Pistons czar Stan Van Gundy: NBA Executive of the Year?

The concept behind the NBA’s Executive of the Year award is tough to nail down.

Sometimes it’s given to the executive who pushes a team from good to great — or, in some cases, bad to palatable. You can see that with past winners like Bob Myers in Golden State as he flipped the Warriors from good team to great last season.

On the other side, you’ve got John Hammond shaping a bad Bucks team into a 46-win playoff team in 2009-10.

But there’s really no set of rules. There’s nothing to say San Antonio’s R.C. Buford shouldn’t just win it every year considering the constant success the Spurs experience.

And that brings us to this season.

Buford probably will win the award — let’s just get that out now. The Spurs have continually evolved under Buford (and coach Gregg Popovich). Keeping up with the Warriors this season may be the most impressive transition yet. Credit Buford for acquiring LaMarcus Aldridge and signing David West for pennies on the dollar.

What I’m curious about is how the rest of the race shakes out — mainly, where does the Pistons’ duo of Stan Van Gundy and Jeff Bower stand? It’s understandable that the league hasn’t done somersaults over moves that have firmly put the Pistons as the No. 8 seed, but that doesn’t change the work the pair has done over the past two seasons.

The Pistons were an absolute mess when Van Gundy took over. They were a misfit bunch of toys — some talent but mostly bad fits and worse contracts. Detroit has finally been molded into something of a functioning basketball team. That deserves credit, but I don’t think the Pistons’ front office is going to see that this season.

Trading whatever was left of Caron Butler as well as Shawne Williams for Ersan Ilyasova wasn’t flashy. It’s just that trade ended up netting the Pistons a cornerstone forward in Tobias Harris. From a pure asset point of view, the Pistons basically traded Butler, Williams and Brandon Jennings for Harris… somehow.

Down the road, that trade alone may prove to be one of the best we see from this season.

Trading second round picks and pixie dust to Phoenix for Marcus Morris was a heist, too. Even Reggie Bullock, the forgotten throw-in from that deal, has turned into an important role player as the Pistons head into the playoffs.

I think Van Gundy and Co. deserve a lot of credit.

We really don’t know how much of a hand he had in all of these moves. Obviously, he had a large part, but I don’t think he was the one who really executed all of this. It’s a package deal between he and Bower, maybe that hurts. I dunno.

At the same time, I think they did as good a job as Neil Olshey did in Portland. The situations were just totally different.

Yes, Portland lost four starters, but they still had a top 15 player sitting there in Damian Lillard — plus a blue chip scorer in C.J. McCollum. The Pistons didn’t have any individual player as good as Lillard, despite what you may think about Reggie Jackson or Andre Drummond.

And, really, I don’t think we should apply McCollum blossoming into a 20-point scorer this year as part of Olshey’s case to call himself the second best exec in 2015-16. McCollum was a 16 point per game guy in the final part of last season, including an impressive scoring run in the playoffs.

This award is about what’s most impressive, though. It’s tough to pass on Buford since they have a title contender in San Antonio and Olshey has turned a seemingly-catastrophic mess into a pretty solid playoff team; one at a very similar level as the Pistons

I think this is one of those situations where the future helps.

If the Pistons end up playing at a 50-win pace next season — which is what they did with Tobias Harris over the final 28 games of this season — the front office earns more national praise. It’s just not going to happen this season.

It’s just hard not to be impressed when a team improves by 12 games. Part of it was the natural improvement of Jackson, Drummond and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, of course. I suppose credit is due there to Van Gundy the coach and not Van Gundy the executive. The fact that Stanley Johnson hasn’t been a gem off the bat probably hurts them in this race, too.

The accolades aren’t going to come rolling in now, but the Pistons’ improvement is obvious. The future is bright and there’s reason to believe this group can grow together. There’s reason to believe the front office knows what it’s doing.

Considering the past six seasons, that’s an award in itself, right?