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Perimeter Defense

The thorn in the Pistons side, perimeter defense. With Rose, Reggie Jackson, Kennard, Langston Galloway and Griffin, the team is going to have trouble defending the perimeter this year and that was apparent in all three preseason games. But not being able to defend the Cleveland Cavaliers raised major concerns.

It started early with Brown helping one pass away, at least half-step further than he should have been, allowing Collin Sexton to make a slightly contested three. Brown often oversteps, overhelps and overreacts. habits we’re going to see change as he gets more experience.

Rose falls behind early on this play and allows Sexton to get middle penetration. You want to go under that screen, show or force the ball handler to go baseline but you can do none of that when the two defenders are not on the same page.

Once again, the three-guard lineup with Rose, Kennard and Galloway displayed their lack of length contesting perimeter shots. I don’t think this is just a preseason thing. The Pistons will have trouble with this all season. Brown and Snell are the only ones that can help. I don’t want to see many lineups this year where neither are on the floor.

On that last play, Rose gave up middle penetration once again and everybody in the league, including the Cavs, can score in this scenario. We’ll see if Rose can fight over screens once the regular season comes but the signs don’t look great and they never have been with him.

Below, he acts as the weak-side man and he has the responsibility not to guard his man but to guard the space between the two spot-up threats. That way he can close out to whoever gets the pass and a teammate can rotate. Rose is just unaware of the situation and late to close out.

Rose just finds himself late on simple plays way too often and puts his big men in tough situations. Maybe he’ll get adjusted to the drop coverage but maybe he needs more help to cut off dribble penetration further away from the basket. It’s interesting to see a defensive coach like Dwane Casey solve that puzzle.

This is just the clearest example of the Pistons giving up middle penetration. This particular ball screen is happening on the side where defenses usually “ice”, which basically means they force the opponent to go baseline. Kennard should be on his opponent’s right hip but he starts way out of position, allowing Matthew Dellavedova to get to a spot where he can score.

And Rose just gets lost on this play, a staggered pick-and-roll, a play the Pistons will be using for him on offense as well. In that kind of action, the two defending guards are supposed to switch and Rose just doesn’t realize until it’s too late. Thompson rolls behind him and he gets a lob.

The Detroit Pistons have to clean up all these mistakes if they want to have a better than mediocre defense. And if they don’t the defense could be even worse than mediocre. Good communication and effort go a long way, so I’ll wait to see how the team’s defense progresses over the year.

Khyri Thomas

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I feel so bad for Khyri Thomas. He still has the potential to be a 3-and-D combo guard in this league but he’s buried behind the Pistons multitude of guards, four of which are pretty good ones. As long as Jackson and Rose, Kennard and Brown are healthy, it’s going to be hard for any other guard to get significant minutes.

Further down the rotation, it seems like Galloway has gotten the nod to be the fifth guard and Sviatoslav Mykhailiuk is right there behind him challenging him for minutes. Meanwhile, Thomas received a Did Not Play against the Cleveland Cavaliers in a preseason game.

Having said that, there are more games to be played and Thomas will probably be given the chance to show some of his improvement. Even though the situation looks bleak for him right now, we don’t know how the season will shake out and the Pistons would be dumb to give up on him just yet.

With the decision for the final roster spot still to be made, it’s not odd that Casey would want to see more of Johnson and Christian Wood, but Thomas getting a DNP has made fans aware of the fact that he might not make the final roster, a mistake in my mind.