Also worth considering: Wade’s career 3P% is a mere .258. A more reliable outside shot for Stuckey will be a nice bonus, but he could probably get by being streaky. (I’m not saying I don’t expect him to improve in that regard, I’m just saying his worst-case scenario is still nice …)

Also, the new emphasis on penalizing floppers will work in favor of players like Stuckey who thrive on driving to the rim.

While McGrady certainly has had his fair share of responsibility for losing in the first round, I hardly feel like this year is even remotely his fault.

Placing the blame on McGrady because Yao wasn’t playing and they happened to be playing a better team anyways is McGrady’s fault? Having a rookie starting in place of Yao is McGrady’s fault?

His back spasms wouldn’t be an issue in Detroit because I like so many others have complete faith in Arnie Kander’s ability.

Meanwhile, having Iverson and Billups at the 1 and 2 would completely undersize us at the 2 in an Eastern Conference filled with solid 2 guards who are rarely on the small side. Additionally, do you really think that Iverson would be okay with letting someone else run the offense? Letting someone else bring the ball up the floor etc.? Maybe he would, but I don’t think switching out one of our starters is enough to get a new attitude on this team. Not only that but the two (in my opinion) most problematic starters are the two that are the on-the-floor and locker room leaders and that is Billups and Sheed. Hamilton needs to go simply because the excessive screening/mid-range game forces our team to settle for those jump shots.

We could have made that trade, plus another piece or two, prior to this season– but not after the shaq/marion trade. There’s no way Kerr would make that trade. Stoudamire for Rip/Sheed maybe, but I’m not sure that makes sense for DET.

Awesome. How far has that PER gotten him in the playoffs? PER doesn’t win games, nor championships. I doubt Joe ever considers that once when making personnel decisions.

The other guy who’d make any sense, except for his contract is that other Wallace guy in Cleveland. He compliments this team well, except for that $14M/yr contract. At those dollars, I’d much prefer Brand (duh) .

Billups
Iverson
Prince
Maxiell
Wallace

@James B.

If our problem is arrogance, “flipping switches” and taking games off, Tracy McGrady is no solution. Besides, I’d only take that trade if we could sign McGrady and immediately trade his back spasms to another team. McGrady’s a dead albatross who would guarantee us a string of first round exits.

After a year, we let Iverson and Wallace move on. We’ve got a HUGE surplus of cash for a big 2010 signing.

Imagine how much of an impact Iverson would have on Stuckey’s game…

The only way Stuckey will ever be on the same level as Paul or Williams, or even close to them for that matter is if he gets starter minutes.

Rasheed & Rip for T-Mac & a salary balancer (Steve Francis would work).

Houston gets Rasheed to play alongside Yao giving them the best defensive front court in the NBA. They get a proven consistent scorer while giving up the guy who just can’t seem to get them or any other team out of the 1st round.

Detroit gets a player who can take the game over on command, but has him surrounded by very good players who can support T-Mac properly rather than just standing there and watching him play.

Detroit also gets a player that David Stern would like to see in the finals (that has to count for something…).

I would stop there, but with Chauncey being the leader of this team, and this team obviously not getting it done, we need to trade Chauncey somewhere for a big. Would a sign & trade work out with Okafor? Not sure why Charlotte would do that…but if they didn’t think they could afford Okafor and/or if they thought Okafor would be leaving anyways for greener pasture, well then they may be willing to get something in return and billups alongside gerald wallace would be pretty formidable.

Stuckey - PG
T-Mac - SG
Tay - SF
Maxiell - PF
Okafor - PF/C

Amir/McDyess off the bench with Afflalo and Hermann to backup T-Mac/Tay. We’d need to find a back up PG though…but Dixon, Hunter, Hayes, and Ratliff are all off the books so we could look to secure a backup using some of the freed up cap-space.

-1st, i like avery johnson coming in. seems the only reason he’s gone from dallas is nelson made a trade that sucked and cuban got pissed at avery for not being able to make lemonade out of s*** and they had a blow up. i don’t blame avery for dallas’ failings this season. (though he’s clearly complicit from last year’s loss to golden st.) my feeling is essentially, if we’re taking a step back to develop the kids and push them towards being the nucleus, then michael curry or avery. if we’re reloading for another run, avery.

-i know i should feel bad for dyess, and i do in some ways, but the guy took 3 f-ing shots in an elimination game. he stepped back in the shadows on a day we desperately needed frontline help. if he thinks he’s being part of the solution by pointing out our deficiencies after the fact, he’s lost his mind.

-if we did a thread of just who should the pistons deal and for whom, it would eclipse the 600+ mark from the other night. i agree with whoever said it above (i apologize for not scrolling back up), that this team is tainted with complacency and arrogance. and unfortunately that comes from our best players: chauncey, rip, sheed and tay. you’re not going to trade all of those guys, but i have to figure at least 1 or 2 are gone. as much as sheed’s disappearance in game 6 was an issue (again) and his antics cost him and us (i think he had a hard time playing with his emotions in check knowing what loomed if he mouthed off too much), i still harken back to joe d. saying sheed is the quintessential piston. you don’t find better 6-11 one-on-one defenders who can make 3s and score in the post than sheed. they broke the mold. some team is going to be salivating out west to get their hands on him. (not portland obviously.) i think chauncey and tay both have pretty reasonable contracts so i don’t know if it’s wise to deal either. (and i don’t think chauncey’s contract is going to deter teams from inquiries either.) to me, it always comes back to rip as the best bargaining chip. he’s coming off a fantastic series. he’s got a contract that’s almost at its end. of course, it’s the very reasons that teams would want him, that would keep him around.

i’ve mentioned it, and it seems more and more unlikely as he and denver discuss a contract extension, but this idea just keeps clinking around in my head: iverson. if iverson doesn’t sign an extension to play out the final year of his deal, he would be available for trade. you’d send them rip, our #1 pick and hopefully just mcdyess (and not maxiell or amir) for iverson. it’s a go-for-it-all deal, because both sheed and iverson would then be UFAs after next season. but if we had iverson, we’d finally have a guy who commands a double-team, who can create his own shot. we have the shots for him. none of our remaining squad needs shot attempts to have good games. we would have philly’s finals squad from ‘01 on steroids. and then after a year, no matter how it goes, you hand the keys over to the kids. but it would make a huge splash next year and it would put us right back in the driver’s seat for the east and the whole damn thing.

and i would think, like most of you probably think, it’s completely out of the realm of possibility. except that we’ve been one matt geiger trade kicker from iverson wearing a pistons uni already.