The Detroit Pistons are winless in their first three games and only scored at least 90 points in one of them, which is not the start fans were looking for.
In addition, number one pick Cade Cunningham has yet to play and Jerami Grant is already hurt, so this season couldn’t have started any worse.
It’s far too early to panic, as the Pistons will be a different team with Cunningham and no one was going to mistake this young team for a contender, but it’s hard not to be disappointed about the way things have started.
Some of the reactions I’ve seen on Twitter have been comical, but there are some big concerns. Here are three big overreactions after just the first three games of the season and why we need to relax a little about all of them.
Detroit Pistons: Killian Hayes is a bust!
Killian Hayes has yet to play even half an NBA season for his career and some fans are already ready to give up on him.
I’m not going to list the thousand players who started poorly and ended up being All-Stars, but the list is long.
Some have even suggested sending Hayes to the G-League for a stint, which would be a bad idea in my opinion.
Though Hayes has not been good yet, he did show some signs against Atlanta and had a few nice takes including a strong finish through contact.
Hayes has been the focus for some reason, but he hasn’t even been the worst point guard, veteran Cory Joseph wins that award. The entire team outside of Saddiq Bey has been awful, so let’s not get too hyper-focused on the 20-year-old.
Hayes is going to take his lumps early in the season and that’s ok. He needs to keep building confidence by playing through the bad games and getting his reps.
Come see me at All-Star break and we’ll evaluate Hayes then.
The Detroit Pistons’ shooting is worse than last season!
Ok, this one might not be an overreaction.
We debated all offseason whether the Detroit Pistons had done enough to improve their 3-point shooting, which was near the bottom of the league last season.
So far in this one they’ve been even worse, as the Pistons are shooting just 22 percent from behind the arc as a team. Ouch.
Pretty much everyone has been broke to start the season and it’s been awhile since I’ve seen a team look collectively this bad shooting from range.
One reason I am not too worried about this is that teams will go through cold streaks in a season. This one just happened at the beginning, when fans are living and dying with every game. If the Pistons had a stretch like this in the middle of the season people wouldn’t be panicking.
The other reason is that the Pistons are missing their best shooter and the guy who is going to get everyone else better shots.
If the Pistons are still shooting 22 percent a few games into Cade Cunningham‘s return, then I will be concerned, but for now I will just chalk it up to a young team trying to figure things out without their best playmaker.
Detroit Pistons: Dwane Casey’s offense is terrible!
The goal of basketball is to score points and so far the Detroit Pistons aren’t doing it.
Some have attributed this to Dwane Casey’s offense, which has looked stagnant and is simply not producing enough points. The Pistons failed to even score 90 in their first two games and barely cracked 100 points against Atlanta.
I’ll defer back to the “we’ll be better with Cade Cunningham” mantra, but also point out that Dwane Casey is not the one putting up all of these bricks.
Casey’s offense revolves around ball movement and getting open 3-point shots, and it doesn’t matter how effective it is if guys can’t hit those shots.
So far the ball movement has been lackluster and there has been a lot of standing around, so Casey needs to do something to inject more life into his team on that end. A shake-up at the guard spot already paid some dividends against Atlanta and hopefully Josh Jackson earned himself another start.
Casey’s offense has not been dynamic, but if guys are missing shots like this it doesn’t matter. Hopefully he will get some more player and ball movement going in the half court and that having his best playmaker back will help.
I am not ready to start piling on Casey yet, but the offense has been brutal. Casey needs to find a way to get his team better shots but it is ultimately on the players to make them.