Pistons get good play from almost all of their main players and lose anyway

Toronto Raptors 110, Detroit Pistons 100

Andre Drummond — B

7 points, 11 boards, and 3 blocks. But he only played 21 minutes because he picked up four personal fouls and Van Gundy is too chicken to leave him out there. Yep, this was definitely a typical Drummond game.

Josh Smith — B

Smith didn’t try to do too much and ended up with a solid, efficient line of 10, 8, and 4 in just 25 minutes. This version of Smith is a valuable asset.

Kyle Singler — D-

He had a pretty offensive rebound leading to an easy KCP bucket. But apart from that, Singler couldn’t shoot, couldn’t defend, and couldn’t do much else to justify his time on the court.

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope — B

Caldwell-Pope’s defense left something to be desired , but he still outplayed everyone he matched up against. If he had contributed much of anything besides scoring, he could be looking at an A-range grade.

Brandon Jennings — A

Jennings had his biweekly good game. He shot decently, rebounded well, found open players repeatedly, and really went at Lowry on both ends, soundly outplaying his counterpart. Jennings even managed to have a positive plus minus.

Greg Monroe — C

Monroe scored effectively and ably returned it all to the Raptors on the other end. His existence didn’t end up moving the needle much for the Pistons.

Jodie Meeks — D

Meeks is still rusty/hurt or isn’t actually good. Impossible to tell which thus far. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt until 2015.

D.J. Augustin — D-

In spite of having two steals and four assists to just one turnover, Augustin was mostly giving the ball back to Toronto in this one as he bricked every shot he threw up.

Caron Butler — B

Butler played well. But it’s impossible to get excited about him. He is a stopgap to keep the Pistons from being stuck playing atrocious players in a season that’s lost anyway.

Jonas Jerebko — B+

Jerebko didn’t shoot well, but he was once again the player showing the most hustle of anyone on the court. He is a limited do-it-all guy who would be a useful role player on absolutely any team in the league.

Cartier Martin — C+

Meh, Martin didn’t really play enough to give me anything to assess.

Joel Anthony — C-

Ditto for Anthony. But in the insanely small sample size, he looked bad.

Stan Van Gundy — F

Jennings, Caldwell-Pope, and Smith combined to shoot 20-40 and 6-12 from three. They put up 50 points, 13 rebounds, and 15 assists while playing smart basketball. This could be the only game all year in which they all play at least this well. And Van Gundy squandered it. His rotations sucked and his team came out completely flat after the break.

Toronto came in as the strong favorites. And if Stan coached it well, they still might have won. But this was a subpar coaching performance.