Detroit Pistons torched by Trail Blazers

Detroit Pistons 86, Portland Trail Blazers 98

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope-B+

Caldwell-Pope was playing on another level in the first half. He looked a step faster than everyone else on the floor and there wasn’t any indecision for him on offense. He finished the half with 9-points on 4/5 shooting, particularly because he’s starting to get easier shots for himself.

The only area I would really critique Caldwell-Pope this game would be his ball security. He gets the ball knocked away far too often when he’s attacking the rim.

Andre Drummond-C-

Played the best defense on Aldridge over any of the other Pistons bigs, but continues to miss way too many easy shots.

Consistency remains the biggest obstacle in Drummond taking the next step, but still no reason to be concerned, because that’s something that will come with time.

I said in my last game review that I would start keeping a separate stat for Drummond called “missed bunnies”. Tonight he had six missed bunnies.

In other words he left 12-points on the court in a game that had a differential of 12-points.

Josh Smith-C

Still taking way too many jump shots for a guy who should be way more dynamic compared to his defender. Against traditional power forwards like Aldridge he should be able to use his speed and quickness to get to the rim. When he plays small forward he should be able to use his size advantage to back down his defender and either score or set up a teammate.

Brandon Jennings and D.J. Augustin-F

Jennings continued his streak of poor performances, particularly on offense. If now isn’t the time to start giving Spencer Dinwiddie a chance than it never will be. Van Gundy is either letting him play through his struggles or he doesn’t think much of Dinwiddie.

Or maybe Van Gundy has bigger plans for Jennings in terms of a trade and wants to show other teams why they won’t no part of him.

The dynamic duo combined to go 2/13 from the floor (Jennings 0/5) with 12 assists and three turnovers.

Kyle Singler-C

Singler started the night knocking down both of his spot up three-point attempts, but was far less accurate the rest of the way.

Still, he’s the Pistons best option at small forward. (Sigh)

Greg Monroe-C

Monroe’s role has evolved into shoot first, second, and third. His prerogative is to back down and shoot no matter what the defense is showing, which explains why his shot percentages were so low tonight.

I can live with Drummond’s misses, because they high percentage shots that you shouldn’t pass up on. Moose on the other hand is being extremely selfish.

His stat line of 22-points on 10/22 shooting was pretty misleading.

Caron Butler-A

Good energy off the bench in the second half after a lackluster first. 13-points and 7-rebounds on the night and he kept the Pistons in the game.

Cartier Martin-C-

Not much of a stat line, but all of his shots where quality.

Jonas Jerebko-B

Jerebko gets into the game and immediate contributes to an offensive score and hits a three-point shot.

Spencer Dinwiddie-D

Didn’t see the floor until there was one minute left in the third quarter. Aside from a nice three-point play he was pretty bad.

Stan Van Gundy-D

You’d think during this losing streak that Van Gundy would be able to get Spencer Dinwiddie on the floor more. I guess he feels it would be hard to justify playing an inexperienced rookie over Brandon Jennings and D.J. Augustin. Maybe he questions the message he’d be sending to his players if he didn’t put the players on the floor that gave the team the best chance to win. I don’t necessarily agree with that thought process, given there’s no evidence to support it, but that’s the only reason I can think of that prohibits Dinwiddie from seeing the floor.

The good news is change is coming in the next month or so. Hopefully the new year brings with it some trade offers that can put the Pistons in a better position in the long run, because right now the Pistons are in a pretty dark place.

As far as game analysis goes for Van Gundy, he made a good change in regards to who played defense on Lamarcus Aldridge. The Pistons started the game with Josh Smith covering Aldridge, but he was thoroughly outplayed. Van Gundy then tried Drummond on Aldridge who fared far better.

Mysteriously however, Van Gundy benched Caldwell-Pope and Drummond for the entire fourth in favor of Dinwiddie and Monroe despite it being a fairly close game.

You could make the case for benching Drummond who left a lot of points on the floor but Caldwell-Pope?

I really would like to hear his reasoning on that one. He’d probably use the excuse that the five players on the floor had nice chemistry and that he didn’t want to interfere with that, but given the way Dinwiddie was playing (and the fact that he hadn’t seen any action is multiple games), that excuse still wouldn’t be good enough.

It may seem like I have a double standard for Van Gundy in terms of Dinwiddie. I bash Van Gundy when he doesn’t play him, but get on to him when he does. That’s not really the case. To be clear, I’m actually questioning why he wouldn’t play Dinwiddie earlier in the versus in the fourth quarter in a tight game over Caldwell-Pope who was playing extremely well.