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Lawrence Frank is not a happy coach. His Detroit Pistons have been largely dreadful on offense save for the opening night and the Orlando Magic's JV team. They also just got absolutely torched by a Minnesota Timberwolves team missing Ricky Rubio and Kevin Love.
Now, Frank is saying that the Pistons' rotation is in limbo and it will remain so until he gets consistent effort from a 10-man group.
He didn't go so far as to imply that spots in the starting rotation are vulnerable but if I were Jason Maxiell or Tayshaun Prince I wouldn't be sitting too comfortably right now.
"If a guy is not giving the required effort it takes to win, then you have to get the next guy a chance, right?" Frank said. "Now that may not impact the rotation or maybe it does. Maybe that's the door that's open. But as a coach, your loyalty is to the team. It can't be to any individual. For us as a building team, we have to make sure every night we're bringing it."
The shooting percentages for the team so far look pretty spooky as we approach opening night on Halloween: 47.3, 34.7, 39.1, 48.6, 35.2, 37.3, 32.9.
They also haven't sped up the tempo at all in pre-season action. In other words, the team can't run, can't hit a jump shot, and can't seem to get easy baskets. A team as dreadful on offense as the Pistons were last season, they might be even worse this year. No amount of defensive improvement would be able to make up for how poor the Pistons look to be on offense. I don't care how many shots Andre Drummond and Ktrl-V manage to block.
I'm glad to see that Frank is willing to verbalize his disatisfaction but it seems like all he is willing to do is tinker around the edges.
We all know what needs to happen, and in honor of the upcoming election I will turn it into my Five-Point Plan for the Betterization of Piston Nation :
- Start Andre Drummond
- Slide Greg Monroe to starting PF and move Jason Maxiell to the bench
- Replace Tayshaun Prince in the starting lineup with Jonas Jerebko
- Pick up the pace and rely on your athletic big men to give you second-chance opportunities
- Trade whatever you can cobble together for a legitimate backup (or starting) point guard
In other words, don't worry everybody, I think next year's draft pick is safe and it's going to be a good one!