4 Buy-low trade targets for the Pistons to monitor

Brandon Ingram 

We’ve been talking about this one forever, but those talks ramped up when Ingram’s former GM became team president of the Pistons. 

So far, Langdon has shown absolutely no interest in BI, either in extending him as the Pelicans’ GM, or trading for him as the Pistons’ team president, but that could all be gamesmanship. 

Why trade for Ingram now when the price is inevitably going to do down as the trade deadline approaches? You could even argue that waiting until he is a free agent is even smarter, as the Pistons then wouldn’t have to give up assets other than cap space to get him. 

But the Pelicans are likely to try and move BI before he hits free agency and if so, will get increasingly desperate as the trade deadline approaches. 

They aren’t going to give BI away, but the longer they have him, the less value he has on the trade market. If Langdon could get a “wink-wink” agreement with BI that he’d re-sign in Detroit for less than the max, then trading for him at the deadline may make some sense. 

If not, you just wait it out or move on, but Ingram is a very good player and there is a cost to acquire him that the Pistons would be stupid not to pay. Obviously, it goes the other way too, as he is not a number one guy, so they couldn’t give up too much in terms of trade assets or cap space to have him on the roster, but if the trade cost is reasonable and he’s willing to sign a 4-year extension for less than the max, it’s an option worth exploring.