The Detroit Pistons were embarrassed at home last night by the Milwaukee Bucks in a game that was all but over before it was five minutes old.
I have to admit, it takes some kind of effort to go down by 25 points in the first quarter, but the Pistons managed to pull it off, spearheaded by a defense that may as well not have come out of the locker room.
It’s been six years of futility against the Bucks, so it’s not like anyone expected the Pistons to win this game, but the Washington Generals have put up more fight against the Harlem Globetrotters than what we saw last night and the game was emblematic of the season in many ways.
The Pistons have lost by an average of 17 points in this four-game losing streak, but this one just felt different. Pistons’ Twitter was a mess of finger pointing afterwards and just about everyone has a stake in how bad this has gotten.
So who is to blame for this mess? The best question is, who isn’t?
Detroit Pistons: Who is to blame for this brutal season?
Youth and Injuries
Yep, we’ve heard all about these. The Pistons are the 9th-youngest team in the NBA and every one of the younger teams but one is ahead of them in the standings. They also lost Cade Cunningham for the season, which obviously hurt their chances and development.
None of those things have anything to do with effort, so fans are getting sick of this as a fallback excuse. Like I said, no one expects them to win every game, and fans aren’t even bothered by the losses, but giving up 49 points in the first quarter (and at least 32 in the other three) cannot be entirely blamed on youth and injuries.
The Magic are younger and have missed more time to injuries and they are seven games ahead of the Detroit Pistons, so I think we’ve all heard about enough of this one.