Pistons news: That team, dead broke, playing games that lose jobs

After a couple of days of having someone to look down on, the Detroit Pistons are "that" team again, tied with the Washington Wizards for the worst record in the NBA.

Even though the Wiz are on a 14-game losing streak, the two teams both stand at 9-51 and both have plenty to be embarrassed about. The Wizards are in the first real year of their rebuild but have two players in their starting five making over $20 million. They realize their roster isn't complete, but there is no way they should be this bad, as they're not even that young.

The Pistons are in year four of a rebuild that is going about as well as trying to rebuild the Titanic with chewing gum and duct tape. They are worse than they were when they started, sitting at the bottom of the ocean and almost certain to have the worst record in franchise history.

They were dead broke against the Orlando Magic, losing to a team that they were supposed to be challenging in the standings for the 4th time this season and this one wasn't even close.

The Pistons shot a dreadful 38 percent overall and just 22 percent from long range, making 8-of-36 attempts. Meanwhile, the Magic shot just under 60 percent, roughly what they'd hit if the Pistons hadn't been in the gym at all.

The Magic shot and made more free throws (Monty Williams had the gall to complain about the refs, as if it mattered), outrebounded the Pistons 48-28 (must be the refs), had more fast break points (stupid refs) and outscored the Pistons by 28 points in the paint because the refs are against the Pistons. Cry me a river. The Pistons' incessent complaining about calls is as annoying as it is ineffective.

The Magic led by as many as 27 points, so the final score looked closer than it was and the final score was a blowout. This is the type of game that gets people fired, at least in competent organizations.

Will the Detroit Pistons fire anyone?

I wrote last week that jobs were the one thing the Detroit Pistons had left to play for this season, as any team goals have long been scrapped.

Not only are the players vying for future jobs and roles, but their coach and GM need the team to show some kind of life or could see the door at the end of the season.

No one expects the Pistons to win games anymore, but being competitive and not tuning out their coach would likely be enough for Monty Williams to keep his job and for Troy Weaver, the man who built this roster, to get another chance to overhaul it.

But getting thrashed like this, failing to score 100 points and looking completely overmatched and overwhelmed may get the attention of Tom Gores, if he's paying attention or bought the NBA League Pass to watch from his mansion in LA.

There has to be some evidence that this team is going in the right direction, and right now that is not happening. You can blame the adjustments being made by new teammates, the refs or anything else, but ultimately the blame has to fall on the players, coaches and architect of the roster.

Will anyone be held accountable?

It's hard to imagine any free agent wanting to come to this mess and any poor sap that gets traded to Detroit might consider retirement before trying to waterski behind the Titanic as it sinks into the abyss.

I've never cheered for the Detroit Pistons to lose, not even when they were tanking on purpose, but I'm almost to the point where I want more games like this just to force some kind of change, to get some kind of sign that they have standards that go beyond "showing up," which they didn't even meet last night.