Random bits and pieces I wanted to mention before they fall through the cracks:
- I made a list of Detroit’s top 10 athletes for FanHouse — how’d I do? Leave your list in the comments over there.
- The Sonics hired Sam Presti away from the Spurs to be their new general manager, and one of Presti’s first moves was to hire Scott Perry, formerly Detroit’s director of player personnel, to be his new assistant GM.
What this means for Detroit is … I don’t have a clue. I know Perry’s main job responsibilities for the Pistons had him intimately involved with scouting prospective draft picks, but I honestly don’t know how much input he had on the team’s final decisions. Either way, I’m happy for the guy — he first joined the Pistons as a college scout in 2000 and has steadily moved up in organization, and this seems like a pretty big break.
- Natalie from Need4Sheed has John Hammond’s ear … or at least his business card.
- Kobe and KG and Marion have (not really) been traded!
- An interesting theory about Alex Acker’s immediate future from the guys at PistonsForum.com.
- Is Mark Champion, radio play-by-play guy, taking a shot at Rasheed Wallace?
Following back-to-back NBA titles in 1989 and ‘90, the Bad Boys began losing their balance on that slippery slope called complacency. The 1990-91 season was the beginning of the end – the famous walkoff led by Isiah Thomas following a Chicago Bulls sweep in the Eastern Conference finals.
The following season saw the urgency of winning replaced by the complacency of “been there, done that.”
A first-round loss to the New York Knicks would end a five-year run that stamped the Detroit Pistons as one of the NBA’s elite franchises. During the dog days of that season, Daly urged me to watch closely during a timeout. Look at the body language of the players. Look at their eyes. It was a window to the soul of the team.
Dennis Rodman would be sitting on press row, several feet from the nerve center. …
Replace “Dennis Rodman” with “Rasheed Wallace” and Champion sounds a lot like Chris Sheridan.
- If you haven’t listened to Chad Ford’s interview with Joe Dumars over at ESPN, I recommend you do so. There’s a lot of interesting tidbits there, many of which were highlighted by MLive.com’s Full-Court Press as well as Keith Langlois at Pistons.com.
Ford always scores incredibly insightful interviews with Dumars. Does he simply not make himself available for these types of things with the local press? Because he never seems to reveal quite as much to them as he does Ford.
Also, if you’re looking to satisfy your mock draft jones …
- I’m no good at mock drafts (all I know about most of these college players I learned reading other mock drafts over the past few weeks), but that hasn’t stopped me from participating in a few. Over at the FanHouse, Spencer Hawes was available at No. 15, so I took him. I haven’t seen him falling that far anywhere else, but I imagine the Pistons would be intrigued with him there, right? Since I went big early, I went small late, going with Marco Belinelli with the 27th pick.
- In a mock draft conducted at Ballhype, though, I had them going with Rodney Stuckey and Sean Williams …
- … and in the one at SB Nation, I went with Nick Young and Daequen Cook. In hindsight, that Cook pick was probably a bad/unrealistic move, at least following the selection of Young.
What can I say, I’m not really that good at mock drafts. You guys sound pretty intelligent, though.
espn’s chris broussard just gave his mock draft for the lottery, and some how, by his estimation, julian friggin’ wright was available at 15. that would be such a lovely gift from the draft gods. his reasoning wasn’t preposterous. basically the 3 point guards would have to go before we pick (conley, law, and crittenton) and philly would have to choose thornton over wright. draftexpress’s latest mock has wright dropping that far as well (though in theirs, we’re still taking stuckey.)
1 week until the draft!!!
All I’m asking is that for once, Joe D and the boys get us a damn player. At this point i don’t CARE what poisition he plays (but i swear if it’s PF i’m giving up on Amir), just so long as he can play and play now. If we make one more damn upside pick involving a foriegn “stud” who’s game may or may not translate to the NBA in 3 years… I’ll, well, I’ll cry damnit but thats not the point.
Please Joe, pick me a damn ball player not a project.
*Nick Young or if by some miracle he’s there Acie Law*
I’m starting to think somebody decent is going to fall too–probly not julian wright but maybe nick young and maybe acie law. derrick byars should be there as well.
joe keeps saying he wants to get somebody who will contribute right away. i’ll take him at his word.
RE: the mock draft picks. I have to admit, I like the Pistons taking Nick Young or Stuckey at the 15 (or Crittenton, even, if he’s available there), but for the love of god please not Hawes … I’m not sold. Neither am I of Williams at 27 (getting dismissed from BC midseason won’t help). I like Belinelli if he’s there. I watched this kid play overseas and he has some real fire burning inside him and he’ll kill you from outside if he gets going. If his shots aren’t falling, he’ll kill you by finding a way to get to the rim. No Belinelli? I reach a little for a guy nobody’s mentioned in the first round and take Herbert Hill of Providence. He can play at both ends down low, has good footwork in the post and can play with his back to the basket. Those could be two real good picks that the team can use to shore up the bench.
There’s a troubling article on http://www.draftexpress.com/viewarticle.php?a=2132
about Sean Williams. It doesn’t inspire much confidence in him.
I’m thinking positive and assuming that because most GMs are borderline morons someone good will drop to us at 15. It seems to happen every year. Whoever it is will have a huge chip on his shoulder and will procede to “make it rain” on every team that passed on him. My fingers are crossed.
Frankly, almost every single scenario I’ve seen the past week online has SOMEONE who was rated big time falling. I mean Noah has been anyplace from 4th to 14th during this process, where he goes ALONE changes everything. Either way it doesn’t matter to me who we get so long as his game right now is why we’re drafting him, not what his game MIGHT be in 3 years right before we’d have to re-sign him anyways. I’m DEFINATELY in the “not Hawes” camp, and i’m pretty GLAD we have no shot at Yi since his scouting report looks exactly like Amir’s and I’m still waiting for Detroit to find HIM mins….. Now what we do with the 27th is a different matter entirely and I wish Joe D all the luck in the world on his next “foreign project big/guard” with that pick. Go Tiago Splitter, drop like a stone for us baby!
There’s three holes in the pistons roster. PG, SF, and C. With our depth at pf and Acker coming over we should be fine at pf and sg. Here’s my plan going into the draft:
#15:
I say Pistons go for Nick Young, Al Thornton, Julian Wright, or Thaddeus Young (in that order)
#27:
Sean Williams, Kyrylo Fesenko, or Marc Gasol (in that order)
Go after usual project with 2nd round pick.
The hole thats left is pg. I say make a run after Steve Blake. He’s a young pg, whos a true pg. He can pass and he can shoot the three and can eat some of Chauncey’s minutes. I think we’d have a fantastic bench if this happens (fantastic meaning better than last year).
At 27 I’ve got them taking Fesenko, but Jared Dudley would be a steal. Not a workout warrior, just a productive basketball player in the Battier/Chuck Hayes mold. I’ll boycott the NBA if his knucklehead ex-teammate gets drafted first.
Dudley would be nice but if we take anyone of those I mentioned at 15, he’d become moot since theres no real roster spot for him. We can’t have every good guy unfortunatly.
I think the Hornets will take Nick Young, but I would love to have him. A potential dunk champion with a strong mid-range game. Him and Rip running around screens together will give defenses fits.
I bet we end up with Stuckey and either Fesenko or Dudley. And some obscure Euro in the second round.
I’m okay with that scenario but it still sounds to me like we’re relying ALOT on getting really lucky with the 27th pick to man the 5. I mean think about it, assuming everything we *need* to be true is… Acker can roll, Chauncey is back, Amir is ready and the Baby Muncher is ready for a bigger role. Downside? Mohammed is still a complete bum, Dyees doesn’t play the 5 well even in limited time, Maxiel is too short, Scouts indicate Amir doesn’t have the right type of game for it and our best 5 on the roster ATM doesn’t LIKE playing the 5 even though if he’d just start there we’d be infinately better. I mean I’m all for it if it works out, but it looks like we need a starting 5 who can roll about 22-28 mins minimum and it’s not exactly COMMON to find those at 27. As a side note, most of the scouting reports I’ve heard on Marc Gasol say he’s fat, slow footed and likely a dud.
Sorry, I guess there’s always the option of resigning Chris Webber, I forgot about that. Probably has something to do with trying to mentally block out the entire “Don’t worry we don’t need Ben, Chris Webber will be available by mid season” period of the Franchise.
Seriously though, nobody wants to see Chris Webber trying to guard Igauskas again… I know I don’t.
Fasenko is projected to be there by the 27th pick. And I hope we don’t get Stuckey. He sounds like he can really score but he’s a pg/sg. I believe we need a true pg and a guy that can play sf. We don’t need Stuckey.
I pretty much agree with MattG, except I’d take Gasol off that list.
Splitter would be good at 27 and be able to start right away but it sounds like he has some buy-out issues with his contract.
There are a few things that Dumars has stressed, athleticism, NBA ready and Hunger. So everyone should keep those in mind when considering who the Pistons will draft.
At 15, i think its going to come down to Stuckey or Critt (I Dont beleive Crit will go to the Clipps because he is years away from contributing) with Detroit ultimately choosing Stuckey because he is the more NBA ready of the two. Stuckey is a poor mans Dwayne Wade and a rich mans Flip Murray, so IMO- He is a Randy Foye, or a taller Ben Gordan.
At 27, Detroit needs to go SF. Im thinking Byars or Marcus Williams. I also like Dudley too, but something Dumars has stressed is athleticism which Duldey does not have. Byars is a highly athletic lock down defender who does whatever it takes to win. Marcus Williams is a top 20 talent with slight charactor issues (laziness). Dumars wants somebody who is hungry which makes me think that he might shy away from Williams, but he could gamble at 27.
At 57, another foreign bigman to gamble on like Stanko Barac.
they just better be prepped for someone falling out of the lottery. because there’s a good chance that someone like julian wright could be there. i don’t know why they’ve waited so long on starting this workout process. even if they did expect to be playing in the finals. were daryl watkins and zabian dowdell that busy? go steal somebody already!
btw, what’s to keep scott perry from focusing on players in this draft for the sonics that he just spent the past few months focusing in on for the pistons? is there some sort of clause? gentlemen’s agreement?
second steve black in free agency (mattgibson) and jared dudley at pick #27 (lanierfan)