Betrayer

Apparently we weren't interviewing him anyway, but it still makes me sad. Now go out and get Chris Quinn.

This is where I'm at. I'm not worried about Cade asking out. If we can use some of our cap space to acquire guys on bloated contracts that can play and bring in future assets with them (Wiggins, Capella, etc), this team can easily double their win total (28). The following year, with any development from your youth you should be pushing for a play-in spot. If the youth didn't develop, you're restarting anyway so it's good you got some assets. If they did develop and Cade took an SGA leap, then you can go get your co-star with those assets and some consolidation moves.

Guess I'm just not that enamored with Green. I feel like there are a number of those guys available in every free agent market. I'd rather have a war chest of future picks to package for an All-Star in a year or two.

There are a bunch of teams who really want Clingan. If he falls to 5, I'm shopping the pick to move down and acquire some future assets.

I'd rather have THJ and the pick. Hardaway is an expiring and we need to gather up some future picks for a deal (or another rebuild) down the line.

Carter's still my guy. I'm expecting us to move down in the draft, so maybe you get him a few picks later, but honestly I might just take him at 5 in this draft if Sarr, Risacher, and Sheppard are off the board as expected. Here's Sam talking about him in a recent video:

I get where you're coming from, and for another team I'd agree. But for the Pistons at that time, it was a terrible move. Weaver should have been acquiring draft picks in the first year of his rebuild, not locking them up to bring in bench role players. That's even before we get into the discussion of whether or not he'd have been there at 19 anyway, not to mention the fact that he was picked before guys like Maxey and Bane. I think there's a world where they can take on some contract to acquire assets now and still improve with Cade before taking the next step in a year or two. Just improving to 30 games would be a massive leap and create an environment where you can truly evaluate these young guys. First, I think there's probably a 75% chance they trade down in the draft based upon what Langdon said and what I've heard about them not working out many guys in the #5 range. That's one way to acquire future draft capital. Then, in addition to Simmons and Lavine (who I do NOT want), Jack Kelly tweeted out a few names including Wiggins (3yrs/84M), Hardaway (1yr/16M), Hunter (3yrs/68M), Capela (1yr/22M), and Huerter (2yr/33M). I'd add Grant to that list as well. Those guys can still contribute to your team even though they're on bloated contracts that their current teams need to shed. You could easily take on 1 (or even 2) of those contracts and still have the cap space to go after a free agent like Claxton or two lesser free agents. So, while I agree that Lavine is a bad move, I think there's a way to use some of the cap and this year's draft pick to fill up the war chest while improving the team in the short term. Then in a year or two you can use those assets and some players to make a splash that will shoot you up the standings.

Oh, and my other favorite part was when Trajan went on and on about being "on time" and "punctual". Y'know, after they were an hour late to start the presser.

For what it's worth, the one semi-useful nugget of info from today's press conference was that Trajan wants to use the trade market (and therefore the cap space) to acquire players that can help now but also come with future assets. Sounds like he wants to do what Weaver should've done years ago. Get ready for this rebuild to drag on a bit as they try to do it the right way this time. Also, get ready for Lavine or a similar sin contract that comes with some draft capital.

Livestream press conference was set for 3:30. It's now 4:12 and it hasn't started yet. Is it too much to ask for just a little effort to make this franchise seem like they're competent? At this point I feel like they should just continue cleaning house. Maybe some people in Marketing and IT need to go as well, who knows. If it was my company, after being the laughing stock of the league for over a decade, I'd want to make sure we were doing everything to show we're turning the corner. That includes at least being prompt for our press conference that's already 3 weeks too late.

I’m taking Grant at 30M on a shorter contract over BI or George at 50M on longer contracts all day. As I’ve mentioned before, Omari was talking about a pick swap plus one secondary young guy (Grimes, Sasser) as possibly being enough. That means you’re only eating about 20M of that, leaving you with 40M+ available to go after someone like Claxton and another 3 and D vet like KCP or Trent Jr. You can then re-sign Tek since he’s a restricted And you still have Ivey and Duren as tradeable assets for the right deal. This would create a competent roster that can help Cade develop. It’s not the championship move, but you have to take steps forward and make the move before the move.

Bickerstaff doesn't excite me for all the reasons already mentioned. I'm sure he'd be better than Monty, but probably on par with Casey. Sweeney also doesn't excite me. He was here with Casey the whole time and was reportedly the defensive guy - yep, that same defense that we all complained about non-stop. Unless he was jumping up and down trying to get Casey to try something more innovative on offense and defense and Casey just ignored him, why would we want this guy back? Because Giannis likes him? Are we really still talking about that?

Exactly my thoughts when I saw the news this morning. Glad he's off the table for us.

Great trade for OKC. If Caruso can stay healthy, he helps a playoff team. Giddy never impressed me. Always just felt like a rich man's Killian Hayes.

Unfortunately, it's really hard to predict when it comes to an assistant. How much is he really responsible for? How much has he learned? Same questions we had with Weaver working under Presti or Landgon working under Griffin. You never truly know. What we do know is that he is very highly regarded around the league and most reports say that he will be a head coach at some point soon. He's been learning under the guy that most people consider to the best coach in the NBA right now. Also, "Heat culture" is something that many teams wish they had, especially in Detroit where the fans would love a return to something that feels like the "Going to Work" era. He'd be a gamble, just like any assistant without a proven record as a head coach. You're hoping that the apple doesn't fall from the tree. It's not a guarantee, but the alternative is to go get a re-tread who failed and got fired at least once before.

Stein is absolute garbage every time. I have no idea why people keep acting like he's a respected source of information.

He was an absolute train wreck this season. Nobody is saying it was a good roster, but Williams was called out by everyone from the Piston's beat writers (notorious for not saying anything bad) to the national media, including well respected guys like Vecenie and Windhorst. He coached like he was actively trying to get fired. Everything from starting a non-NBA player (Killian), benching Ivey, mishandling Ausar, 11 man lineups with all bench units, terrible game management, and outright lies to the media. Speaking as someone who watched all 82 games, this was an absolutely criminal display of coaching. He should've been fired mid-season and the fact that it took them this long to do it was simply because of the money and pride Gores had to swallow after he publicly bragged about overruling his GM to throw bag loads of money to bring in a big name. I'm glad that in the end they did the right thing even though it took way too long. Now they need to rush to bring in a coach because it would be nice to know who your guy is and what he wants to implement before you go into the draft and free agency. Edited to add: Let's not forget that Casey had a similarly terrible roster - and didn't even have Cade - the previous year and won more games. Casey is an average coach at best. What does that make Monty?

Give me Quinn from that list. Too bad Atkinson isn't on there.

YES!!!!! Langdon has earned a lot of trust with this one.

Maybe a better term is "front-bench". Those guys are the ones who the head coach hand picks as part of his crew. Usually they're tied to the coach and are cleared out when the coach leaves. Then there's the developmental and health guys that sit in the back row (or don't even appear on the bench) and work with the players. Those guys are often independent of the coach and are more likely to stay with the team regardless of the current coaching staff. Vinson falls into the latter category and was clearly a Langdon hire which is why I question the "joining William's staff" wording.

Good, maybe we can unload some of these players to the Wiz in exchange for draft picks.

Exactly. Getting this guy was a huge win. One of the most respected and desired shooting coaches in the league. I know we said the same thing about Dan Burke as a defensive guy last year and that dude looked at this train wreck and decided not to show up to work for "personal reasons", but seriously this is a great hire. He's credited with making shooters out of a lot of poor-shooters (Lonzo, Herb Jones, etc). And like you said, it's a Langdon hire. I'm just curious why it's being reported as "Vinson being added to William's coaching staff". He's a behind the scenes guy, not an on-the-bench guy. I wonder if that wording is officially from the Pistons and they're just trying to pretend that the whole "Monty decision" isn't a thing, or is it just JEIII trolling the fans again.

I guess we should keep refreshing his bio on X to see if he gets the job.

They've made it a lot farther than I thought they would, but the heliocentric offense just isn't it. Watch Boston move the ball, find the open man, and consistently get good looks while Dallas dribbles the air out of the ball with everyone else just watching Luka (or Kyrie). Sure, it's fun to see them make a lot of tough shots, but they call them "tough" shots for a reason - it's a bad offense plan to rely on those shots possession after possession.

You're definitely right. I consume all the Piston's podcast/youtube content out there and there isn't much hype at all. And with the team keeping everyone in a holding pattern for so long on a press conference or any news about Monty, there really isn't much to talk about on any front.