The Detroit Pistons learned a painful lesson in last night’s loss to the Portland Trail Blazers: You can’t coast in the NBA.
Detroit got out to a big lead in the first half and everything was going the Pistons’ way. They were flying around on defense, nabbing steals, getting out on the fast break and everything was peachy.
They were throwing down alley-oops and windmill dunks, puffing out their chests and getting a little too excited for a team that hasn’t won squat in four years.
The Pistons started loving themselves a bit too much, thought the game was over at halftime and neglected to show up in the second half. You can’t do that in the NBA, even against a bad team, as Portland kept battling, kept chipping away until they eventually pulled ahead in the 4th quarter.
By that time the Detroit Pistons didn’t have the gas to mount a final surge and lost a game they certainly should have won. Fans were rightfully angry (some people went a bit far in their criticism of Cade Cunningham) and there was plenty of blame to go around.
The Blame Game for the Detroit Pistons in loss to Trail Blazers
Let’s start with a couple of things that were out of the Detroit Pistons’ control last night:
Injuries
The Pistons were without Bojan Bogdanovic, Monte Morris and Isaiah Livers, but we knew that going in. Jalen Duren also sat out with a sprained ankle, and Alec Burks was a late scratch with a forearm injury. If Duren and Burks had played, the Pistons probably win this game, but hypotheticals don’t matter in the win column.
The refs
Do NBA refs hate the Detroit Pistons or what? I am not a ref blamer, as usually there are bad calls on both sides (including last night), but when one team shoots literally THREE TIMES as many free throws as the other, something isn’t right. The Blazers shot 33 free throws last night to the Pistons 11, gaining 17 points in the process. There is your ball game. Part of it was that Portland was more aggressive getting to the rim in the second half, but part was that they were getting whistles that the Pistons simply weren’t. Cade Cunningham got hammered on at least three plays I can think of with no calls (in the 2nd half alone) while Shaedon Sharpe was getting to the line every time someone breathed on him. Sharpe nearly had more free throws (10) than the Pistons’ entire team last night. By the end of the game, it looked like Cade had been in a fight.
That being said, Cunningham has to stop jawing at the refs. Twice last night he was arguing calls while the Trail Blazers were scoring on the other end. Cade can’t let blown calls affect his defense or poise, which it did last night.
Now let’s get to the things the Detroit Pistons can control, starting at the top.
The Blame Game for the Detroit Pistons in loss to Trail Blazers
Troy Weaver
Weaver punted $20 million of cap space into the expiring contract of Joe Harris instead of getting a player who can help them win games. “But Harris scored 11 points!” they exclaimed. Yes, but he was still bad. He’s a layup line on defense and overpassed several times last night which led to multiple turnovers. We know Harris can knock down wide-open 3-point shots, and he got a few last night that he hit, but if he isn’t WIDE open, he can’t get his shot off, which we saw multiple times last night when he was forced to pass from open looks where the defender closed out. I’m not trying to pile on Harris, who just had his best game of the season, but with injuries piling up, Weaver’s failure to get a rotation player with $20 million is rearing its ugly head.
As is the trade for James Wiseman. I hated it at the time and now it looks even worse, as Saddiq Bey could have at least given them rotation minutes last night. Even if the Pistons thought they needed to move Bey, give me the five second-round picks the Hawks offered rather than a player who is cannot be in an NBA rotation. In case you are wondering, Bey is shooting 42 percent from long-range this season while playing big minutes for Atlanta.
Monty Williams
Williams has been a huge part of the Pistons’ rejuvenation on defense this season but last night was not his greatest performance as a coach. I will cut him some slack considering his team was shorthanded last night, but they had chances to put the game away and he didn’t push the right buttons. He left Joe Harris and Killian Hayes in the game too long, failing to recognize that Marcus Sasser was his best shot until late in the game. He couldn’t draw up a play in the 4th quarter to get the Pistons a good shot, relying far too much on hero ball from Cade Cunningham. He didn’t play Jaden Ivey enough even though the Pistons were desperate for someone else to make a play on offense, even after Ivey had a decent first half on defense.
I also thought he let the game roll a few times when he should have called timeouts. I get what he was trying to do (see if they could battle through adversity), but with a tough schedule coming up, this wasn’t a game to be playing around with your food. Overall, Monty has been great, but he didn’t adjust well last night and Detroit gave away a game they needed to win.
Cade Cunningham
I’m not going to get on Cade too much, as he was spectacular for most of this game. He ran out of gas at the end, took some bad shots that he missed and committed some egregious turnovers. Your star player can’t average five turnovers a game, and he especially can’t be throwing the ball away late in a close game, as he did several times in the 4th quarter. Again, I’m not going to kill him too much, as no one else was doing anything and there was a tremendous load on his shoulders. His 30-point outing was offset by the inefficiency (27 shots) and turnovers, but you can’t expect one guy to carry an offense all night. So I’ll leave the Cade hot takes to others and just say that he obviously needs to take better care of the ball, but also obviously needs some help on offense.
The Blame Game for the Detroit Pistons in loss to Trail Blazers
Killian Hayes
I’ll have more on this later but last night might have been the nail in the coffin of Killian Hayes’ career with the Detroit Pistons. That was probably the worst game of his career and miles away from the guy we saw in preseason when it looked like he had figured some things out. It’s not just that Hayes couldn’t hit a shot (0-6 last night 27% shooting for the season) but he was taking terrible ones, dribbling way too much on offense, selfishly not passing the ball and was actually terrible defensively. Yes, he had three steals, but he gambled on several more that he did not get which led directly to Trail Blazer baskets. His confidence again looks shot. On his one 3-point attempt, Killian was so wide open that it actually took two full seconds for a defender to even be on the TV screen. He bricked it. Hayes was so tentative on a fastbreak layup attempt that the other team caught up and he just dropped the ball. I am still cheering for the guy, but it’s just about time for this experiment to end, as Hayes is simply the worst offensive player in the NBA.
Marcus Sasser is already better than Hayes at everything offensively and is no slouch on defense himself. When Monte Morris gets back, it’s time to pull the plug on Hayes.
James Wiseman
Wow. Just wow.
While Killian Hayes might have played the worst game of his career, James Wiseman might have played the worst game I’ve watched in the last five years. He only played six minutes, but managed to be -15 in that time, with four fouls, a turnover and some of the worst post defense you will ever see. Can all of the teenagers in my mentions crying about Wiseman not playing please go away? He’s miles worse than any of the Pistons’ bigs and it showed last night, as he was basically unplayable even in short minutes. I’m ready for this experiment to be over and for people to admit that trading for Wiseman now ranks as Troy Weaver’s worst move.
The good thing about being young is that the Pistons should have short memories, and they will need to, as they hit the road to play a tough Pelicans team tonight and will get eviscerated if we see a repeat of that second half.