We were a doormat for almost 20 before that.
Thing is in Basketball now with the massive playoff. Theres the bottom 8 teams that are Doormats.
The next 8 that are play in teams that have 0 shot at the title.
Then the top 12 that can actually fight their way to the conference champ.
Sure pistons from ~2008-2023 were that bottom rung. Last 2 years were that mid tier. We were all hoping Langdon would push the Pistons to that next top tier. He hasn’t. And a $40m contract would lock the Pistons in that mid tier for 4+ years.
I dont want to be mid. If theres no path for a championship. There is no future.
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I like that he’s taken the team from being butt cheeks, to good…but now it seems that being good, is good enough, which is not too baaad for some folks I reckon (hmmm, I’m beginning to see a pattern here with these DET sports teams). And forgive me if I think paying someone who has zero offensive game (short of being a lob merchant) and was Wendell Carter’s sock puppet in the playoffs $40 mill a year…especially after the kluster ■■■■ that was the Pistons off season 
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You know why the Pistons won in 2004. That made that trade that got them over the hump
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Same with the Wings back in the day when they couldnt get over the hump…and same with the Tigers their last two world series appearances…starting to see a pattern again…
And now the gms put silly putty to try and fix a water leak. Pistons and lions are close but dont make that one move. I honestly think the Pistons will have a small hiccup this year. Like probably 48- 52 wins.
Boy you sure have a thing for wanting to fire executives and coaches that lead big turnarounds…. 
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100%. It’s a gamble. Which we tried to repeat with Blake Griffin. You just don’t know. Trajan hasn’t swung for the fences yet. Not sure if that will end up being an asset or a critical error for him. Retrospect I guess will tell us.
What do you mean? Of course it matters what another player gets, markets get set all the time based on what other players make.
The likely reason why other offers didn’t come in is because the projected offer sheet was 4 years $177m because that’s what Duren was eligible for after his All NBA honor and what it would have taken to get him from the Pistons. If his RFA market was set at 4 years $130m like Kessler I bet multiple teams would have been in on that.
If you think Duren’s market is $30m/yr or under you’re way off base. I know everybody hates Duren now and think he’s trash after the playoff run, and nobody is more critical of his playoff performance than me, but this is still a 22 year old that averaged 19 and 10 and was an All Star and 3rd team All NBA. There’s no way on gods green earth that he’s getting $30m/yr or less long term, it’s just not realistic at all. $40m/yr is an overpay no doubt but his market is in that $35m/yr range and he’s going to get that from the Pistons or somebody else if he walks to free agency after this season and has another year like he did last year.
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Pistons were trying to make the playoffs with the Griffin trade and weren’t close to competing at all. It was a greedy trade made by JVG, so he can keep his job. Pistons right now are but I think as of now their 4th or 5th in the east. Plus Blake was having some back issues as well.
Every player and situation has blemishes. The question is if the GM feels the player will make a difference. Joe D made an assessment that paid off for example. He also rid himself of a championship caliber team.
I can’t argue with or against the idea of getting a basketball player to put you over the top or get you into contention. But it puts an enormous emphasis on player development to organically create a contending team all peaking at the same time.
Again, neither for nor against in this situation, just something Trajan will ultimately be judged by in the end. But the way in which he has rebuilt this team has been awesomely fast compared to the crap it was.
Yeah but the team Blake Griffin got added to was pretty average…and definitely wasn’t good.
It’s different when you add good players to good teams instead of bad/average teams.
Cade, JD and Thompson were all here before he got here. Did make a few good moves yes. But he didn’t take that next step
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Most of the role players who were vital in the regular season success and the turnaround were Langdon adds as well as the head coach who was hired by Langdon. Obviously the core guys improving played a big role but the real strength of the team last year in particular was the depth a lot of which was due to Langdon. Part of the issue with the previous regime was adding crappy vets/support players. Langdon has added much better support players even though he didn’t add a #2 option yet so he should plenty of credit for the turnaround.
With that said, the hardest step is going from good to great (something the Lions have struggled with a bit) so Langdon still has his work cut out for him to make the Pistons championship caliber. It remains to be seen if he’s capable of adding that final big piece.
But those are role players and people who wont be around for years. Pistons roster is different and tons of those role players are gone.
I don’t know what you mean. I’m talking about the players he added the last two off-seasons that were a part of the turnaround, I’m not talking about the future. I’m talking about credit deserved for helping to bring the team from 14 to 60 wins in two years.
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Well yes but a ton of the winning was because of cade and JD getting better. I dont think the pistons are better this year then last year. And I think the east got better as well. Hell cade was in mvp talk all year.
I do think the coaching staff had a lot to do with the improvement on the young guys.
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In a way yes but cade has gotten better and better every year. Jd was great in the regular season and was average in the playoffs.
The Pistons had one of the best benches in the league and in fact their bench had a better plus/minus than their starters. When Cade was out later in the season the Pistons barely missed a beat. That speaks to good coaching and great depth which was fueled by some of the guys Langdon brought in. Don’t get me wrong, Cade is great and is the leader of this but the team was much more than just Cade.
Going forward I have questions as well but I’m just talking about the past and how the Pistons got to this point which wasn’t only due to Cade and the core guys.
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