Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 4B: The Trade, the Draft, and More Free Agency Talk

Episode Date: June 25, 2019

In this episode, we visit the Tony Snell trade, Detroit's draft-night decisions, and some further free agency content.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, everybody. My name is Mike, Narawan on the Detroit Pist and Subreddit, and welcome to episode 4B of the podcast. Calling this episode 4B, because 4A was my pre-draft podcast that I ended up deleting. I just didn't feel confident enough in my mastery over the draft material. And as it turned out, though I got rid of it, you know, probably about six hours before the draft, maybe a little bit less. My predictions were completely inaccurate. though in my defense, I was hardly the only person for which that was the case. The draft was pretty crazy. A lot of guys dropped.

Some guys went way earlier than was expected, than were expected rather. Mostly guys dropped the likes of Kevin Porter and Kelton Johnson as well as others. So in any event, this episode is going to focus on the aftermath of the draft. We'll talk about the Tony Snell trade, and we'll talk about the upcoming off-season. and I know that's something I've covered in previous podcasts, but maybe we've got a little bit better idea of the field after the draft and certainly after the recent trade that the Pistons made. So let's start with the Tony Snell trade.

Pistons traded John Lauer for Tony Snell and the number 30 overall draft pick, which came for the Milwaukee Bucks, where the week's best regular season team. Now, why this makes sense for the buck, they're trying to clear salary. They're not going to clear much salary this season, I believe maybe about a million and a half. But they're looking to clear it for the next season

because they've got a lot of guys who are coming up for contract extensions this summer. And my impression is they're trying to stay too far. They don't want to go too far into the tax next season. They've got to resign Middleton this season. They've got to resign Nicole Amiritich. You've got to re-sign Malcolm Brogden. And Janus will be up for a contract extension not too far in the future.

So, Lur costs a little bit less than Snell this season, and he has one less season on his deal. Snell's got about $12 million on his deal for the 2020, 2021 season. So it made sense for the bucks who are also trying to move or assign Eliasoba, which, again, they'll pretty much do for nothing if they get the chance. still a useful player, more of a role player. But I digress. So what the Pistons get, they get Tony Snow, and that's big for the Pistons, because last season they just didn't have a capable small forward on the roster, and that was a big problem.

They ended up playing some undersized guys at the position. One of those was Bullock was capable, but not ideal to play the guy at small forward. And ultimately, Bruce Brown ended up starting at, at small forward. He and he and Wayne Ellington kind of swapped on and off after the trade demline after Reggie Bullock was gone.

And Stanley Johnson, of course, just didn't work out. Just the Pistons, particularly a team like the Pistons, who were short on shooting to begin with, who will always and Andre Drummond have one non-shooter on the floor. They can't really afford to have non-shooters,

and even more non-shooters in the floor. They ultimately did with Bruce Brown. That was not ideal. by any means. The difference between Bruce Brown and Stanley Johnson is Bruce Brown just, you know, he would defer all the time. Whenever he could, he would defer even on wide open threes, which is for the best for the pistons, because he shot, I think, 26% on those. But it's not ideal in the largest sense. So what you get in Tony Snow is a guy of small forward size and a guy who's played the position before. And is he going to give you a lot as far as

his offensive creation. No, he can create a little bit off the dribble on the weight of the basket if he's got a mismatch because he's a pretty long player. He's about six-foot seven and has a seven-foot wing span. So that helps on the weight of the basket. But he's mostly a guy who's going to spot up at the three-point line and shoot and shoot threes, which is a very useful skill in today's NBA. He shoots about over the past three seasons. He shot about 41% on catching shoots, and I think close to 45% on corner threes. So that'll be great. It's another guy in the starting lineup who can shoot.

And it's a guy of small forward size. He's a decent defender, too. So that's big for the Pistons, because they've solved their small forward problem. He's not ideal. He's not the greatest starter, but he's a serviceable starter. And you get him now, and especially you get him in exchange for lure,

who was, unfortunately, after a pretty good, Actually, you know, pretty darn good. Not great, but pretty good. First half season with the Pistons in the 2016-2017 season. It really fell off. And he missed most of the last season with an ankle injury. And, excuse me, the season before last 2017-2018 season. And then last season, he was just pretty useless.

Unfortunately, he was signed as a guy who was, you know, the idea was he was going to be a stretch for. He was never able to get himself. he was never able to make himself into a good three-point shooter. He, for that first half season with the Pistons, or first, you know, 30 games or so, he was actually a very capable mid-range shooter. And off the bench, he scored around 10 points on about 58% true shooting.

And it makes him no slouch, even though the lack of spacing of the three-point line hurt. So in any event, he had become completely useless to the piston. So you replace a useless player with a player who can actually offer something to you. So an additional benefit is that on top of getting a guy who can start at small forward, now you don't have to go for one in the off season. It was going to be very awkward for the Pistons to sign a backup point guard.

I mean, I've said multiple times that I think Luke Canark could get that job, but he's not going to. So it's kind of a moot point. So before you had to look for a backup point guard, you had to look for a backup center, and you had to look for a backup small forward. And you were going to have to shirk at one of those positions. So now the pistons have that small forward. And it would be nice if they could get a little bit of additional depth, somebody on a minimum contract. It's no longer a necessity.

So they can really focus on point guard and center. So that's real nice. It also defines the plane. field a little bit more for the pistons. Also, the Sekud Dumboa, also, you got him at backup power forward, which hopefully he can manage. As I'll talk about later, you know, nobody knows what he's ready for at this point. He was picked on potential rather than an ability to contribute now. But you like to think he can at least play those backup power forward minutes and maybe some backup small forward minutes.

Though again, I think it would be more ideal to get a guy in the minimum contract to play those. So the playing field is also defined a little bit more for other teams, which will have an implication on the free agents whom the Pistons will reasonably be able to pursue. So the cost for the Pistons was that you got to eat another year on Tony Snell's contract, so you've got a bit less flexibility next season, or next off season, which is fine. The Pistons had the contracts of Jackson, Galloway, and Lue, were in addition to the dead cap hit of Josh Smith coming off the books next season, which was going to be about $40 million.

And that would have been nice. But in terms of practical cap space, because the Pistons are about, you know, about, I mean, at the end of the season, they'll be, at the end of the off season, rather, there'll be a lot over the cap. So in lieu of them, I'm saying, one-year deals, which I don't think they're going to with the middle-level exception and the biannual exception, just because it's tough to get guys on one-year deals with those.

And also, you really want to lock up, you really want to maximize those exceptions. You know, the Pistons weren't going to have quite as much cap space as you might think. So losing that's what's going to be about 12 million given Snell's cap hit for 2020, 2021 isn't really a big deal. Also, if you want to maintain even the pre-eastern, you know. or having even a chance, you know, of maximizing Blake Griffin's window. The Pistons just had to have a small forward. So, and a small forward crop on the free agent market, at least for, you know, the attainable ones. It's, it was, it was a very top heavy class with guys like

Kevin Durant and Kauai Winer. The guys whom the Pistons really could have afforded, there were not many of them, you know, guys who would do, you know, who the Pistons could afford and who really fit their needs. So. Anyway, let's talk about the draft. So, of course, we've got Seco-Dumbaya. Pistons did not expect him to fall. So, you know, the minutes he fell to 15, he was the guy they were going to take. And they drafted best player available for the future.

They didn't draft for the right now. Everybody, you know, from scouts to the Pistons front office, says definitively that Dumbaya is very raw. He, I believe, is the youngest player at the draft. He weren't turned 19 until December. He didn't start playing on any level in basketball, I think, until age 12. He's got three years behind him playing against, you know, playing, I guess you can say, on the pro level in France, you know, playing against men is the way that they put it at the draft. So he's not by any means without experience, but what you've got is in Dubai as a guy

with a potentially all-around skill set, you know, who's very athletic. He's got a lot of potential as a multi-positional defender. And, you know, if he can put it all together with shooting, with driving to the basket, and basically refine himself, he could be a very good player. But right now, he's that potentially multi-talented player, but he isn't good at anything yet. And that's fine. Ed Stefanski has said, you know, this is a player who's meant to help us in probably 2021,

2021, 2022. He's a guy for the future. Maybe next, you know, maybe, you know, 2020, 2021, if all goes well. And hopefully you can contribute this season. But I don't think Pistons fans should really expect much of him this season. You know, who knows? Maybe he manages to really put it together and he has a great season. That's not outside the realm of possibility. But it's also not outside the realm of possibility that he just can't really get it together

and he plays very few minutes, which is why it would be. nice to have a backup combo forward. Again, a guy preferably on a minimum contract, just as a failsafe. Of course, you've got to consider which guy, you know, who can provide with the Pistons need would actually be willing to come here for that salary and, you know, in a role that isn't guaranteed. But I don't think if you're the Pistons, you want to bank on him being able to step up his backup power forward, you know, as starting power forward in case of injuries, or, you know,

certainly not a backup power forward in case, goodness forbid, of an injury to Blake Griffin. But in any event, Pistons took best player available, which I didn't think they would do. I thought that they would draft kind of in the middle player with potential who's kind of ready for the NBA. But, yep, they decided to swing for the fences. And, you know, in a way, it took guts to do that because it's not going to allow you to maximize necessarily Blake Griffin's window, at least for the coming season. but for the sake of the future of the Pistons, you know, obviously that's, you know, the ideal situation if you really want to be building for a few years down the line. Now, one of the knocks on Dumbaya was maturity, but, you know, you'll recall that Andre

Drummond's had the same concerns about maturity, but they're, you know, they sounded the same, but they're actually different. So Dumbaya's wax maturity in the way of he's just very young, you know, he's a real young guy, And so was Drummond. Drummond was also 18 at the time of the draft back in 2012. But there were additional concerns about Drummond in the area of, does he care enough about basketball? You know, is he going to have the motivation at the NBA level to be a truly great player and to maximize what was, you know, and remains a very significant potential,

albeit less so than seven years ago because the league is grown into, you know, Shooters League, even at center. And he can't shoot right now, at least he can't shoot, nor would it really make sense for him to operate on the perimeter because his biggest strength is rebounding. So, I mean, it'd be nice for him to take the odd spot-up three, but, you know, and it'd be great for Griffin to have a center who can space the floor. But that's just probably not in the cards for Drummond. Nor is it something he should be working on this summer.

I guess he just has other aspects of his game, particularly in the way of offensive polish, that he really just needs to work harder on. Will he do that? anybody's guess, but I digress. So that's what you got in Seco, Dumaya. And only time will tell if it was the right pick, as with any draft pick. Anybody but the sure things. And, you know, you're going to have a hard time finding a sure thing with a lot of potential with the 15th pick. So moving on to the other guys, you have Deavitis Servitas, Servitas. Pardon me, I haven't fully learn to pronounce his name yet, even though I can spell it now. In any event, I don't necessarily

approve of the way that the Pistons handled the second round. So they traded that 30th overall pick to Cleveland for four second round draft picks. Cleveland had hoarded a lot of second round draft picks, so none of these belonged to Cleveland. But I think this was a case of the tail wagging the dogs, so to speak. I think the Pistons had a plan that they wanted. to get a guy in the second rounds whom they could stash in Europe because counting Dumbaya, they're going to go into next season with 11 guys on the roster. And the maximum number of guys you're going to have on an NBA roster is 15. I mean, there are some exceptions.

Like if some teams will go into the season with 13 and if you just, if you have injuries and, you know, and given cap situation, you're just not, you know, basically you can get exceptions, but that's irrelevant right now for the sake of the point. Pistons. So with 15 is the limit in wanting to sign some guys in free agency. I think, and also given a pretty strict cap, with not much flexibility in the way of cap space. I think the Pistons wanted to find a guy whom they could take, a guy with potential whom they could select, and then just stash in Europe where he could continue to accrue

experience. But also importantly, would not count against the roster and would not count against the cap. However, the end of the first round wound up to be, the first round wound up to be, have a lot of talent at the end, much more than a lot of people anticipated. You had the Kelden Johnson, Kevin Porter, Casey Ackpala. You had guys who fell pretty far back, who nobody expected to fall that far. So I think it may have made more sense for the Pistons to take a chance on a guy like Okpola, for example, who could one day make a pretty good combo forward, probably off the bench. But they decided to make that trade to get into the second rounds, presumably for a European player.

I'm guessing they targeted him. But what they did is they traded for those picks, and they immediately started trying to trade down to 32, which ended up apparently not being possible. So I think this would have been a situation. in which it would have been wiser for the Pistons to take a flyer on a guy with potential, whether Akpala or even Porter, even though there would have been no space. I think what warned the Pistons away from Porter is that he's the kind of player whom Dwayne Casey would absolutely despise, you know, at least assuming that he didn't mature a great deal over the summer.

Porter is very talented. And he's, I think a lot of scouts agreed that he had one of the highest offensive ceiling. in the draft. Now, his main knock was maturity. He had a lot of off-the-court problems in college, included one of which running with his coach resulted in a pretty lengthy suspension. So those were the biggest concerns, despite his ceiling.

That caused him, rather, despite his ceiling, to fall ultimately to number 30. And Dwayne Casey's preferred sort of player is one who's really going to buy into the system work hard for the team and has a lot of character. But I think it would have, it might have made sense for the Pistons to select Porter and try to move him for a decent roster player. I mean, they would have had to pair him with maybe Langston Galloway,

but another decent roster player on a good contract. Or, though I do question if they would have selected Kelton Johnson. He was selected at 29. If he'd made it to number 30, I've got to think the Pistons would have been end in that plan because he is the exact sort of player whom Dwayne Casey loves. He buys into the system. He works really hard. He really hustles on defense, and Casey is all about defense. He continues to say, you know, if a player can't play good defense, he's just not going to see the floor. But, you know, as I've said in the past, I think that's an indication of Casey's sort of archaic

way of thinking because it's in today's really offense-focused league where it's all about scoring and the rules really favor scoring. They don't at all favor defense. The freedom of motion rules rather that were put into place at the beginning of this past season really made it more difficult to defend. That's the point where guys like, you know, Tremont Green, who admittedly complains about everything, but is also one of the great defenders in the NBA today. And Greg Popovich, who's arguably the greatest coach of all times. I just said it's extremely difficult to play defense now. So it's much better in today's league to be a good score and bad on defense than to be a bad

score and really good on defense. But I digress. I got to think that the Pistons would have taken Kelton Johnson if you'd fallen. But maybe not. And I think they just surrendered their desire to have a guy whom they could stash and passed up better talents in the process. So I don't really like the way they did it. I think it was a little bit befuddling, given the talent that was still available, and there was some.

Now they moved on to take Jordan Bone in the late 50s. Jordan Bone is, as many of note, an athletic specimen. He ranked very highly at the combine in basically every athletic category. Is the NBA ready right now? Maybe. I mean, he's not the greatest at running an offense. He's pretty good at penetrating in the basket. He's super quick.

He's a great weeper. And, you know, he was a decent enough three-point shooter. In college, it's about 35 percent, though it's worth noting that the college three-point line is about two feet closer to the basket than the three-point line on the NBA. But I think the Pistons just saw some potential for, at the very least, a backup point guard of the future, and who knows, maybe he'll surprise everybody. But they also saw the potential to get a draft pick whom they could put on a two-way deal.

Two-way deals don't count against the 15-man roster limit. And they also don't count against the cap. So it's real nice to have young, talented players on two-way deals. Each team gets two slots. And there have been some players recently who were drafted really late in the second round who ended up on two-way deals. And there's been talk that the Pistons, that's their plan. They're going to put them on a two-way deal,

which means presumably Jordan Bowen has agreed to. it. So I think that was another factor. And maybe, but probably not. You know, the Pistons received $5 million in cash considerations from the Cavaliers, which I believe was the most in the way of cash considerations ever traded the draft. And they ended up using two million of those to, along with a really pretty useless top 55 protected draft pick came from the heat and then 2024. But I mean, the point is you're very unlikely to see a draft pick that requires, you know, that has to be in the range of 55 to 60 to transfer. In any events, they packaged that $2 million because it was basically Philly was trading for cash. They got the pick from the 76ers by way of the Pelicans.

And so, you know, Philly, who are probably going to go terribly into the luxury tax this summer if their plan comes to fruition, if they managed to sign Butler and sign Harris. and this is just going to get worse when they have to sign Simmons to a big contract. It's not air base basically just looking for cash and maybe just said, you know, we'll take the draft pick too, why not? So in any event, and it's worth noting because I've seen a lot of people who have asked about this, that that five million the Pistons got from the Cavaliers does not impact the salary cap situation at all. You can't trade cap space. It was just money in the organization's pocket.

So that's what I think about the draft. Was it a successful draft for the piston? I would say yes. They got a player with a lot of potential who could easily have gone in the top 10. And Servetus isn't a bad player. He's considered that to have potential as an elite outside shooter. He's got some ability to create off the dribble as well. He doesn't have the greatest wingspan.

I'll probably struggle on defense. And right now he's not ready. I think I've seen a lot of. analysts say he's just not ready for the NBA and it's it's true he's very he's very small for he's very slighted only about 195 pounds and at six foot nine so he's really he's kind of a twig right now so he'll have to put on more strength but also just as a player he's not necessary he's probably not ready for the for the NBA and also he plays hopefully he'll he'll bulk up and be able to play you know maybe be a bench shooting a bent small forward rather in the future but right

now he's a shooting guard and the Pistons already have plenty of those so there's just no space for him on the roster but you know you need elite shooters in this week so I don't think he's a bad piece for the future and Jordan Bone could end up being something and he'll be probably the third string point guard this season two-way players can only be with their team for 45 days but I'd rather be with the NBA team for 45 days but that means in practice they can play quite a few games. I don't really know what the restrictions on practice are. But I just, you know, I think it means they could play 45 games. So in any event, hopefully that doesn't turn out to be necessary. Because if it does turn out to be necessary, it's because either Reggie Jackson or whomever

the Pistons signed as their backup point guard has suffered a very long-term injury. So, all told, was this a successful draft of the Pistons? I suppose so. They got a high potential player who fell to them at 15. Do I think it could have been better? Yes, I really think the Pistons, instead of sticking with what looked to be, just their original plan, should have drafted some of the talents that fell to, that was still available at the end of the first round,

that people just did not expect to be available at that point. So that's the draft. Anyway, so now we move on to free agency. So the Pistons have, I would say, three defined needs in free agency. First, of course, is a point guard. And that's where probably that's the priority pick for the Pistons is a backup point card. I've said many times, I think Lou Kinnard is ready to play backup point guard. I see him as sort of a Lou Williams type.

And, you know, obviously if he could be even 75% as good as Lou Williams, that would be fantastic. But I see him as that sort of type because he's a guy who comes in and can handle the ball. He thrives on volume. You know, it seems like the more he shoots, the better he does. And he attracts a lot of attention when he, for example, comes around a pick and roll. Because he can shoot the ball from anywhere. He's a very good mid-range shooter, for example. And if you have a guy who's an elite mid-range shooter and Lukinar was this past season,

not early on, I suppose, but when he finally started getting playing time, he was very much an elite mid-range shooter. So a guy like that, he comes around a pick. You cannot give him six inches of space. So often both guys will go to him, and then the roll man is free to go to the basket. Or if it's just one guy defending him, the guy's got to stay real close. And so it'll generally open up teammates. And Luke, at that point, you know, if he can't shoot the ball, if he's so well-covered that he can't shoot it,

there's probably a teammate open, and he's very good at finding him. He's a very able passer. He's got quite good, surprisingly good corporation. You know, his weakness playing at point guard would be that he's not very good at penetrating into the basket. He's got a slow first step. He's not explosive. He's not a good jumper.

And he's got a pretty short wingspan. And those are all pretty significant disadvantages when you're thinking about penetrating into the basket. So if Karnarad ever gets good at that, it's going to be because he's going to do it on the basis of his cleverness, you know, assuming he has that. He's going to need to get real Kani with his moves on the way to the basket. Canny? Maybe, maybe not.

In any event, I really think the piss and should just roll with him, but that's not going to happen, so it's kind of a moot point. It seems, it's unclear. If he'll start next season, I personally doubt he will. I feel like Dwayne Casey has made it kind of sort of clear that he plans on using Kennard as the pivot of the bench units going forward, and I think that's the best role for Conard again. if he doesn't have to share the floor with Blake Griffin or Reggie Jackson, he's going to be able to handle it a lot more. He's going to be able to shoot on volume and so on and so forth.

So I think that's the ideal role for him. It'll also protect him from the very difficult matchups he would otherwise face in the starting lineup as there are some shooting guards who will absolutely roast him. And teams would probably deliberately target him on switches because he's pretty small. And he doesn't have a good defender or point guard. to help out with that.

Reggie Jackson has always been a below-average defender, even when he's healthy. So I suspect he'll be playing from the bench. So what does that mean? It means pistons, of course, need to look for a point guard. This is likely what they'll spend the mid-level exception on. That's about $9.25 million. And so backup point guard is going to be their largest expenditure

because 9.25 is the most the pistons can spend on any individual player this summer unless by some incredible miracle they move all the bad contracts they want and that's, you know, that's not going to happen. So who's going to be best? Number one, guys you can rule out are anybody who can't shoot, and that includes Isch Smith. Ish is a super hard worker. He's a great team guy, and he's super likable, but he's not right for this team. And players like him, guards who can't shoot, point guards who can't shoot, are on. on the way out. Because they come with a whole host of disadvantages. And the chief amongst these

is that they destroy spacing because they can't shoot. It often makes it much considerably more difficult to come by open shots for their teammates. They can't really be on the floor with another non-shooter ideally because that just annihilate spacing even further. They've got to have the ball and that means that nobody else can have it. So they really just limit your options. We can use ish as an example here. And I think a very good example is the series against Milwaukee. And granted, Milwaukee is a pretty darn good defensive team this past season. But any good defense will play Ish the way that they played him. So what they did is they just backed off and dared him to shoot. They said you can either shoot the ball or you can try to drive to the

basket, you know, drive into the paint. And we've got a bunch of people there to stop you. So he went on to have a terrible series. He could not penetrate to the basket. He's not a good three-point shooter by any means. He doesn't even like to attempt them. Oddly enough, he can shoot a little bit better on this weird little pull-ups of his than on catching shoots. He's not a good catch-and-jew three-point shooter by any means.

And he has generally had a decent mid-range game, you know, a decent shot maybe 10 to 15 feet away from the basket off the dribble. But even that's unreliable. And that's not enough because you drive in there, again, that's not going to provide you with spacing. So basically the fact that he can't shoot means he always has to be on the ball. He's super ball dominant because the second he loses the ball, he becomes worse than useless. And this was illustrated pretty well in that series. When he was on the floor with Luke Kinnard, Isch just had to have the ball.

And Luke was closely guarded. It didn't help that Dwayne Casey wasn't giving him any off-ball screens or anything like that. but Canard was closely guarded, and on the incident, a very exceedingly rare instances that Isch passed to him. I don't know if this was deliberate, I got to doubt it, because he's a pretty selfless player. He did not often pass the ball to Canard, whether in the regular season or in the playoffs. It was very, very rare. And when it happened, it was generally just a short pass at the three-point line. So when he did pass the ball to Canard, Ish's defender would just go double Luke immediately,

and Luke would be forced, essentially, to pass the ball to Ish, who would generally be somewhere at the three-point line, because, you know, it's very difficult for anybody to break through a double-team to the three-point line, and, you know, especially so for Kinard, who's, you know, not of the biggest nor the most explosive player out there. So he'd have to pass the ball right back to Ish, and then you're back where you start it, and you have to reset the play because Ish can't shoot threes.

His defender just goes back and, you know, sits around the pain again, and you're just right back to where you started. So it really cuts down on your options. You know, in addition to destroying spacing, it really just cuts down on your options because your options basically boil down to let Isch have the ball or give it to somebody else and have Ish be completely useless or worse than useless because his defender will just leave him.

And that makes him also, you know, as far as the considerations for the pistons go, that makes him an exceptionally poor fit with Knard, who, barring a recovery by Reggie Jackson, which is possible. You know, it's conceivable that Reggie Jackson and what is his first healthy offseason since 2015 could make some progress on his health. And if he were able to make even a significant amount, not even get back to where he was and was able once more to penetrate to the basket off the pick and roll, he used to have, you know, real good mid-range pull-up if you could get that back and so on and so forth.

I mean, that would be massive. But barring that, Luke Kennard, is going to be the second most valuable offensive player on the team next season. and you've got to maximize what he can provide you, and he is in just absolutely utterly terrible fit with Isch Smith. So that's another factor, but on top of that, you have that Ish cannot start because, well, for a couple of reasons. Number one, he's in the starting line if he's invariably going to be on the floor with Drummond, and Drummond can't shoot.

So you've got two non-shooters out there, and that annihilates your spacing to begin with. And so that's not going to work. He can't play effectively with Griffin either, because, again, Ish has to be on the ball. Griffin performs it his best when he's on the ball. So, Ish is going to give it up to Griffin, of course, because it's Griffin's prerogative, and he should have the ball,

because he's the most likely to do something good with it. And then you got Ish just kind of standing there, and he can't really do anything. And, again, his defender is free to go and double-team Griffin. It was the same sort of problem you saw with Bruce Brown in the starting lineup. Bruce Brown, even worse shoot than an issue. So just with all of those factors, I think it's imperative that they let Ishko. Now, if you would have worked super hard and suddenly become, you know, like 35, 36 percent

three-point shooter when left open, that would be a different story. But I think that's very unlikely to happen. It's just not as cup of tea. And that all of these problems are going to extend to any non-shooting point guard out there that includes, say, Alfred Payton, Corey Joseph, or even Delon Wright. or Tyos Jones, though they're restricted. I doubt the pistons would really try that out anyway. But any guy who is not a good perimeter shooter comes with his sets

with a pretty big set of liabilities. Also, Terry Rozier. Rozier is a guy that you see a lot of people talk about, or a lot of fans talk about, rather, around the league, largely because of his pretty good performance in the 2018 playoffs. On the whole, though, Terry Rozier is not a very good player. He's a pretty bad shooter. He's very much a hero bowler who likes to take bad shots.

And again, super ball dominant. Basically, when it comes to this team, you can rule out any backup point guard who is super ball dominant. So, I mean, you can rule out guys who can't shoot, and you can rule out guys who are super ball dominant. The Pistons have, the front office has been very clear. They want a guy who would be able to step into the starting lineup. And a guy who can also play significant minutes because they want to limit Jackson's minutes. largely for the sake of his health, probably it's also not ideal to have him playing a ton of minutes because he has asthma. So if you want a guy who's going to be able to play big minutes

and step into the starting lineup, it can't be a guy like Ish. We've seen what happens, and we know why. As I said, I mean, it's just not going to work out between non-shooters and Griffin and Drummond. So, or Karnard. So, but if you want a guy who's going to be able to step in the starting lineup, it's got to be a guy who's able to play off the ball and a guy who's good at shooting. So you can rule out probably all the non-shooters, all the non-shooting point guards, so Roger Joseph, and so on. I think you can also rule out Derek Rose. So Rose had a pretty good season. He really had a very resurgent season with the Timberwolves, including that 50-point game. It was a really feel-good story. Now here's the issue with Rose. Number one is health.

He's still, I mean, he's the entire story of his career from, you know, his initial ACL tear onward is bad health. He's not likely to give you more than, say, 60 games, if that. And when you're dealing with already with a starting point guard whose health is a question mark, you really don't want to be inviting in a backup point guard who has the same problem and to an even greater extent. So that's one issue with Rose. Another issue is that he's still a very ball dominant point guard.

He actually did pretty well at shooting the three this season, but at his heart, he's a guy who performs best when he's able to take the ball and do something with it. That's where you're going to find the majority of his utility. He's got that mid-range jumper he loves. He's actually gotten pretty good, again, at penetrating into the basket, and that's when he's at his best. And again, that's going to make it hard to play him with Blake Griffin.

Blake Griffin is the center point of this team. Everything's happening around him. And if you've got a guy in the floor whose utility is mostly found in what he can do when he's on the ball, that's not ideal. Again, Blake is the best guy for the pit, you know, he's the best, he's the guy you want to be handling the ball the most. He's going to be the primary ball handler on the floor because he does the best things with it. So that makes ball dominant guys like Rose, even if they can shoot fairly well, not the greatest fit. And again, Rose, not an ideal fit with Luke canard once more, because Luke is a guy you want to handle the ball. so you want a dude who's not going to minimize that.

So I think even if Derek Rose decides he wants to leave Minnesota, you can probably rule him out as a primary candidate for the Pistons, even on the basis of his health alone, if not also the way he plays. Maybe the Pistons will take a shot at him if he's on the market, and they've struck out on the primary candidates, but I don't see them pursuing him otherwise. Another name I've seen bandied around a bit among fans of the Pistons is Isaiah Thomas. I think there's no realistic possibility of the Pistons

will have even the slightest bit of interest in him. He used to be a great offensive player. He was the kind of player whose game was never going to be able to weather the loss of half a step. He got injured. He's slowed down. He's no longer a good offensive player, and he's always been a terrible defender. So the Pistons have no reason to even look at the guy. So onward to point guards in whom the Pistons would actually have interest.

Top of the list is Patrick Beverly. He's also effectively unattainable for the Pistons. Beverly is a super-reliable catch-and-shoot three-point shooter. He's been at or above 40% in each of the last three seasons. he's a real hard-nosed defender, super hard worker, and really good teammates. So he's going to be sought after. And we'll almost certainly, I would say personally, I'd just say certainly, we'll get offers in excess of the mid-level exception,

and the mid-level exception is the most that the pistons can offer. So that takes him off the table for the pistons right off the bat. Even in the purely hypothetical and incredibly unlikely scenario that he only receives offers of the middle-level exception, summer. He's got better options than Detroit. We can just be honest about that. The Clippers are a real up-and-coming team. They were quite good, even after the Tobias trade. They made the playoffs in a super competitive Western Conference and took two games off the Warriors. They've got a great coach in Doc Rivers. He could easily just stay there. He's a Chicago boy. He's made it clear. He's

waiting for a call from the Bulls. He'd love to play there. They drafted Colby White, but as things currently appear. He's not ready to start in the NBA, so Beverly would be a pretty good choice. I mean, they'd be happy to sign him and just start him at point guard for the time being. He's been linked to Dallas. Dallas, another upcoming team, also with a great coach in Rick Carlisle. He would be a really good match with Luca Donchich if they opted to start Beverly at point guard, which they could easily do. Donchich is a very on-ball sort of player. Beverly would be a really good, a really ideal to Donchich in that he's very able as an offball player. Also, Donchich is never going to be a good, probably never going to be a particularly good defender. So Beverly could help to take some of the

heat off of him in the area of defense by taking on the more difficult defensive assignment in the back court. So there's another, and they've got poor Zingas too. So they've got all the makings of a pretty darn good team. So I think we can safely say that as much as we'd love to have the guy in Detroit's, Patrick Beverly will not be coming to the Pistons this summer. And that moves us on to the two potential candidates for backup point guard, whom I believe are both attainable for the Pistons and will fit the team's needs. And those are Darren Collison and Seth Curry. So as far as what the two of them offer, in Collison, you're getting a guy who is better able to run an offense and is better able to penetrate.

In Curry, you're getting a somewhat better shooter, and, you know, he's surprisingly decent defender, at least off the bench. He's a better defender than Collison, who is kind of, you know, he wasn't in the time. terrible defender, but he's below average, certainly. And also a guy who's three years younger, exactly three years younger, in fact. They coincidentally have the same birthday. So how would they work as far as the context of the pistons go? So Collison, like I said, he'd be able to run an offense. He'd be able to kind of run the bench units.

He's not very good at scoring at the baskets, but he's good of penetrating into the paints. He's a good drive-and-kick passer, and the driving kick, of course. is a big deal for any good offense. And he'd be able to swat under the starting lineup in case of an injury to Reggie Jackson, and just his ability to run an offense would help to take some of the load off of Blake Griffin. When it comes to Seth Curry, he's an absolutely lethal shooter. I mean, Collison's no slouch by all means.

He's a pretty darn good catch-and-shoe three-point shooter. Curry is an absolutely lethal three-point shooter, particularly if you leave him open. And he, like I said, he's a second. he's a surprisingly fairly decent defender. And, you know, it's just, it's always great to have that kind of elite shooter. Now, which of the two is the ideal option? I'd have to go with Collison, just based on his ability to do more things with the ball. It's entirely conceivable, I guess, that you put Curry in that position,

in the position of backup point guard, and, you know, he surprises all of us. You know, it turns out to be a decent passer with decent cork vision, but he hasn't displayed that yet. So I think Collison is the ideal choice that you probably don't want to give him more than a couple of years because he's kind of slowing down a little bit already. And, you know, 31 is, you know, as far as the NBA goes, you know, you're getting on the older side. But it comes down to the question of attainability in any event. So whether or not Collison will be retained by the Pacers may actually come down to, I mean, basically, the situation may trace back all the way back to, believe it or not, Kevin Durant.

So the Nets, there were all sorts of reputable sources we're saying a few weeks ago that Kyrie to the Brooklyn Nets was more or less a done deal. Now, what seems to have been the assumption of the Nets was that you bring in Kyrie and you bring in Durant, so you're bringing the two of them in together, and Durant was the more valuable of the two. Now, Durant tears as Achilles, and that is the worst common basketball injury you can possibly have. Very, very rarely do players come back and look and be as good as they were. Usually, they take a steep hit to performance. Like, you'll recall, for example, Brandon Jennings, who I think is a little bit overrated by Pistons fans because of that great and a really good stretch he had after Josh Smith was waived and before his own Achilles injury. prior to that he'd pretty much just been sort of an inefficient chucker.

But, you know, he had that really good stretch. He tore his Achilles. He came back about a year later, and he was not a good player anymore. He was kind of a shadow of what he had once been, and he was out of the NBA within a year and a half. I believe he plays in China now. DeMarcus Cousins, before his Achilles injury, was a top three center. He was a dominant score.

He came back, and, you know, maybe he'll recover. more, but at least with the Warriors, again, he was nothing like that dominant player he had been before his Achilles injury. Kobe Bryant was still a pretty darn good player into his mid-30s. He injured his Achilles. He came back, and he was bad. He was a bad score. And he had his farewell to it with the Lakers, you know, basically two years in which they let him shoot as much as he wanted to, and with the exception of that, you know, really feel-good,

final game of his, he was just awful in those last two years. So it's tough to know how Kevin Durant's, you know, how it will look when he comes back. I think personally he's not going to decline as much as the other guys I mentioned just because he's never, he's, number one, he doesn't carry much weight. You know, if you're a big man and, you know, your, because your Achilles is what you push off of. So if you're a big guy, you know, just you got to move more weights. It's just going to be a bigger issue. So that's not as big of a thing for Durant. Also, he's really made his effect, and it's not so much on explosiveness,

which you really tend to lose a lot of from an Achilles injury. But just from being an incredible shooter who can just shoot from anywhere, can shoot from the three-point line, can shoot off the dribble, has that really basically unguarable fade-away two-pointer, can score at the basket, can drive to the net. So I don't think, and also he's as a seven-foot-tall guy with really long arms and just the way he shoots it, he just basically can't be guarded. You know, there's no good way to guard him when you combine his frame with what he's able to do as a shooter.

So, but will he come back looking the same as he was? Who knows? And nobody knows now what he really wants to do. Will Brooklyn still offer them the max? Who knows? I think they're kind of, by indications, I don't know anything about the internal state of Brooklyn Nets, obviously. but it seems like what they felt was a certain situation is no longer certain, and now they're wondering if they just want to bring in Kyrie alone.

Kyrie is a very talented basketball player, but he's not the kind of guy who's going to be the best player on a really successful team. He's also, for lack of a better word, or maybe just because this is the best way to describe him, kind of a douchebag, the fact that he'd amply demonstrated during his time in Boston. So if Kyrie does go to Brooklyn, then they're going to let go of DeAngelo Russell. That's pretty much certain. They're not going to want to invest upwards of $50 million into two guys who play the same position, and we're both very ball dominant.

So in the event that Kyrie goes there, DeAngel Russell leaves, and who knows, maybe he goes to Indiana. They can make the space to accommodate him, and I'm sure they'd love to have him. And in that event, I think it's pretty likely that Darren Collison is gone because that's a lot of money. He's spending a lot of money on DeAngelo Russell. You've got to re-sign Bogdanovich. So that would make him more likely to be on the free agent market. As things stand, apparently Indiana is looking at Ricky Rubio.

I couldn't tell you why. He can't shoot, which means he plays, you know, he's a super on-ball guy. Quinn Snyder managed to play him in a slughey. slightly different way to accommodate Donovan Mitchell in Utah. Donovan Mitchell is a very on-ball player as well, but he's, it strikes me, it's not at all ideal to play next to Victor Oladipo, who really does most of the ball handling. He won't be back until February, but he really has done most of the ball handling for the Pacers over the past two seasons. But I'd digress. So Collison may be attainable, maybe not. It's, you know, based on whether or not he stays with

Indiana. Strongly doubt he gets more than the mid-level exception because, you know, he's, he's a serviceable backup. He's a pretty good backup, rather. He's a serviceable starter. But, you know, he's not a particular standout by any means, even, you know, amongst this free agent class. Curry would be quite a bit more attainable.

There's very, very little chance that the Trailblazers keep him. In the first place, the Trailblazers are well over the cap, and they don't have Seth is bird rights, bird rights being what allow a team to exceed the cap in order to re-sign a player. So there's that. As things stand, they're not even going to be able to use the full mid-level exception without going over the end of the luxury tax. And Portland for quite some time has avoided the luxury tax like the plague. Also, if you know, if you're talking about giving a guide to full MLE, they're looking forward pretty soon to. Damien Willard being eligible for a supermax and for a team like the Trailblazers that doesn't

really like to spend a ton of money. I mean, that's going to take up a bunch of cap. So I think they'd rather pay a guy who's not really going to cost them much money. And Curry didn't this past year. He was only paid around $2.5 million. So I think it's basically certain he hits the open market. So I think he's the more attainable the two. So in the event that Collison isn't attainable, and I think that the Pacers would keep him if they were just the son, Ricky Rubio, who probably won't be all that expensive. But I could be wrong and he could decide he wants to go someplace else. That's a, you know, like, just like, for example, Patrick Beverly, I mean, the Pistons will hardly be Collison's only option, and there will

probably be other teams that pursue him. So in the case that the Pistons are forced to turn to Seth Curry, it's not ideal, but I don't think it's the end of the world either. It provides them with some intriguing options. Number one, I mean, he's a, he's in no particularity. He's a guy who can flex between point guard and shooting guard. He's a lot understads for shooting guard, but just the fact that he can shoot the ball so well, you know, just allows him to slot, to either position, and it's always valuable to have, to just have a really, really good shooter. Also, if you put them on the courts and the bench unit with Luke Kennard, sure, Curry can't penetrate, or at least he hasn't shown it yet.

He hasn't shown that he has any real ability to penetrate into the panes, and penetrating into the pane is a big deal. As I mentioned, I mean, just for the sake of breaking down defenses and being able to kick the ball out to open three-point shooters. But what you could do in the situation you have the two of them playing together is just let Kinar do most of the ball handling. You know, let Curry be the secondary ball handler. And whatever the case, you've got a back court off the bench

that is just that you've got two great shooters there. And that'll be real nice. And same late game situations when you really need to score, you put the two of them out there with Blake Griffin. like maybe, you know, it doesn't matter, just at each of the guard positions. Curry would still work pretty well with Griffin if he were forced into the starting lineup by an injury to Reggie Jackson because, yeah, he's just a super good off ball player, or at least in the context of shooting.

Always good to have more shooters around, you know, around Blake Griffin, and Blake is going to be doing the lion's share of the ball handling in any event. So while I see Curry as the less preferable option of the two, I think you could do well for the pistons. His main liability would be his inability to really create for himself off the dribble and penetrate into the panes. So hopefully the pistons would have a guy on the bench units who was able to do that. Who that might be? Who knows?

You know, I couldn't exactly tell you. So that's who we'd look at at point guard. At center, there are a lot of guys you can look at at center. And it's tough to know what the market will be. The pistons will almost certainly use the biannual exception, which is $2.6 million, or excuse me, 3.6 million, which isn't really a tremendous amount of money. But you've got a lot of low-cost centers on the markets. Now, what can you get with $3.6 million?

I mean, ideally, you want, I mean, anybody would love a center who can space the floor and defend the rim. Like Dwayne Dedman, for example, is obviously the dream not going to happen for the pistons. You know, he's going to demand the full mid-level exception, if not more. So basically, at $3.6 million, you've got to choose between either a guy, you've got to choose between a guy who can shoot the ball or a guy who's just a good interior scorer and can protect the rim. And a guy you can look at, you know, assuming the sun's let him go,

assuming to keep Aaron Baines, is for Sean Holmes, decent rim protector, good interior scorer, hard worker, good guy in the pick and roll. He would work, and I think he could be happy with $3.6 million. But there are just a lot of just low-cost centers in the market there. We're going to have to wait for the first day free agency to see exactly what the, what the going rate is going to be on them. But, you know, worst case scenario, you sign a minimum contract center like Amir Johnson, for example, assuming he's available. Not great, but, you know, he can kind of do the job.

Maybe, you know, Noah, his health is always a concern, of course. And they'd really, really love to get a shooting center next to Blake Griffin just because his ideal compliment is a guy who can space the floor and defend the rim, space the floor because it gives him an extra got to shoot, extra got to pass. two, assuming he's double-teamed in the post, which he is a lot of the time. It also means that he doesn't have a teammate in the paint who's just hanging out there and thereby another defender is in the paint next to him, which obviously isn't ideal, you know, for obvious reasons. But the Pistons, unless they just take a chance on a guy, like an undrafted free agent,

for example, highly unlikely to get, you know, unless they take that chance and they get lucky, highly unlikely that that happens. But I think they should be able to get a decent center. Just the trouble is, it's first we get to see who's going to be able to see who's going hit the free agent markets and we get to see, you know, what kind of rates are being paid for basic backup centers. So I wish I could say more about that, but I'm just, you know, I'm just feeling pretty, pretty unsure as to exactly what the situation around that's going to be. So that brings us to our third need, which is a backup combo forward or at least a backup power forward.

So Saqwa Dumbaya, as I said earlier in the show, is considered extremely raw by everyone, including the front office. Will he be able to step in and contribute this year? maybe that would be the dream. I personally think it's unlikely. Seems like the front office seems, it feels like it's unlikely. And you don't want to be relying on him to be playing really the back of small forward minutes

and certainly not the, you certainly don't want him to be the backup power forward and put him in a situation where if Griffin goes down to injury or just has to, you know, load management, takes him out of a few games. You don't want to bank on Dubai being able to step in there and start. because like I said, it's entirely conceivable that he's just going to play relatively a few minutes this season

while just the pistons aim to develop him. So it would be great if you could, at the very least, sign a backup power forward who could swat into the starting lineup in case of injury to Griffin. So three guys can you look at. Two of them are Jeff Green and Wilson Chamler. They're both veterans. They can both shoot the three. Chamler is a pretty good defender. Jeff Green's are – he's never going to – you know – he's not a particularly good defender.

but I digress. They're both guys who can swat in and could conceivably slot in at small forward as well, if necessary, though that's not ideal. So they could provide those minutes off the bench, just swatting in, you know, whether it's off the bench from a point guard, excuse me, a power forward or at small forward or going into the starting line if it necessary. Do I think they're attainable? Probably not. These are guys who can, you know, who probably will be on minimum deals. I think it's very likely they'll be on minimum deals.

But when you have guys at that stage, their careers. You know, two things you're probably looking for. Number one is a team you're actually going to get minutes, and that's not guaranteed on the Pistons. You have Dumbia by some miraculous occurrence, and we would all be thrilled about, turns out to be fully ready to play a good amount of minutes,

then those guys, you know, whichever one, Green or Chandler wouldn't really see all that much in the way of minutes. So I don't think if you're a veteran like that, and you can get spots and you can get spots, and you can get a role on another team, which you could easily get if you're either of them. Well, Chandler maybe a little bit less. But you can get a role on another team, like a guaranteed role. You probably want to do that.

Also, guys at their age are not chasing paychecks, they're going to want to look conceivably for a team where they could sign for the veteran minimum and have a chance at a championship. And the Pistons at this point aren't that team. So I think that's unlikely. A guy whom I do think likely is Anthony Tolover. He'll be on the free agent markets, almost certainly. because he was basically squeezed out of the rotation in Minnesota. He can get back in there now, possibly, because Dario Sarich is gone.

But will he stay? Who knows? I think he could be had maybe, maybe, maybe on a veteran minimum. He's a well-liked guy in Detroit. He likes the city. More importantly, he would be able to step into the starting lineup in case Blake Griffin was not able to. excuse me, in case Blake Griffin were to become injured or just take time off. Obviously, they're not going to be resting Griffin for several games at the time. But, you know, he took a game off this last season for time to time for low management.

I think that was absolutely the right decision. And I think the Pistons will do it again. So in the event, in the likely event that Dumbaya just isn't ready, even, you know, probably it's the likely event that he's not ideal to even play those backup power forward minutes. So, again, I could be wrong. The front office could be wrong. All the scouts could be wrong. It's possible.

Tollerver gives you a guy who can step into the starting lineup. He's a good three-point shooter. He's a pretty able defender. He can even play some small ball five. He did that with the pistons a bit. I mean, he's a pretty darn small, small ball five at around six, seven. But he's also just, he's a veteran presence. He's real good in the locker room.

So he's a guy, if I were the front office, I would definitely look at. And out of those three players, I think he's reasonably to buy a good amount the most attainable. So that'll be it for this episode, which, as as usual, gone significantly longer than I had anticipated. I'll be back with one more episode before Free Agency, and that one I'll focus on the necessities of a modern offense, where the business stand with that, and what they can do to address the needs that they still have.

So, as ever, thanks for listening, and I will catch you next time.