Detroit Pistons: Should Luke Kennard come off the bench?

Detroit Pistons guard Luke Kennard made a splash with his postseason play. Has he played himself into a starting role or is he better off the bench?

A pretty topical discussion around the Detroit Pistons 2019-20 season is what role Luke Kennard should have. Pistons Twitter has hotly debated this topic, playing around with lineups and seeing what could fit.

Kennard had a solid sophomore season. The shooting guard put up 9.7 points per game on shooting splits of .43/.39/.83 in 22.8 minutes per game. More exciting for Pistons fans would be his performance in the postseason, though a very small sample size, which saw Kennard score 15 points per game on splits of .48/.60/.83.

Has Kennard played his way into the starting lineup? At the risk of going against the grain from the fanbase, given the above polling numbers, I say no. However, I think the question needs to be rewritten. Kennard could very well start, but is that where he’d be best? No.

With an offense that contains the Pistons big three of Reggie Jackson, Blake Griffin, and Andre Drummond, a trio that averaged 44 shots-per-game out of the team’s 88 field goal attempts per game, there’s already not a lot of room to grow starting alongside those players.

Asking to play as the fourth option behind the three aforementioned players would negatively stunt his progress as a player and also handicap the team. Coming off the bench, though, and being the first-option would open up his game. (Probably more like 1A and 1B with Derrick Rose also coming off the bench. Rose made some sixth-man noise as he averaged 18 points per game off the bench for the Minnesota Timberwolves last season.)

If I’m being frank, aside from Griffin, Kennard should be the only other player on the roster with a green light to shoot at will from anywhere (within reason, obviously the team doesn’t need him launching 60-footers at will). And his value will be stronger coming off the bench.

Bruce Brown is the better defender and should start over Kennard for that reason. Brown isn’t expected to shoot much at all, averaging only 4.2 shots per game last season. Swapping Brown for Kennard in the starting five would likely relegate Kennard to a similar role because there would be too many mouths to feed. Kennard would either forfeit shots or take away shots from the trio, and I don’t see the latter happening.

In an ideal world, and I hate exaggerated comparisons like this so let me just be hypocritical, Kennard would have and also flourish in a similar role as Lou Williams with the Los Angeles Clippers. Comparing Kennard to Williams, a three-time and reigning Sixth Man of the Year is obviously the asinine part as Williams has established himself as one of the best bench players of all time. But the comparison is being made more on game flow than actual statistical output.

Last season, Williams played 26.6 minutes per game and averaged 20 points per game on 15 field goal attempts per game. Williams also has much more freedom on offense to do what he pleases.

I’m not saying that Kennard is going to be Williams. He has not really shown much to make that comparison accurate. However, the reason I bring up Williams is that Kennard can have a very similar 48-minutes – the first player off the bench, play most of the second quarter, rest up some in the second half, and play crunch-time minutes in the fourth. Down the stretch, Kennard can provide better minutes than Brown.

Kennard can still play close to starter minutes, similar to Williams. And he certainly should see his shot attempts per game increase from 8.3 attempts of last season. If he took 12 shots a game, he could very well average mid-double figures on the season. And just to stir the pot more, Lou Will averaged 11.5 points per game on 9.4 shots per game off the bench in his third season.

Starting Kennard takes a strong shooter from the second unit and places him with a group that is going to eat up most of the shots. Yes, he’d benefit from more catch-and-shoot opportunities, especially with Griffin’s playmaking abilities, where he had an effective field goal percentage of 61 percent and 62.2 percent when he takes zero dribbles. Numbers that Brown won’t be able to replicate as a starter or a bench player in a similar role.

Dwane Casey has to play to his strengths. He has two players in Rose and Kennard that can average 30+ points off the bench combined, and some nights probably more. The Pistons bench unit scored 35.7 points-per-game which put them comfortably in the bottom half of the league, which included the second-worst shooting percentage by a team’s bench at 41.8 percent. Adding Brown to that bench and starting Kennard would seemingly make the offensive output on the second unit substantially worse, even with the Rose addition.

The moral of the story is, Luke Kennard coming off the bench gives not only himself but also the team the best chance at winning. He retains scoring on the second unit that was already lacking last season.