Driving to the Basket: A Detroit Pistons Podcast - Episode 88: Cade, the Rookie of the Year Race, and More (featuring Bryce of Motor City Hoops & The Pistons Pulse)

Episode Date: March 9, 2022

This episode, featuring Bryce of Motor City Hoops and The Pistons Pulse, discusses Cade Cunningham's continued impressive play, where he stands in the Rookie of the Year race, Jerami Grant's return to form, and Isaiah Livers' promising start. Thanks to Bryce for joining us on the show! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome back, everybody. You're listening to Drive into the Basket, part of the basketball podcast network. I'm Mike, joined tonight by Tommy and by Bryce, we know from Motor City Hoops and from his new podcast, The Pistons Pulse. Bryce, thanks and much you're joining us. We're really glad to have you. Yeah, thank you, Mike. I'm excited about this. I've been pumped all weekend to record with you guys all week to record with you guys and excited to talk some Pistons basketball. Excellent. So before we get started, why don't you tell us about your new podcast? Yeah, thank you. So some of you may know. me as Motor City Hoops on Twitter from the Motor City Hoops podcast doing articles and stuff at Detroit Bad Boys. But recently I started a new podcast with Omari Sancoe for the second Pistons Beat

Rider and that podcast is put on by the Detroit Free Press. So we put out new episodes every Tuesday. This Tuesday yesterday was just our second episode. And so just go check that out after you listen to the driving to the basket. Check out the Pistons pulse on wherever you listen to podcasts. Fantastic, man. Yeah, absolutely. to myself to listening to it. So we're recording this literally just after, like about less than a half hour after the Pistons defeated the Atlanta Hawks in overtime to win there, I believe it's the sixth and eight games. One player who stuck out, a guy who hasn't gotten to play much until recently, is Isaiah Livers. And I know we were all very impressed about,

you know, how he played in this really is first extended run. So to you guys, what really stuck out from what we saw about him. What we saw from him tonight. Yeah, I just think he does a lot of really high basketball IQ things. We were talking about this before we started recording. And the shooting has to be there, guys, right? Like he has to be able to knock down shots. If he doesn't do that, then I'm not sure any of the other stuff matters. That's the most valuable asset.

But I think he's a high basketball IQ guy. He keeps the ball moving. He's a connector. And then I think defensively, he's at least engaged. And because of that basketball IQ, you could find him being in the right positions. And I don't know that he's a plus defender, but at least be new. as a position defender on that end of the floor. Yeah, I was really happy and surprised, quite frankly,

that he got extended run there at the end of that game. I know he missed that pretty important three that might have closed out the game in the regular, or in the regular 48 minutes. But it's not a big deal. You know, he's going to make those mistakes, and we're happy that he's just getting the run. I think that if he continues to shoot the three ball well, especially down the stretch, we're going to see a lot more of Isaiah Livers.

I think he's going to earn those minutes. And unfortunately, he had those injury bugs. to start the year, but now he looks healthy and he looks ready to contribute. Yeah, definitely. I like what I saw from him. He's a steady player. It looks to be sort of a glue guy. It clearly is very well liked in the locker room. I mean, I think that that's been made very apparent. His teammates, just, I mean, watching them celebrate when he made his first shot was really cool. That was a few games ago. But like you said, Bryce, just a guy who does a lot of things right. I mean, he is, I believe he was a four-year player at Michigan.

and there are certain downsides with that, of course, you know, just in terms of upside coincidentally. But also, you know, those guys tend to come out as more mature product. And you can tell he's a player like, you know, very similar to Sadiq Bay, in which it seems like can count on him to make the right decision in most situations, to read the floor well, to make the right pass. And also just the kind of player I really like in that he's clearly a very team for a sort of guy. So I agree.

The shooting, of course, that's going to be his primary utility in the NBA. Maybe he'll attack some closeouts. But I liked how he moved on defense. I liked how he made the right pass off the drive on offense. And yeah, I mean, you need those kind of role players. So it was just good to see. But I just really like players who like him, who are just hard workers who play for the team, period.

No frills. Yeah. And I think, you know, I don't know that the upside is there, like you said, to be like a starter. Like I don't know that any one of us three thinks that that's a potential for Isaiah Livers. and right now I think we'd all also agree that high-end talent is really what this team needs. So it's, well, it's exciting to see livers play well and maybe be another guy that could be a member of the second unit. I think what's important is, you know, still acquiring the top-end talent, you know, a couple more starters to go along with who they have.

But it's nice to see, you know, a second round guy, Troy Weaver, you know, hits on possibly hits on another guy in the draft that, you know, late in the second round that maybe contributes. But he just settles into that second unit and can provide some shooting and floor spacing, high basketball IQ, and he can just grow with this young team. Absolutely. You said it's the floor spacing that we need. This team desperately still lacks three-point shooting. That was definitely a focus that they had going into the offseason. And Isaiah Livers is one of those guys that they tried to use to address that.

Even if we have that top end talent, you see it right now. If you don't have the right pieces around them, they're going to have a significantly harder time. And I think we're seeing that a lot right now with Cade. Yeah, well, one last thing I just want to say about livers. And this is just, it's a relatively small thing, but it's a valuable thing. He can shoot threes. His shot form essentially, he can shoot threes through heavy coverage. It's a high arcing shot that isn't really bothered by closeouts. And that's just a very valuable skill to have. Just not only in that defenders really have to close out on him and can't give him space, but it's just a really nice tool to have. It might seem like a small thing, but it is a very nice tool to have. I think what Tommy said right there is really important that, yeah, you have Cade, you have Sadiq, you know, Jeremy Grant right now, I don't know if we want to call it a big three. I've seen that thrown around on Twitter. But having the right talent around them helps them shine.

I thought that was a really good point you made Tommy. And that's why Isaiah Livers being on the floor and playing well is really important. You know, I think it's the same thing with Kelly Olinic. I realize Kelly Olinick's not an important piece of the future of this organization in this team, but him bringing what he can bring to the table. And we've seen him not play well this year, admittedly. But whenever those guys play well, it lets Cade have nights like we saw on Monday night. It lets even guys like Killian Hayes play better.

And so I think that's why it's important to have those tertiary guys playing the game well, spacing the floor, being good teammates. Yeah, absolutely agree, definitely. And I mean, everything really in the Piston season had gone wrong up until recently. Like, I don't think that they're like a six wins and eight games sort of team in the long term of this season. We've got about to say we got 17 games left, but definitely we've seen a lot more of what I think the team was intended to be, which was still a team that wasn't, you know, wasn't going to try to make a run to the play ends, but a team that wasn't absolutely terrible.

So, but yeah, on Decade had kind of a characteristic game tonight. And that, I mean, 10 assists, great. He was good on the boards and did all of his usual things. The scoring efficiency really It wasn't great there. That's something he's struggled with recently. But, you know, even when he's, I think we're all confident that the scoring, in particular the three-point shooting will come along. But he just continues to do things on the, just his presence on the floor, how he sees the game, the gravity he draws.

Even when he's not scoring well, really just makes the everybody else in the floor better. Yep, 100%. That's it. Despite the fact that he has, for the past maybe month, he's been shooting it a little bit worse, well, considerably worse than his rookie of the month showing in January. he still gets all the respect from opposing defenders. They're still guarding him tightly. He's still collapsing defenses.

He's still getting double, triple teams. It doesn't matter. And he's still making effective plays off of that gravity. And that's going to be the most important thing. I don't think anybody's really worried at this stage about him being a poor shooter in the long run, even though for the last month or so he's been struggling. It's just about what he's able to do with that gravity and with that respect that he has earned and is getting from the opposition.

Yeah, I can't help but wonder sometimes about the three-point shooting in terms of, is he going to end up being like a 40% three-point shooter in the league like we saw in college, or is he going to end up capping off, you know, in the mid-30s to the upper 30s? But at the end of the day, Tom, like I love the word gravity. Like, C.J. Marchassani, I don't know if you guys know him or not from Twitter, or if the listeners will know that name. If you guys don't, you got to follow him on Twitter. He does some great stuff.

But he was kind of the guy that put me on gravity. And Cade has it. And he gets double-teamed whenever he starts just working people in the people. and the pick and roll. And the mid-range, we've seen it. It's not always efficient, but we've seen it be good at times. But I love his craftiness around the rim.

I don't know if it's surprised you guys or not, but I think the biggest thing that surprised me about Cade Cunningham is his ability to his wiggle, to go by guys, and then finish at the rim. Again, not always super consistent, but he can do it with his right hand and his left hand. Yeah, he's been crafty. I think it's been a pleasant surprise that he's got more burst

than I think some people were expecting also. but he's just a smart player. At this point, he's operating in a bit of a disadvantage because I don't believe he's actually 220. I think he's pegged a little bit higher than, excuse me, he weighs quite a bit lower than what he is listed as. The guy has a lot of space to add strength to his frame, and that's not something you do in the middle of the season.

It's just very difficult to do that with kind of the grueling cardiovascular. These cardiovascular regimen, these guys are under between training and actually in-game. You typically make that jump in the off season. I think you pair that craftiness with considerably more strength. It'll make it much easier for him to kind of barrel his way through or not be knocked off of his stride so easily. And you'll see real progress. As far as his shooting, I'm actually pretty confident he's going to be a 40% guy. But also, excuse me, on catching shoots.

I think that the pull-up three is going to be an important part of his game as well. Oddly enough, he's actually shot quite a bit better on pull-ups and on catching shoots, at least like since the beginning of December. So so I'm confident in that. And the mid-range game, he's shot about 50% on mid-range pull-ups since the beginning of February. And that's just a good tool to have

so the guys have to cover you more closely and also just if you need to create offense. I mean, it's just, that's a very helpful tool to have. Yeah, I agree with you with the bulk. I think whenever, I think you can tell by his play style, he wants to be able to,

I don't want to say bully people, but like play through contact. He has a nice little, like, I think he has a nice little, like, a nice mid-post game, a little baby hook over his left shoulder. When he attacks the basket, you can see him seek out contact at times. I think he had an and one late in this game on Monday night where he like missed it, got a rebound, missed it, got a rebound, and then eventually got an and won and played right through by Ganovich.

And the other thing is he's going to start getting to the free throw line eventually. I've been begging and begging and begging. And if you guys listen to Tuesday's episode of the Pistons Pulse, you'll hear me talk about begging Dwayne Casey. I ask O'Marie to talk to Dwayne Casey about getting a technical in defense of Cade Cunningham getting some more calls. Yep, I know exactly what player you're talking about. It was the one where he got, he lost the ball out of bounds and he insists that he got slapped on the arm. And you just see Casey just standing there. Stoicley. I thought of you when I saw that happen because you've been talking about that for months. I totally understand. And yeah, you mentioned the midpost hook. That was something that he definitely had at Oklahoma State. I feel like he did that more. at the collegiate level. And I think that the issue is, it's what you alluded to, Mike. It's the lack of size in the NBA.

It's an adjustment that needs to be made. It's something that will happen as he gets older. He's just naturally going to put on some size. And right now, I think it's kind of showing itself more as that midposts fade away. Like, he'll put his shoulder into a guy and then back off of them and put up a jumper. And he's been knocking them down. And that's so useful in the NBA, especially as a heavily on ball player. If you're like that three-level score, you're a,

so much harder to guard. So it's great that that's showing there. But yeah, I think the next natural ad that you want to see is that midpost hook because he's going to be backing down guys. Once he gets stopped short, he can either pass out of the paint or he can go up with that right hand. Yeah.

And I think right now he's resorting to going to like a ball fake. He'll get in there and he'll like shot fake, but the defenders aren't going for it. So they're not respecting it. So then when he tries to up and under, step through whatever, it's not there because he's got to hit that first shot first to get them to respect that.

But back to the, like right now, I think he got teasing back-to-back games here at the end of last week. But I do, like, I do want to mention Monday night after the game, Coach Casey did say that he thought Cade Cunningham was rookie of the year. And the only stat against him was record. And so I did like seeing that from Coach Casey kind of defending his guy. Yeah. I mean, a thing with Kate Taggals, yeah, it's nice to see that fire. I'm just glad he hasn't had to point at anybody again because that's like really damaging to other players.

Absolutely menace to society. no place. There's no place in the game for that, right? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I liked what Bobby Marks had to say. Bobby Marks was kind of like the NBA Twitter cap guru, who rightly said in that game. He's like, people don't spend their hard-earned money to go to these games to watch the officials. You know, it's like I felt like after a certain point of the season, the refs have been a little bit out of control with the tax, but that's an entirely different story. Yeah, Kate really doesn't get the follow calls. You should. And I think that often he'll get jostled and lose the ball.

And I think that kind of counts against him where the refs are concerned. When he's stronger and he's not as easily jostled and he's giving up the ball less, he's able to have a more solid handle and he's just more able to get to go down the middle. Because right now generally he goes off to the side. When he's strong enough to just go down in the middle, I'm confident he'll get quite a bit more in the way of calls. But it's just exciting to see a player come together who's projected to beat a total package. a guy who hopefully can shoot those pull-up threes. You have to guard him closely at the 3.1,

and then you just run in the pick and roll. You can't give him any space in the mid-range. And you have to guard him closely in the mid-range too, which means not only does the role man or somebody else have to come to help to double the guy. We saw this with Lou Canard a couple seasons ago, but also makes it that much easier to blow by him into the interior. But either way, you're getting defenders need to rotate

and leave guys open, and he can be confident that Kate will find those. I mean, isn't exciting? Like, I'm just sitting here thinking about the conversation we're having right now, guys. And we're talking about, like, he doesn't get to the free throw line enough because he needs to add 15, you know, 10 pounds of muscle as a, which most rookies do. And we're talking to, like, we're nitpicking him. And I know none of us are being negative.

Like, I get that. But it's just, it's exciting because all the other parts of his games are there. We're not talking about, like, him needing to mature and say the right things and be a good teammate and be a leader because he's all the right things off the court as well. And I'm not trying to like bash Jalen Green. I'm not one of those guys. But that's a huge difference between those two guys. Cade can literally be the face of your franchise because he has all the other intangibles

that go along with being the face of a franchise. Yeah. Even if Mobley does get the rookie of the year, nobody's going to look back at this draft or look at the pistons and be like, yeah, we should have gotten it. Well, there might be a few, but I 100% believe we made the right pick. We definitely needed a guy who could put the franchise on his back, make the big difference on the offensive and defensive end. Kate is a very complete player,

and he's more impactful than anybody else in this draft class. He's one of the most impactful players in the NBA already. I don't know if I'd go to him saying it to calling him one of the most impactful players in the NBA already. I mean, in terms of how it affects his team when he's off the fourth. And yeah, I mean, he's super important to his team. Like in the NHL, technically, the MVP award is the guy who would, most valuable to his team. Of course, it doesn't end up being that. But definitely, Cade is the most valuable player to his team because, I mean, part of that's based on who's behind him, but also

just because he does so many things off the score sheet that just make things easier on everybody else, wrong foot the defense. And also, Bryce totally agree with you. The leadership qualities are also important. It's rare to find a player who can really carry your team, be the franchise player and is also a good leader. That's not a common thing. Like, you look at, Mike Yannis is one example of a guy who is. I don't think Luca

really is. And yeah, you're fortunate to find all those qualities and also a guy who's going to, who's got excellent focus and is going to tirelessly work to improve himself. I don't think you'll ever see Cade show up like 30 pounds overweight like Luca does and just play his way into shape. I don't

think we'll ever see that. No, and I don't know how important it is. I know it's important to the fan base, but even the way he, he purposely endeared himself to the city of Detroit. You know, he put on the buffs, and he did all these things that were the culture of Detroit and the city and the fan base. And I think that is important. I think it showed the fan base he wanted to be there. Now we see his trainer is very active on Twitter, not just about Cade, but the Pistons and Coach Casey and GM Troy Weaver. I do think that that stuff matters. And, you know, even if it's just to the fan base. I do want to ask what you guys think about him defensively.

because I think I may be a little bit lower than the consensus with him defensively. I think he's good. I don't think he's great. The foul trouble obviously is a little bit of an issue. But I don't want him having to guard the other team's best perimeter player. Yeah, I think Tommy is the highest of the three of us on his defense. I think that Kate is a competent defender. He is a hardworking defender.

He's a smart defender. But he's making what I hope are just rookie mistakes at this point. Like his guy, often he'll end up. too far off his guy in the perimeter. All the time. Yeah, it happens pretty frequently. And hopefully that's just a rookie mistake. I don't think he's a guy who's making that mistake because of the lack of IQ.

If you remember back to Tobias Harris, he would just get caught ball watching. Tobias, you know, absolutely love the guy in terms of just, I think he's like one of the model sportsmen in the NBA, but not high in defensive IQ. And it just constantly, his man would end up open. So I don't think that's the issue with Cade. I think that it's, like I said, I hope it's just a matter of an experience. I think there's also the question of conditioning. He's gotten in a better condition as the season has gone on.

But it's tough to come right in the NBA and do as much as he's doing on offense. So I think on defense there's a little bit of a maybe working a little bit less hard. But I'm confident that he'll end up as an above average defender. Yeah, I would have to agree with you, Bryce. well on the idea that you don't want him guarding the other team's best player. One, because, yeah, ideally you're not putting that much of an assignment on him, both offensively and defensively. But when I think of his good defense, I think of two things.

I think he makes excellent rotations, especially when the Pistons defense has broken down and they start to kind of recover. He's really good at kind of finding that guy who would ordinarily be left open on the perimeter for an open three or an open look. he's he's gotten there and snuff that out a few times when i but the other thing is uh closer to the basket especially like in the paint he's really good at not playing defense with his hands i know that i feel like that's been a recent recent development the thing where he's been swiping at the ball and getting those reach and files i hope that that just gets taken care of but uh especially early in the

season i thought it was really impressive the way that he would defend with position you know it seemed like he wasn't trying to block the shot with his hands. He was just trying to get in the guy's way, meet them right before they went up with it, and just make the shot difficult. That was what I was impressed with. Yeah. And so I think you brought up a good point with his conditioning, Mike. I think that was something that was talked about quite a bit.

But he did play 43 minutes on Monday night in an overtime game and then look good in the overtime part. So what I've been struggling with is what do you want in a back court mate for Cade Cunningham? Do you want a guy that can take the offensive load? So he, sorry, let me backtrack a second. They can take a little bit of the offensive load so he can give you more of that all around game with his defense, his rebounding in those things. Or do you want somebody like in the Killian Hayes archetype that's going to take the defensive load so Cade can do the offensive stuff?

Do you want to do the Ivy thing? No, I don't know if I want to get into Ivy right now. We've had this like month long discussion about the potential fit with Cade Cunningham and Jade and Ivy, and it's like their potential role and fit together. I don't think we'll do that one this time, but we have discussed this at length. Okay. My bad. My bad.

No, no, it's all good. We haven't done it on the area yet. Oh, no, we love it. Yeah. I don't know. I love it. I love it, Mike. I appreciate your company.

Yeah, likewise. No, I don't dislike it, but I don't know. It's something I feel pretty strongly about, but we're talking about a drafty. So, yeah, we have good discussions on these sorts of things. beyond the scene. So in any case, I think you don't necessarily have to have a guy next to him who will take over as kind of offensive lead to a degree at times. But I think you do want a guy next to him in the back court who can create offense, a guy who's going to, at times, play the leading role in unhinging the defense. I bring up Dielo a lot on this podcast. I think that

I'll just use him as an example. I think he has the capacity to be a 20 point per game score if he can become a reliable perimeter shooter. He's also excellent at attacking the interior. He give him a pick. He stands a really good chance of scoring at the basket. You can just generate mismatches, and he kind of looks like, gets to looking like a shark when he gets a good mismatch because he knows he's going to destroy someone. So I think you want to have somebody like that who can penetrate into the interior and unhinged the defense at the very least. Brunson's a name that's been brought up. I don't like that because that's a guy who just has to have the ball a lot in order to do his thing. And I don't think that's a good one.

And I don't think Hayes is a good fit for him in the starting lineup either. Just Killian does so much of his work on the ball. And also just you don't want a starting lineup that's that on athletic. Yep. Yeah, I think when you talk about the potential back court, mate, if you're just building a player, it's a guy obviously who can knock down the three, especially on the catch and shoot. You want a guy with a good set shot. A good defender.

I think you want, it's like you mentioned, Bryce, you don't want Cade to be the primary defender of, like, their best offensive player. You want somebody who can give Cade a little bit of a break on that end. So that's another important thing. But yeah, Mike, exactly what you said. You want somebody who can take, like, in my opinion, like the secondary ball handling role. Take the pressure off Cade a little bit. Just more options or more things to worry about for the opposing team. You know, you can't have too many, too many weapons.

I think a guy who can take it off the dribble. And penetrate and kickout would be paramount for a, you know, a very diverse offensive attack. Yeah, I will say when it comes to guys who can play the primary creation role and also defend the other team's best player, there's a very short list. Like the only one I can think of in recent memories, LeBron, who was a perennial all-defense player until he got older and he wasn't able to do that anymore. And then he kind of stopped caring about defense in the regular season, so he could just do offense. Like even Janice is, you know, he's not a guy you put on the opposing team's best player. He's an elite help side defender. So, yeah, I do think you want to spare him that.

And I do think Diallo, who's a very athletic defender, could get there. I just want to say, I'm a huge fan of Hamadu Diallo. I have some of the same questions with the shooting. I, the consistency at times, you know, I'm not sure. And then defensively, like I kind of would like to see that, what you're talking about, Mike. Like, just put him on the other team's best player. I think the next game for the Pistons is the Chicago Bulls whenever we're recording this. Just put him on Demar De Rosen or Zach Levine tell him not to worry about anything else because

I don't think he's necessarily great off the ball. He gets caught ball watching some things. Just guard that guy and see, you're not going to shut those guys down, but just hold him to as little as you possibly can. And I know in the NBA, there's a lot of switches and ball screens to get the right mismatches, but I would be interested to see if he's a guy that could do that. Just dog the other team's best player on the perimeter. all night long.

And I would be really interested. And that would help Cade flourish even more and show even better that he's the best rookie in the league. Yeah, here's a question I would ask. If you could pick any player in the league to put next to Kate in the back court, who would that be? Who? I'm not going to put you guys in the spot here.

So here's the archetype that I actually kind of like. And it's not, it's a Lonzo ball type of player. Like, Lonzo's a 40% three-point shooter on seven attempts. And he's a long, he's a tall player. and he's a defender. Like if I'm not just picking the best possible players, there's an archetype like that, that he's going to take the other team's best player defensively,

and he can knock down shots. He's a good passer. He can create a little bit when Cade isn't. Right. I'm trying to think of players who wouldn't take the ball out of Cade's hands without, or who are still like really good. I still think the Clay Thompson is probably like the easiest answer there. You know, a guy is a great shooter, a great defender.

Maybe you can say prime Clay Thompson. I don't know how he's been since coming back from his injury. I think he's still been pretty good, but I think that's like the ideal role. I don't want to take the ball out of Cade's hands too much, but I also don't want to give him like the Luca role where it's just Cade. I don't think he's that player either. Cade plays a pretty unselfish brand of basketball. He's always looking to get his guys their shots.

So I'm not really worried about that. But I think just I think the spacing is the most important thing when you're looking for a teammate for Cade. Yeah, real quick. I agree with that 100%. I do not like the Luca Donchich comp for Cade as much as I used to. I think coming into the draft, that was the easy one, and that's probably the one I went to. I'm not necessarily – I don't think Cade wants to be that type of player. I don't think that's in his personality to just dominate the ball all game long and take all the shots.

And maybe he's doing it more right now because of the talent. But I think ideally he plays a role where, you know, he doesn't take as many shots. He gets 10 assists a night. Not every night. He's not going to average 10 assists. But, you know, he gets his teammates involved. He gets eight rebounds. And he just shows that all-around game that makes Cade Cunningham.

so special. Yeah, true. I mean, even Luca has help from Brunson this season. I could quite a bit of help from Brunson. It's kind of revealing that they chose to start him over Tim Hardaway, Jr. Because Brunson does take up a certain amount of the ball handling, even with not a ton, but a certain amount with Luca on the floor. Now, I disagree to a degree with the Wanzo comp, just because of Wanzo's extreme fit dependence, like the guy is best if he's placed in the situation in which he doesn't need to do anything but shoot open threes and create and transition, maybe do some perimeter playmaking. When he's done well, which is this year and last year, he has been next to two elite athletic creators, Zion and Ingram, and then Levine and DeRosen.

And that really just, number one, is athleticism isn't an issue. Lonzo's not a fast guy. And number two, it just frees them up to do nothing but that. I think on the Pistons next decade, you just, you'd be setting yourself up for really on athletic backcourt, especially if you have, you know, you have Sadiq Bay in a lineup as well. Like, we saw that the Pistons were basically a slow motion team, earlier in the season with Hayes. But who knows? The name that comes to mind for me is Jalen Brown. He's, who does play for him on a shooting guard,

he is a guy who can create, a guy who's gotten better at passing off the dribble. He is a really good defender and a super athletic guy. And who knows? Maybe he gets to 2024 and you still haven't spent your money and you can go with that. But that's the kind of player I'd like to see. Clay Thompson is kind of a unicorn in the league these days.

There are very few players like him. No, I agree with Jalen Brown. Like whenever the Celtics weren't playing super well and maybe the Celtics were thinking about breaking up that duo, obviously that's a long, long time ago now because they've righted that ship very much so. That was like you trade whatever you have to do to bring, you know, if you paired Jalen Brown with Kate Cunningham, I agree with that 100% Mike. I guess I was trying to think a little bit, you know, not somebody quite so good with the Lanzo. But that makes sense with Lanzo. I understand what you're saying that the rest of the roster, the rest of the starting lineup would have to fill out with the right talent for Lonzo to make sense. But Jaylen Brown, absolutely. I love that kind of player, a player in that mold to pair with Kate Cunningham. Absolutely. Yeah, I know that that's setting a high bar. So, yeah, I know there was the hope earlier in the season that Killing could develop into the Lonzo Ball Row. And of course, he's got a long way to go as a shooter before he could do that. But also, it's like, I think Bay is a long-term starter. And if you're putting Bay and Kate in there,

I feel like you have to have athleticism, but the other three positions, just so you have a team that has that, what I call athletic spacing, the ability to gain separation off the ball. But, yeah, I see what you're saying about Lonzo. Maybe I didn't center the criteria too well. No, no, and you make a lot, you got, you make really good point with the athleticism because it is like not the most athletic lineup. Because I agree. I think Kate and Sadiq are the two guys are probably long-term starters for this team, depending on Jeremy Grant and what happens in the offseason. So that makes a lot of sense that you would be looking for somebody with some more athleticism to pair with those guys or to put into the lineup with those guys.

I completely understand that. Yeah, I mean, but speaking of Cade, you know, moving on, there's the rookie to year race, which I know is very important to Pistons fans. I take solaceous in any case. Detroit is going to have a rookie to year this season, whether it's, you know, more at Cider or Lucas Raymond with the Red Wings or Cade, which I don't think is particularly likely with the Pistons. but yeah, Tommy, what do you think is Kate's case right now and his probability, perhaps?

I think it, well, I mean, the obvious frontrunner right now is Evan Mobley. And for me, it's just a matter of if you swap the rosters, you put Cade on the, on the cavaliers and you put Mobley on the Pistons. Is Mobley still going to be leading him rookie of the year? I don't think so. I think so much of what he's done, not to take anything away from him. He's obviously been a really good player. but I just think so much of the narrative for him is just based on what Cleveland has done this season.

He has Darius Garland creating for him and he has Jared Allen helping him in the front court, covering some of his maybe deficiencies with his size. But it's kind of interesting now. I mean, this isn't a good thing, but Jared Allen is out indefinitely. As of right now, I think he broke a finger. Yeah, fractured a finger. Right. And it might be Mowbly having to.

play center. So we'll see if he's able to maintain his numbers and we'll see if maybe that shifts the narrative a little bit in Cade's favor. Yeah, Bryce, what do you think? Yeah, I mean, I'll be honest. I've tweeted this out. I don't necessarily care whether Cade wins rookie of the year or not. At the end of the day, for me, we've seen Cade Cunningham and who he is as a player and that's all I really cared about. Like, we have the guy that the Pistons have the guy they needed to get with the number one pick in last year's draft. And they have the face of the franchise. They have that building block.

And that's all I really care about. Whether he wins the rookie of the year, it'll be cool. It would be really cool if you want it. I don't think he's going to win it. I think Evan Mobley probably does. You know, Scotty Barnes might have an argument as well. Not might. He does have an argument at least.

Josh Giddy could probably throw his name in the hat as well, even though their record isn't that great either. If I was going to make a case for Cade Cunningham, it's nobody else has been tasked with what. what Cade has been tasked with. And we've talked about it multiple times already on this episode. He's the face of the franchise. No, no, what other rookie had to walk in and be the guy that he's had to be?

They haven't. And he's passed every test. He said the right things. He's done the right things. And the numbers back it up. Yeah, I agree that he's come into a very difficult situation. And guys who are going to come in be lead handlers in the NBA generally just have a lot longer to go.

The adjustment to the game is, I mean, just the learning curve is severe. like the NBA is drastically more competitive than the NCAA, than the G League, than any overseas league. Your second best league in the world is EuroLeague, where Luca Dodgers came from there. He was MVP at, I think, age 19, like MVP of their sub-League and then of the EuroLeague championship, and basically the most accomplished EuroLeague player ever to come out of the NBA, so he was in good shape there. But you've just got longer to go as a ball handler. You have to step in and assume a lot more in the way of duties. And, you know, that can be harder.

Whereas Mowbly, for example, his role was to play defense and, you know, finish relatively easy offense in the interior. I mean, don't get me wrong, he's an elite defender. He's been great there. And he's done well in the interior as well. He's done well on the boards. And he's done some creation of his own. But he and Barnes, like, again, Barnes came in, was asked to finish relatively easy offense and to play elite. defense, and these are both guys who do great off the score sheet, but they're just starting at a higher

floor. And I think that rookie the year should go to the player who has performed best, not necessarily the player with difficulty of the situation taken into account. And I think Moble is still at the top there. And I just think that Cade's shooting numbers are what will take him out of the race, because he has struggled from the field. Yeah, I mean, I think that's the numbers, right? As I say, the numbers back up, Cade Cunningham. I mean, wouldn't you just look at points for game, rebounds per game, assists per game. But then the shooting efficiency, if you just look at the shooting numbers, he has the lowest field goal percentage of any of the guys we're talking about.

His three point percentage, you know, it's lower than Franz Wagner. It's only a little bit above Scotty Barnes. Mowgli doesn't shoot it well. Giddy's not a great shooter either. But the field goal percentage, just the efficiency shooting, you know, it hurts K. But again, I'm just not overly concerned about whether he, wins it or not. At the end of the day, I feel very confident that the Pistons got the right guy at number one. Yeah, it doesn't matter to me. I'll draw that back. I actually do really want Cade to get the

award. I just, I want the kid to get some hardware. I think it would be really cool. Maybe it'll help him get some respect from the refs. I don't know what it'll take at this point. But, I mean, even when you factor in the field goal percentage, it just goes back to the difficulty of shots. Scotty Barnes, he's getting a lot of his offense right at the rim. And it's obviously, it's through extremely good athleticism. Evan Mobley, he's finishing plays, like you said, Mike. Franz Wagner is another example, I think, of, you know, guys who are just like on losing teams, just not getting their respect.

Like, hardly anybody talks about Franz Wagner, and he's one of the best shooters of this class, and hardly anybody talks about it. Even Jalen Green, you know, he's been significantly better over the past month, and hardly anybody talks about it. I think that if you're going to factor in the. the team situation, it should take into account, not the winning necessarily, but the role that you're being asked to play. Yeah, I agree with that also. And I just wanted to say real quick, I know it's a Pistons podcast, but I got to admit, Scotty Barnes and Franz Wagner have both been

way better than I anticipated them to be in the league. I was not high on Scotty Barnes at all coming into the draft. I was shocked when he went when he did. And just watching, I don't get to watch a lot of other NBA games because I'm just so laser focused on the Pistons and then, you know, my high school season, which is over now, I get to watch a little bit more. But the games, the Pistons have played against the Raptors. I have been, I have to admit, I've been impressed with him offensively. And defensively, he gave Cade some struggles there late in the game here recently. So I've been impressed with both of those guys and what they've done in their rookie seasons.

Yeah, I agree. I think they're both going to be great role players. and if Scotty Barnes can get his three-point shot together, maybe you have a borderline all-star there. Barnes also, by all accounts, just a stellar personality, a guy who's going to be a team leader that, you know, I think he's 19 now.

He's about the same age as Kate. They both bring that to the table. And, yeah, I think he's going to be very good in this league. I think he won't be as good as Kate or Mowgli, but they're both going to be valuable players. Yeah, it just comes back to the shooting numbers, and I agree with you, Tommy. He has a higher degree of difficulty in his shots,

but he's also just not hitting his open threes. I think he's at about 32% on the probably worse after tonight on open threes. And that comes down to just poor shooting. If he was shooting significantly higher from three, then you just look at his self-created offense from the interior and maybe discard that a little bit. And his efficiency would be quite a bit better. But at this point, you know, he's hovering around 50%.

And as a rookie, you don't care about this. You know, he's a pretty inefficient volume score. He's not the worst in his class. And you just don't care based on the kind of thing, the kind of shots he's taken. But of course, the three has to improve. I mean, and I think it will. So, yeah, I think that it'll probably, it's possible Kade goes supernova and that Moby really drops off now that he's forced play center probably.

And he doesn't have Jared Allen around. Jared Allen was an all-star. But yeah, I think that Kabe really have to improve his shooting to do it. But yeah, I don't care. I don't care either way. It's like you guys, I'm not concerned with the award. Now a quick word from our sponsor. Hoops fans.

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All right, why don't we move on to another, actually a very good. good performer of weight who's really turned his season around and that's Jeremy Grant. Tommy, I know that you had quite a few things to say about that. Yeah, I really just think it's that he's that he's been shooting it a lot better lately. But I also think he's been just playing a better brand of basketball. Honestly, I know that James Edwards mentioned that the Pistons are trying to get Jeremy Grant to pass the ball more. And tonight I actually, like, I watched him very carefully. I tried to keep track of every shot that he took. And it confirmed a couple things. One is that he's shooting a lot better on pull-ups. Tonight he shot four of six on mid-range pull-ups, which early on the season,

that was just an awful shot for him. And then on catch-and-shoot threes, he shot 50% three of six. That's kind of the rule, well, I won't say that that's the role that you want him taking. But right now, through this better stretch of basketball winning more games, I think that's been a pretty significant contribution to that. It's just been a matter of guys knocking down shots that they weren't hitting earlier on in the season. So, yeah, Jeremy Grant, I mean, I don't know if he's earned a lot of goodwill back with the fans based on his earlier play. But he's definitely been a lot better as of late. And I think he has changed his game.

I think a lot of fans right now want to say, oh, where are all the people who said that Bay and Grant couldn't coexist? It's like, well, I didn't think they could coexist in the way Jeremy Grant was playing to start the season. And you have to remember, Sadieq Bay just wasn't making shots also to start the season. But I think Jeremy Grant has changed his role. He's taken a back seat. he's trying to pass the ball.

He's trying to be a ball mover. There's still some isolations where you're like, oh, my gosh, like get rid of it right now. But I do think he has, I can't help but wonder if he was struggling, releasing kind of all like the number one role and all of that stuff to Cade Cunningham early in the season. Not like anything against Cade, but I feel like Jeremy came to Detroit to be that guy.

And then after one season where he had a really good season, And a borderline all-star, it was all of a sudden taken away from him by this, you know, 19-year-old kid who has taken the city by storm. So I do think a big part of it is Jeremy Grant has changed his game and adjusted and good for him. Yeah, I agree. There's definitely been an adjustment. Like earlier in the season, who knows, you know, whose head, whose feet this can be laid at. But he was just a ball stopper attempting a lot of bad offense and not really passing the ball very much. And lately, he has, like he and Bay were absolute black holes earlier in the season.

I think that Bay, he was just being poorly coached, but Jeremy's been passing the ball more. I don't think he's really all that great of a passer off the drive. I don't think he makes necessarily the right read as much as he would like him to, but he's been moving the ball. And you didn't just look at a player stats when you're evaluating a player, you look at his overall impact on the offense. And this has made his overall impact a lot more positive. The shooting definitely has been better.

The three-point shooting definitely has been quite a bit better, getting closer to what I think he's capable of. The mid-range pull-ups, so Grant went from shooting mid-30s on those last season and this season to, like, recently shooting in the high 50s. That's not going to last. This guy is as prime a regression candidate as they come in that category. You can expect into crash back to Earth in that capacity

because it's just really only recently, you don't get like a 20-plus percent improvement abruptly. So that is what it is. And I'd like to see those gone whenever it is, still on the team and the pistons start trying to win because that's bad offense for almost everybody. But he's just, he's operated within the flow of the offense. And that's really, mostly got rid of the drag he had exerted before that. Yeah.

The only kind of gripe I still have with Jeremy Grant is I wish he was a better rebounder. Like for a team that just doesn't rebound the ball very well. I know they kind of play small. Isaiah Stewart's undersized at the five. Shout out Isaiah Stewart went down with an injury on Monday night. So hopefully we have had some good news by the time this comes out on Wednesday that, you know, everything is okay with that. It didn't necessarily look great. I hadn't seen, I don't think we've seen anything yet.

But shout out, Isaiah Stewart, prayers up for him. But I just wish Jeremy Grant would get on the boards more. Like if he was grabbing six, seven, eight defensive rebounds a night, that would just add such another element. Because he is a good defender. I don't think he's a great defender. I think that gets overstated at times. And again, he's not between Sadiq Bay, not being able to guard on the perimeter. K, you're not wanting to do that.

And I don't think Jeremy does it great either. It's kind of trying to figure out who does it. But if he would grab some more defensive rebounds, I would really appreciate his game and enjoy his game a little bit more game in and game out. Yeah, I think that would be very helpful. I just question how much he can actually improve as a rebounder. I mean, he's got a frame that is very helpful on offense,

particularly in his way to the basket. And that's another thing recently. He has been taking the ball hard at the basket, more like he was last season, though not really in the air. I think just the fact that he got like the win knocked out of him in so many times. last season on the way of the basket may have kind of had an impact on him. But I just think he doesn't really have, he's just knocked out of the way really easily. We'll put it that way. He's not going to muscle his way in amongst a lot of the power forwards and centers and even

a lot of the small forwards in this league are stronger than he is. I also think, though, that often he's just waiting to go back on offense. And he much rather get out and transition than rebounds. He does end up on the floor quite a bit, guys. Like, I don't know what that is, especially whenever he drives to the basket. It just seems like he ends up on the ground a lot. Sometimes it gets him the foul calls and sometimes it doesn't. That's another thing. And you brought it up there, Mike,

where he just kind of gets knocked around a little bit with his body type. But it does seem like he ends up, you know, knocked on the floor quite a bit. Yeah. Last season he would elevate when he was around the basket and made some pretty sweet layups. But when he got knocked down, man, he got knocked down. Yep, he went all the way down. I had a question for you guys, actually. I mean, this is really kind of deviating from the Jeremy Grant discussion,

but just as a whole, both of you guys, do you think that the team chemistry has made like a significant improvement in terms of like the passing the ball and them kind of understanding where they want each other to be? Like I feel like the ball movement is a lot more crisp compared to the start of the season. You guys feel like that has come along a bit. Maybe that's part of why they're looking a lot better

than they were, you know, early on the year when we had all these blowouts. I mean, one thing is they were historically bad offense at the start of the year and there's still, I think I saw something today. somebody tweeted out that they're kind of average. They've been an average since the All-Star break offensively. So it looks really, really good to Pistons fans who have watched this all season because it was literally historically bad at the start of the year, the three-point shooting. I do think there's been some chemistry because finally, and Mike alluded to this earlier,

we're seeing the iteration of this team that we were supposed to see all year. There was Cade started off the season injured. COVID hit everybody in the NBA. Jeremy was injured. K.O. was injured. We've seen all these different guys injured. It's still not a good team. We all understand that.

But you're seeing what the vision was for the team now that everybody's kind of healthy. And I do think there's a little bit of chemistry developing, one, because everybody's settled into their roles and the roles they are supposed to have. And the other thing, guys, I think you guys, you know, know this. Winning helps a lot of that as well. And they've been fortunate enough to pull out some close wins recently. Yeah, you mentioned COVID. I just got to say, probably my favorite win in the season in a season that's not really meant

for winning was that one against San Antonio, where it was Sadiq Bay and Tomadu Dio and Buka Garza and a bunch of Gleague players. Like, that was such a feel-good win. I think it was on New Year's Eve, I could be wrong. But the crowd was super into it, and this was just a group of players just scrapping and grinding their way to a win over a team that was missing players, but had a lot more talent. That was just a lot of fun. But, yeah, I think that things look a lot crisper on offense.

I don't know what to lay. I really just don't know what to, at what or who. whose feet to weigh that. I just think in general, like the passes are a lot more on target. That was definitely something that was an issue to start the year. Like, guys would catch the ball off size, and then whatever little advantage was created by the driving kick, it was gone instantly because guys didn't catch it and then attack quickly.

I think just the timing of it and just knowing where the other guys are. It's one of the things, like you just brought the spurs. Like those historically good spurs teams, like the chemistry there was just next level. I think that's kind of what we were. We had the opposite of that going on. Yeah, Bryce is telling me that game is on New Year's Day. And they did beat the Bucks the next game, but that was with most of the roster back. I also really like from that game.

I know I'm just musing at that point, but it seems you got kind of like a bromance between Sadiq Bay and Hamadou Diallo, which I think is cool. So, yeah, I agree that just the offense looks better in general. That helps that Grant is passing the ball. I don't, I just don't know where, yeah. The Spurs offenses, like those were amazing. Like in 2014 in particular, I mean, you've got Greg Popovich. and four Hall of Famers on the team.

That's very helpful. But they just cut the heat to pieces. I mean, it was really something to watch. Like that, that was just like they called it the series between the Pistons and the Lakers, a five-game sweep. That was a five-game sweep. I mean, they just annihilated them. And I love seeing that kind of basketball.

I don't think we're really going to see it under Dwayne Casey, who's got an offensive ceiling, but he's been better lately. No, I agree with that with Dwayne Casey. I think there's a lot to be desired with him, X's nose-wise, offensive, and defensive scheme-wise. I actually do, I think I'm kind of known as a defender of Dwayne Casey for people who follow me on Twitter, listen to the podcast or whatever. And I think that's probably just because I'm a coach.

I'm fine with the trade-off right now because I do think Coach Casey is doing a good job, turning these guys into professionals, showing them the right way to do things, those type of things. But he absolutely leaves something to be desired when it comes to the creativity of some of the X's and O's. And, you know, especially with a young team, it's definitely taken a while for them to do what you're talking about, Tommy, gel together, get the ball moving, know where the next pass is supposed to go.

That might be Coach Casey, that maybe just be young players. But it will be interesting to see, I don't know how much longer he's the head coach of this team, but whenever there is a new coach, kind of what they can do offensively to make it a little bit more fun to watch. Yeah. All right. If you guys are ready, why don't we move on to listeners submitted questions? So, number one, we all got these from the Detroit Pist and Subreddit. Thank you all for submitting.

So from a Duke in 432, three-fighter fan, obviously. Maybe what the best fit for Killian is. I'm looking like on the team right now. He's definitely looking better these past few games. Is that a product of coming off the bench or just improving in general? I'll just take this one. I talk a lot about Killian. So he has been improved.

This is a situation though, in which I think it's important to recognize context. So you can forgive a lot more on the court for players on a bad team. Killing is improved. Killing is still a minus player with a lot of flaws. as these are players like Killian Bagley right now. Bagley was had for very little as a reclamation project for a reason. These are players who would not play on good teams. So I think that's Killian, who is only going to capitalize on his potential as a handler,

is much better suited to a situation in which you can handle the ball more. So I would say the bench is better for that. I think it has been good for his confidence as well. So I would say pretty unequivocally, that's the best situation for him. And the improvement, I would say, coming to the, combination of coming off the bench and just playing more confidently. Yep, I would have 100% agree with you. I love that they've been bringing him off the bench.

And there's even been some discussion lately that I've seen about maybe putting him back in the starting lineup. And I think that has just as much to do with who's there currently. Corey Joseph, people don't like him for some reason. But I would not do that. I would keep killing exactly where he is. For the past few months, I feel like he's been improving in terms of confidence and just getting to the rim because that was one of the big things.

He was unable to generate advantages because, he could not drive inside and he didn't shoot well enough. Unwilling to drive inside also, which has changed to a degree. Yeah, and even when he would attempt to attack, I mean, he was just getting pushed left and right. Now he's actually getting significantly closer to the basket. And I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that it's bench competition, it's a reduced level of athleticism, and he's just able to take more advantage of what he has. And maybe it's, maybe it is a confidence thing about like not having the spotlight on you. Maybe there's just less pressure. But he's

taken it in stride, he's taking it as a professional, and I just don't see any reason to mess with it right now. Until you fully trust that he's actually turned the corner in terms of confidence, in terms of shooting, in terms of attacking the basket, I don't see any reason to pull him from that role. No, I agree with both of you 100%. I think he's a guy that wants to have the ball in his hands, and that's where he is most confident. And I can't help but wonder if when he's playing with the first team or the starters, if he's always wondering, what should I do? It's Kate, it's Jeremy, me it's Sadiq, but in the second unit, he has a little bit more confidence to, you know, just do what he does.

I don't want to say dominate the ball, but, you know, have the ball in his hands and he's not worried about those things as much, and he can just play. So I agree with both of you, and I think he should stay in the second unit for the rest of the season. Yep. That's a great idea. That's a great point. Yeah, I agree.

Moving on from Working Performance 3, if Marvin Bagley works out, do you still draft a big is that contingent on Grant staying here. We'll be drafting a big to come off the back. behind Stu. Bryce, what do your thoughts? So let me, I don't think anything on the roster should sway this team from who they want to draft. So, um, like if, if it's Jabari, if they have a top three pick, they should take Chet or Jabari or Paolo no matter what. I don't think, I think that probably ends up forcing Jeremy Grant to be moved, but I don't think that changes what you do with Marvin Bagley or anything like that. I think you take those guys at the top of the draft no matter, no matter what.

Absolutely. If Chet is the best player left or he's the best player on your board, you take him. Absolutely. And Isaiah Stewart, as much as we love him, he's not a factor. You know, I don't think that Isaiah Stewart has established himself as like a surefire starter in the league. I still think his best role would be off the bench. I think that's like he would get a, I still see him as like a low post big. And I think he would be able to get his touches there. And really, it's really, more about the fit with Cade, in my opinion. Chet, I think he has more potential to actually finish picking rolls above the rim than Isaiah Stewart.

Isaiah, I mean, he's been doing this thing with the highway screens ever since that article from the athletic. I've seen it so much more. It was a great article. But it's still not enough. I don't think Isaiah puts enough pressure on the rim, whereas a guy like Chet Holmgren or whatever big, if, you know, if you have a chance to draft another big in the 2023 draft or if you pick up another first rounder and Jaland Durenne is there kind of later on,

I think you take them. We just need a lot more in the way of athleticism and defense. And Isaiah Stewart, he doesn't have enough of the athleticism. Bagley does not have enough of the defense. You still need a long term. Yeah, I would say with Bagley, you're not going to know until if he's going to work out, if we're talking about workout, it means even become a positive value NBA player because right now he still has quite a bit in the way of issues. There's the defense. he can't defend the interior. Their decision making is an issue. He still can't shoot.

He's a reclamation project, and just like Josh Jackson was, and that, he's got work to do. So I think maybe you'll see him take a leap in the offseason, assuming the pistons keep him. Either way, he's just definitely not good enough right now to impact your drafting strategy. And I'll disagree a little bit with you guys. I think that if this were a draft in which there were some sort of really ball-dominant point guard. I don't think you take him with Kate on the roster, but this draft is very weak in terms of point guards in the upper echelon, so that's really not a consideration. I don't think you let, I don't think you definitely don't like Grant dictate your draft strategy

also. I think you move him if Jabari Smith is available. I don't like Boncaro very much at all, but you're just looking for talent at this point, the best talent you can get and Grant can fetch something on the open market. I don't think Stewart is the long-term starting center of this team other. Yeah, I agree with you guys. I actually think Stu is probably best suited being the first big off the bench. And so I think if you end up in the top three, you probably end up with one of those guys that we've talked about. And then you move Jeremy Grant. If you don't, that's where it gets a little bit more interesting. You may end up getting a guard wing in the Johnny Davis and Jaden Ivy, those type of guys that actually slot into a hole in the starting lineup. And you may keep Jeremy Grant for a little bit longer if he is, you know, if that's what they want.

to do. I think the really interesting pick in Tommy, you brought the name up is Jalen Duren because if you draft Jalen Duren, I say this on the episode Tuesday, I would love to see those battles in practice between Isaiah Stewart and Jailen Duren because they each bring something a little bit different. And if Isaiah Stewart could bring a motor out of Jalen Duren, he's a really, really intriguing prospect. So that would be the guy that would really send Stu to the bench, I think, if the Pistons ended up drafting him. Yeah, Jalen Duren scares me. I've said it before and I'll continue saying it until the draft.

Of course, we've got a player in the recent past who resembles him a little bit too much right now. I don't want to name that player's name because I strongly dislike talking about him. All of you know who he is. You know, you're talking about a player who it has excellent athletic gifts, is very raw on offense and has major questions about maturity, work ethic, and focus. Now, I don't think Weaver will, Weaver who prizes character traits very highly, and I think that's, I think that's wise on his part. I don't think he would draft Duren if he were really concerned that that was going to be an issue. But if he does, it's like, yeah, maybe you hope that he can gain Stewart's Motor by osmosis, but I don't think, I think Stewart's Motor is special.

Most players in this league don't have it. So Duren would scare me. But I don't think he'll be the name called on Draft Night. I'm not sure I'm sold on him either. was just, he's the one guy, I think, you know, provides direct competition. And I know we talked a little bit beforehand as well, Mike, about, I think you feel like Chet has to play the five. So obviously, that would be direct competition for Isaiah Stewart as well at the five position, where Jabari and Paolo are a little bit more, you know, I think definitely fours. Same thing with Keegan Murray and

then the rest guy of the guys are on the perimeter. But he's the one guy, I think, you know, I think there would be a real, if they draft Chet, he's going to start. If you draft Jailen Duren, it could be to, you know, working performances question where that guy may end up coming off the bench and Isaiah Stewart still starts, which would be interesting how the fan base would react to something like that. Yeah. All right. So, well, we should just, we should just qualify here that all of us absolutely love Isaiah Stewart. The fact that we don't think he's an ideal starter is no knock on his, you know, his more positive qualities. It's just that the reason he dropped the 16 in a weak draft is because he's undersized and not vertical. And those are major weaknesses. So, all right, moving on from Libby Hero. Do you think Grant can be on this team's timeline?

Tommy, what do you think? Yeah, this is an interesting one. And I think, you know, I think you kind of have to contextualize this one a little bit with the draft. I know that we said that, you know, the players on this team, they don't affect who you take. But it's like kind of what you alluded to, Bryce, where it's like if you bring on certain players, There might just not be enough room in the front court. So ignoring that personally, I think Grant can still fit the timeline. It's really more about the role that he wants to play, the shots that he wants to take,

and whether he can kind of work within the flow of the offense. I still see him as, like, at his peak and if everything's kind of clicking, third option on a really good team, that's contingent on hitting a lot of your threes, attacking the basket hard, playing good defense, and being a dynamic score. I don't think he's too old. And I think that his presence is actually valuable. He's a respected vet. And he's been in the NBA for a long time.

And he's not a guy who's, like, hated for his age by the fan base. So that's always a positive. But if you do get a guy like Jabari Smith, yeah, no, I would have no trouble moving on from him. I think you just take the best you can get. But I'm not looking to move on from him. This is something that we kind of touched on a little bit at the deadline. I didn't mind that they didn't trade him if they didn't get good value. at the same time, like if in the off season, you get like even a decent offer.

Yeah, go ahead and move him. Yeah, so my biggest thing with Jeremy Grant, one, I've said it multiple times already, if they get those guys in the draft, then I think you have to move him because you're, I don't think you can play Saddick Bay at the two. I personally don't think he can play the two, and I don't think you're bringing any one of those guys off the bench, Jeremy Grant, Saddick Bay, or the draft pick. But I also wonder about the contract. You know, he's due for an extension.

And the salary cap is supposed to take a big jump coming up soon. because of a new TV deal. But. Yep, 2025. Yeah, I'm still not sure if I love the idea of what are some of the reports that have been floated, four for 120, four for 18, you know, 18. 112 over 4 is the extension. 12.

Like, I'm not sure, even with the salary cap jumping, I'm not sure I want to pay Jeremy Grant because I think when this team's really ready to compete and be a playoff contender and makes a little bit of noise, he's probably got to be. your fourth, third at the best option. And I don't know if that's what you want to be paying that guy. Yeah, that's pretty expensive. If he could just fold his way into that Portland trade exception and we just take back the first round from them, I'd be pretty happy.

I think a lot of people would. Yeah. So the thing with Grant, I don't have confidence that as a really lesser option, he's going to fit all that well into the offense for a guy who just does a lot of his work attacking with a ball in his hands. And even though he is much improved lately, taking the right pass. He just, I think it's something that he's relatively weak at. He definitely doesn't want to go back to his Denver role. And even though like 20 something million is the going

rate for, you know, for like your third or fourth best starter at this point, like you said, what Aaron Gordon got from Denver, for example. Yeah, I just don't know if I feel it. I don't think that he's, he's an ideal guy. Like, again, fourth option, like, cool, you know, it gives him more energy to play at, you know, pretty high-level defense again. And he's just shooting threes and kind of the basket and doing some, just doing some attacking with the ball in his hands. But yeah, I'd trade him for a second for a Portland pick, you know, particularly if you draft a guy at that position. So, yeah, I don't think he's ideal. There's also the fact that he's 28. 28's not very old. But if you're looking on a timeline of like six years, players rarely age well

in the mid-30s. And he would be 33. at the end of his extension. So not really ideal for me. All right. So a quick one because we kind of addressed this already. Why is Mowgli from Custard Walrus? Cool name. Why is Mowgli getting treated like a god by the NBA community and everybody else being treated like trash even though his stats aren't any better? I think we covered this. He just, his strengths come through a lot more easily. He is asked to do less. He is much better. He's very good at doing those things he's asked to do. He's in a great situation with an all-star point guard and an all-star center who really compensates for his physical weaknesses. Yeah, and like the cabs are a little bit, I don't want to say like the darlings of the

NBA, but they're a fun storyline right now because, you know, they've been better, I think, than what people thought they were going to be. And so like that just plays into that entire narrative as well. I think you've seen Kate Cunningham get more love since the All-Star break whenever he was the MVP of the Rising Stars and the Pistons are winning some games now. And so you see him get like that's just kind of how it goes i think with the bigger pistons community and well you would love to see kate get more love i think it just kind of plays to the hearts of of how we all feel about detroit versus everybody anyway i think you nailed it i don't have anything to add to that all right fair enough so uh move on to one final question uh this is from kareem long time listener we appreciate

you uh says Marvin bagley's ceiling what do you think that would be bris i i always hate this because I feel like I don't go true ceiling. I try to go a little bit more like realistic. I think he can be a second unit bucket getter that's a neutral defender. Like what we saw on Monday night, I think he ended up having a double double. I don't know that he ever works his way into the starting lineup. I think the offensive skill set is very, very intriguing, guys.

It's really interesting to me. The defense, I think the effort is there. The IQ is not in terms of basketball IQ and defensive awareness. I think he wants to be in the right spot. I think he tries to. He just doesn't see everything happen fast enough. And so there's some limitations defensively. So I really kind of like him as a second unit big that comes in, get you buckets, rebounds, and is just a neutral defender. Yeah, I like that one. What do you think of the idea? I mean, this is really just kind of piggybacking off of that. Ben's unit of Killian Hayes, Isaiah Stewart, Marvin Bagley. Like, do you think that's like a decent? There's not a lot of shooting in that lineup, right?

Oh, no. Yeah, I guess the idea is maybe like, I don't know, Frank Jackson, Isaiah Livers kind of supplemented. No, I like the names. I like the names of that second unit. And I want to put Homi in there, too, but now you really can't shoot it. So, yeah, that sounds a little problematic whenever you put it like that, right? Like, if you draft someone that moves Stewart to the bench. And again, yeah, I'm glad you said that, Mike.

I'm a huge Isaiah Stewart fan. I try to be unbiased and I just think that his limitations, whenever this team is trying to compete and win a lot of games, he's probably best served coming off the bench. So I like those three names in the second unit, Tommy. I just, when you say him like that, I'm not sure it fits very well. Yeah, I would say as far as Bagley goes, he's just in an unfortunate place as a positional tweener now.

I think I've already said that. So I agree with you completely Bryce. The IQ is an issue. I think that's going to keep him out of the starting lineup and a good team, like particularly it's important the regular season have a good rim protector and I think bagley possibly is it's going to be best suited at center like hopefully developing in a sort of like a Christian would roll off the bench a guy who can attack off the dribble and shoot threes but it's very important to have a guy who is an intelligent rim protector particularly in the

playoffs like that is key in the playoffs to have that guy unless you've got like spectacular perimeter defense I don't think Bagley has the IQ to do it so What I think he would be is if he develops, as you hope, a guy who plays power forward or a center off the bench has to shoot the ball, has to shoot the ball, has to be a reliable shooter. No ifs, ends or butts, period. So, yeah, I would say bench big. As far as your idea, Tommy, yeah, he could compensate for some of Stewart's weaknesses off the bench. You know, you're playing him power forward here. Stewart's going to have to be able to shoot, too, period, I think, in order to be a good long-term NBA player.

So if Bagley can shoot, cool, that takes away a lot of the issues, and it pays, it makes. his path to becoming a positive value NBA player a lot, a lot easier. If you can't shoot, it doesn't learn to be a good shooter. I think he's out of the NBA in three, four seasons, tops. Yeah, I wanted to bring this one up because, I mean, over the course of this episode in our past few episodes, we've kind of sent a lot of players to the bench, Killian, Isaiah Stewart, now Bagley. And I mean, if you want all of them on the bench, they have to operate together or you're looking to make some decisions down the line. So I just wanted to see if there's a path there to keep all these guys.

But yeah, no, I'm with you. I think that there are some, I think you're going to have to pick between two or three of those guys down the way. I think you're right, though, Tommy. Like, I still think that Cade and Sadiq are the only long-term starters on this team right now, depending on what you do with Jeremy Grant again. But the rest of the guys are really, really good second unit basketball players, which is good because you have a whole bunch of them to pick from.

You pick the right ones and you keep them there as you hopefully fill out the start. lineup with two, if not three, improved starters. The bench units right now, I'm in sure they've been decently productive. It's just this team. Eventually, when you're fielding a playoff roster, you just need to field a functional roster. And that means, you know, anybody who can't shoot the ball is, is playing center and ideally doing something well.

So it'll be interesting. It's just, I think, not to be a downer, I think it's worth noting that the roster has a fair number of guys whose NBA future is unclear. All right. Any closing thoughts? I'm good. I had a blast. Thanks so much for coming on, Bryce. Yeah, I had a lot of fun. I hope the listeners like it, and I enjoyed it. Yeah, absolutely, man. It was great having you on the show. So yeah, this is Bryce. His new podcast, The Pistons Pulse, drops on Tuesday mornings.

He's co-hosted with Omaro Sancofa of the Detroit Free Press. Check it out. So as always, folks, thank for listening. We'll catch you next time.