Detroit Pistons: 5 best off-season moves

4. Hello, my name is Luka, I am a 7-footer

(Suzanne Vega fans will understand title)

College basketball writers were pretty much unanimous. The best player this season was not Oklahoma State’s Cade Cunningham or Gonzaga’s Jalen Suggs or even Davion Mitchell of NCAA champion Baylor.

Luka Garza was better than all of them. He swept pretty much every national College Basketball Player of the Year award, wrapping up a great career at Iowa.

NBA personnel scouts were also pretty much unanimous in their opinion: He can’t play in this league. He was simply too slow and his outside shot was not consistent enough.

Despite being the consensus top college basketball player in the country, Garza was still on the board when the Pistons, at No. 52 overall, decided to select him.

To show the critics they were wrong, Garza, with the help of father Frank, lost 30 pounds to make himself quicker, and diligently worked on his outside shot.

Garza’s journey has been well-chronicled so we will not go into great detail, but he kicked major butt at the NBA Summer League. With most of the first round picks in the draft playing, plus guys with a year or two of NBA experience, Garza stood out, averaging 15.1 points, and was named second team All-Summer League.

At the end of the summer league, Garza signed a two-way contract with the Pistons. That means he has guaranteed money to play for the Motor City Cruise, and can also be with the Pistons for a certain amount of days.

"“It’s exciting,” Garza said to NBA.com, of landing the two-way deal. “I’m really excited to be in Detroit. That’s where I wanted to be. I’m glad they drafted me and I’m glad I earned myself a spot at the table. I’m excited to work and get better and help this team in any way I can.”"

To get a second-team all-summer league selection at No. 52 (only eight spots from going undrafted) and have him on a two-way, so he does not take up a spot on a crowded Pistons roster, looks smart now.

Good move Troy!

3. Kelly Olynyk at good price

When it was announced at the start of the free agent period the Pistons had signed veteran forward-center Kelly Olynyk to a three-year, $37 million contract, it seemed to many Detroit fans like a big overpay.

Detroit had just gotten rid of last year’s starting center, Mason Plumlee, is a draft day salary dump trade with Charlotte. Plumlee had done a solid job in the middle for the Pistons last year, and only cost $8 million a year. Olynyk has averaged just 10.1 points a game in his career, and would cost over $4 million a year more than Plumlee.

For a team strapped for salary cap space, it seemed an odd signing.

It was obviously a move made for fit. The Pistons wanted to open up the middle for Cade Cunningham and Jerami Grant to work. Plumlee was strictly a low-post scorer, while Olynyk has a nice three-point shot.

Also, Olynyk can swing to power forward, opening more minutes for second team NBA All-Rookie selection Isaiah Stewart to play center.

As the free agent period went a long, Olynyk’s contract looked better and better. Role players (Doug McDermott, $42 million over three years to Spurs!) who had been much deeper in team’s rotation, were getting more money than Olynyk, who had played well for Houston as a starter at the end of last season.

It seemed like NBA teams were in a frenzy to use up their cap space as fast as possible (as Hamidou Diallo would discover).

When it was revealed that Olynyk’s contract was only fully guaranteed for two years, the third year Detroit can get out of it by paying just $3.4 million, the deal looks even better in comparison.

For targeting who they wanted, and getting them signed, sealed deliver before the NBA world went mad, makes the Olynyk signing look more like a steal.

Good move Troy!