5 biggest takeaways from the Detroit Pistons’ 2021-22 season
The Detroit Pistons’ 2021-22 season was a success or a failure depending on who you ask.
While they only won 23 games, they did it while getting plenty of player development for guys like Cade Cunningham, Saddiq Bey and Isaiah Stewart, and while showing a lot of promise for the future.
They played much better post All-Star break, only got blown out once in that time (not including the final three games when they were egregiously tanking) and showed that they could hang with good teams even though they had a very young group. The Pistons won more games in that span than both the Lakers and Bulls, two teams with title aspirations coming into the season.
There is plenty to be excited about, though the Pistons still have a lot of work to do to become consistently good. They need to hit another home run in the draft and add the right mixture of free-agent talent (or make trades for it) without signing any bad deals that hamper the future.
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Hopefully, this will be the final season of the dreaded tank, as the Detroit Pistons have at least enough talent already to make incremental improvement next season and will hopefully be adding some more.
The restoration is not complete by any means, but there are positive signs it is coming. Here are the five biggest takeaways from the Detroit Pistons’ 2021-22 season.
Cade Cunningham is the guy for he Detroit Pistons
Sure you can quibble about his efficiency and turnovers, two areas where most rookies struggle, but all signs point towards stardom for Cade Cunningham.
He probably won’t win Rookie of the Year because for some reason this year team success seems to matter, but if you watched him in March it became clear he was the guy the Pistons will be building around.
Cunningham averaged over 20 points in March and is one of just a handful of players in NBA history to average at least 17 points, five rebounds and five assists in his rookie season (most of that list is in the Hall of Fame or headed for it).
He makes everyone around him better, and the Pistons were just 3-15 this season when he didn’t play, so this idea that he doesn’t affect winning is nonsense, he’s just on a team that isn’t very good.
A lead guard with size who can make plays and score is pretty much the ideal player for today’s NBA, and it became clear over the course of the season that the Detroit Pistons made the right choice.
They have their star, now they just need to develop him and add more talent around him.