The Detroit Pistons and Indiana Pacers were both tanking away last night, but the Pistons had just a little too much talent to lose, and that’s a good thing.
Both teams ran out shorthanded lineups that were missing key players, as lottery odds were potentially at stake (though OKC helped the Pistons by beating the Suns so it didn’t matter!) and Detroit’s role players and bench guys were just a little bit better.
Even though the game didn’t ultimately hurt their lottery odds, some fans are livid that the Pistons are winning “meaningless” games when they could potentially submarine their lottery odds.
If the Pistons were to pass OKC, their odds would only change by around four percent total, though it could mean dropping all the way to 8th instead of 7th overall.
I wrote earlier this season that it would be impossible for the Pistons to tank and even with them “resting” Cade Cunningham and putting Jerami Grant on the bench for the season, that has proven to be true.
The Pistons are proving to be tank-proof this season and that is a good thing.
The Detroit Pistons have multiple guys that can win a game
I’m not really sure what the tank crowd wants the Detroit Pistons to do, as they put out a rotation that had a guy on a 10-day contract and a player that they literally signed two hours before the game.
Aside from throwing a few fans in there, I am not sure what else the Pistons could have done to lose this one.
Sit Saddiq Bey you say? Well, he only played 23 minutes but managed to score 31 points. Bey isn’t going to sit when he is one of only a handful of players to start every game for his team this season. That matters to Bey and is something the Detroit Pistons should celebrate, not sabotage.
And guess what? Saddiq Bey is pretty good! Having a 3rd option who can drop 31 and win you a game is a good thing!
The Pistons aren’t going to sit Bey (they’d have to chain him to the wall) and if he is in there, they have a chance to win, especially against a garbage team like the Pacers.
Bey is getting better, becoming a legit scoring option and has shown he can be that leading scorer if the Pistons are missing guys, which in the end, are huge positives.