In many ways, rookie Ron Holland II has been one of the pleasant surprises of the young season for the Detroit Pistons.
I love watching the kid play, as he gets after it defensively and doesn’t lack for confidence, which you love to see.
Last night, he got swatted at the rim by Bam Adebayo early but went right back at him for a score a few plays later.
He’s been a willing passer and a plus rebounder for his position while playing the best perimeter defense (not saying much) for the Pistons in the young season.
But there has been a glaring problem that is symbolic of a larger roster issue the Detroit Pistons are eventually going to have to address.
Ron Holland’s 3-point numbers for the Detroit Pistons
No one expected Holland to come into the NBA and set the world on fire with his shooting. We all knew this part of his game was a work in progress and would take time.
If Ausar Thompson were healthy, Holland may not even be in the rotation, so I’d say anything we get from him offensively is just gravy at this point and he’s actually been better than I expected.
But he’s just 1-of-9 from 3-point range through the first four games and all of them have been wide open shots, and when I say wide open, I mean it, as there hasn’t been a defender anywhere near him on most of his attempts.
Again, no one expected Holland to immediately hit 3-pointers, and his shot doesn’t look bad to be fair to him. He has a decent stroke and most of his shots looked like they were going in, but they didn’t.
This poses a problem for the Pistons, as his bench mate Isaiah Stewart has also provided next to nothing offensively and is not someone the other team really has to defend.
When the two of them are on the floor together, it’s an issue, as teams are more than happy to back off, clog the lane and let the two of them fire away. It allows opponents to double team Cade Cunningham or Jaden Ivey with impunity (saw that last night), which is a problem.
This issue will be exasperated when Ausar Thompson returns, as he can’t shoot either, so it’s going to be hard to play him and Holland together though the defensive possibilities are exciting.
This isn’t on Holland, but if he’s not going to hit open shots, the Pistons have rotational challenges in front of them. This is one of the main problems they’ve been facing during this horrific run the last five years, which is that they have too many one-dimensional players who can’t share the floor effectively.