. I'm just thanking right now back to, like after he was fired, he really, you know, there wasn't a ton of interest in the coaching market. He did, he came out and said, I think in his coach of the year acceptance speech that, oh, I was pointing on taking some, you know, some time off from coaching. But Tom Gore,

really sold me on his vision of the Detroit Pistons. It's like, what is his vision? What could that vision have possibly been? You know, like, what vision is that? We're going to try to compete for the playoffs. You know, even if we barely have a team that's capable of doing that, we're never going to rebuild. I'm pretty sure that Casey was sold on Gores' vision for his own bank account,

which was to make a $30 million richer. So speaking of Stewart, yeah, let's move on to Stewart. So, yeah, what of your thoughts on Stuart Ben thus far? I know that we, I think we differ a little bit on the, sorry, I think we differ on his role for the future. I don't want to see him as a start. I think he's played acceptably so far. He's, he's coming in with great energy. I think there was a weaver quote that I don't want to repeat, but it was like, sometimes you just need a guy to come in and kick butt. And I like that energy that he brings because I think that is infectious and I think that is, good for the players on the floor and on the bench.

Like he got, I think he got a dunk from Seku as a trailer. Like, Seeku made the extra pass. And even in that empty arena, he added so much energy because right after he slammed that, he started screaming, you could hear it on the broadcast. And that's just fun. He's fun to watch. And he's, in that way, he's a bright spot. I don't know why O'Kefour is getting minutes over him.

I know that we talked about that. And I said it was because I think it's Casey managing egos. I honestly think Stewart might be a better player. I mean, Okifor is not a good basketball player. O'Kefat is fun. And he's attacking. Like, he plays so hard. And I think that as far as his play style,

I think that's more suited for the bench because he is going to be a bit of a ballstopper. I think that his best weapon is probably post-play. And we've talked about how that's probably not an effective use of a possession, but maybe for the bench, I think he might be good enough to still do it at an acceptable efficiency. But yeah, I know that you want him to do more shoot the basketball, so what do you think? I agree that he's been fun to watch. He works hard. He never takes the possession off. He works even harder than a lot of hardworking players around him. And I have no doubt that it'll be a

good character guy. You know, maybe if he doesn't, you know, pan out, it's, to his, you know, I know we both said that the two things that would be necessary for him to be a worthwhile pick would be switch on defense and space the floor. And even if he doesn't do those things, maybe he's the team dad in the long term, who knows, but that, you know, that wouldn't justify the number 16 pick in any event. Howie's looked so far, not very good. And I don't really care. I really, really couldn't care less that he hasn't played well. I just wanted to get chance and be able to develop as a player. I'm not going to judge anybody this early on in his rookie season. I like him. He's, I guess that he works hard. He's got an edge to his play. Really all he's

done well so far is rebound, particularly in the offensive end, and he's good at that because he's really strong and really heavy and can't really be easily moved. He hasn't done the greatest as far as scoring in the interior. It's not helped. He's not helped by the fact that he is not a good jumper. he's really not good of playing above the rim. He's not a lot of threat. Even in terms of layoffs, he's going against good defenders who are taller than he is. He's going to have some trouble. So he hasn't scored very efficiently.

I don't think his post offenses can be very valuable in the NBA. And the NCAA was really just about him bullying much smaller guys than he and guys who are much smaller and less athletic. So I would like to say, you know, like I said, I don't care. I really just don't care. I want to see him get his chance. I don't think there's any reason for Okaford to play over him. I doubt Casey is trying to manage the ego of an end-of-the-bench player. O'Kifor, I said it repeatedly.

He's good at nothing but scoring under the baskets. He has bad at everything else. He has a developmental dead end. You know, he can't pass, can't defend, can't shoot. He just has to stop the ball near the basket and post up and try to score with that. He is not a worthwhile player, and I doubt he'll ever develop any further. I would like to see Stewart start shooting. I think that if he can do it, will be a very important.

aspect of his offense because again, I don't think he'll ever really be a particularly good. I don't think he really ever be able to do affect him, create his own offense under the basket. And the fact that he's not allowed or reduce his threat in a pick and roll. And so if he can, but if he can shoot, I mean, that opens just up, opens up a lot more for the offense. I would like to see him start. Casey has come out and said, oh, he's not having Stewart shoot because he doesn't want to ask him to do too much. I guess I guess he doesn't want him to do anything beyond setting screens, going for rebounds, and sitting on the bench while O'Khafore plays minutes ahead him for no apparent reason.

I really don't get that at all. Like, you don't want to ask him to do too much? What is that? I mean, are we concerned that Stewart is going to ruin his own confidence? Like, what? So, yeah, I just want to see him get minutes. I don't want to see O'Cavore on the floor. There's no reason for him to be on the floor.

Just want to see Stewart get minutes. I like him. I hope he can continue taking strides. I don't really have much else to say about him beyond that. But just on to some other positive. Svi has looked good lately. He's really put a lot more into trying to find lanes to the basket and attack. Svi is actually very athletic.

He's got crocodile alarms, but he's very athletic. So that's been good, just seeing be more assertive again, not something you can do with Griffin on the floor. And seven, Lee, so we, I think needs quite a bit of work as a shooter, but man is the guy fast and fun to watch. Honestly, I would start him over to Lund Wright at this point. Bright has been terrible. Why not just give Sabin Lee a shot and see what can happen?

I mean, what's the worst that's going to happen? Try it out for a few games. There's a team that's rebuilding. It's not going to win anyway. Who cares? Given time, Bright is useless. Sorry, he's just, he's not good for present or future. So, yeah, any other just additional positive as you see from, you know, just what we've seen.

Maybe we've talked about Bay. We've talked about Grant. I mean, you talked about maybe start saving Lee. At the very least, the offense would be faster. I think it would be more fun to watch. I hate this slow half-court offense that we're trying right now. I don't think it's fun to watch or effective for the future. So maybe that is a good idea.

Well, right is just bad at everything. He can't space the floor. He can't score in the restricted area. He's a bad facilitator. He's a bad defender. But he's going to continue getting it because Casey, because he's a veteran. And just by default, being a veteran means that Casey is going to let him continue playing over an unknown, even if it means that your known quantity is bad.

And it's this sort of thing that just pisses me off so much the fact that the Pistons hired him because in this, Casey is very similar to Stan Van Gundy. Casey has a lot of the same weaknesses, Stan Van Gundy, who was a horrible coach in Detroit. So, yeah, seven lead, like you said, it's fun to watch. And who knows, maybe it's something in common of him. He's good at penetrating. He's very fast. He needs to work as a passer.

He needs some work as a shooter. Whatever. This is a rebuild. Fissons aren't going to win. Even if you're trying to win Delonbrite is terrible for that. You know, why not, Why not to just give those minutes to somebody who might do better things with them and who actually has a future with this team? But the mere notion of Dwayne Casey innovating like that or taking a chance like that, even when there's no potential downside, you know, just for a game or two even. It's laughable because the guy would never do something like that. And maybe he'll prove me wrong.

If so, great, fantastic. I think the chances of that are virtually very close to zero. I do think you guys are talking to from Weaver. remember after like the second or third game where it was after the second game yeah yeah something like that because weaver he said he's a draft guy and being a draft enthusiast myself you know you want to see those guys play yeah absolutely but the fact that casey even did that for the first two games is mind-boggling to me and in my opinion and the fact that he's continued to do it to some degree as well just just an illustration of how bad a coach he isn't at the very least how little he fits with the

pistons are trying to do here so yeah i hope that there are some changes i don't know what there's changes will be, but I hope there are some changes of some sort. That assumes that the NBA doesn't go on hiatus soon, and I think that the NBA will go on hiatus soon. There's been talk of a two-week break. Just the things with COVID are just getting a little bit too real, so to speak. In any event, that'll be it for today's episode. I hope all of you enjoyed the show and hope all of you are doing well and staying healthy. So as always, thank you for listening, and we will see you next time.