The NBA season is right around the corner and the Detroit Pistons 2013 NBA Championship Odds are currently at 275-1 ($100 bet pays $27700). They are 130-1 to win the Eastern Conference and their over/under season win total projection is 31,5. Below is the overall season preview by Pregame Pro André Gomes.
2011-12 Regular Season Numbers:
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Advanced Numbers
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|
4 Factors
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|
Overall
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#'s
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Rank
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Offense
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#'s
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Rank
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Defense
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#'s
|
Rank
|
|
Pace
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88.05
|
27
|
|
eFG% Off
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47.0%
|
28
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eFG% Def
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50.2%
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24
|
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Offense
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102.04
|
28
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TO% Off
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14.94
|
28
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TO% Def
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14.13
|
11
|
|
Defense
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108.43
|
24
|
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Reb% Off
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28.20
|
9
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Reb% Def
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26.85
|
17
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Rebound
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50.68
|
9
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FT% Off
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21.37
|
11
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FT% Def
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22.75
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24
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Lawrence Frank was the Coach chosen by Joe Dummars to end the disaster the Pistons have been in the last few seasons, disaster that was caused by Dummars’ recent poor choice of players and coaches. Therefore, Frank had the freedom to put the team playing at the style he wanted.
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Day 2/2/2012
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W
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L
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PACE
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Off. H
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Off. A
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Reb%
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|
Before
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4
|
20
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86.4
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98.1
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113.1
|
50.8
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After
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21
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21
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89.0
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104.3
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105.8
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50.6
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His career in Detroit couldn’t have started worse for Frank, as the Pistons had just four wins at the start of February after twenty four games played. Only Charlotte was worse than them. If it wasn’t for the fact that Frank was a new Coach in the organization and he would have probably been fired after such a poor start of the season.
Curiously, after this bad start, the Pistons managed to finish the season with a respectable 0.500 record with 21 wins and 21 losses.
Detroit Pistons month-by-month record:
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Months
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W
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L
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PACE
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Off. H
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Off. A
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Reb%
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|
January
|
4
|
19
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86.6
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97.4
|
112.6
|
51.3
|
|
February
|
8
|
6
|
89.9
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105.2
|
105.8
|
52.3
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|
March
|
7
|
8
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87.2
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102.9
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106.0
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49.2
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|
April
|
6
|
8
|
89.5
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105.5
|
106.8
|
49.6
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Obviously, we can’t just mention only one motive for the Pistons to suddenly start being competitive. The team had a more efficient offense while defensively, Detroit stopped being one of the worst teams in the league.
But probably the main reason was the fact that Frank started using Rodney Stuckey and Brandon Knight together in the starting backcourt. Knight had some problems in leading the team’s offense at the start of the season, something normal for a rookie, but Stuckey’s presence – even though at the SG position – helped Knight in not having such amount of pressure in having the ball on his hands. Also Jason Maxiell started having more minutes and he ended up being the team’s starting PF at the end of the season.
Detroit’s hope is that Frank is able to develop the Pistons that had an interesting second half of the past season, while using conveniently the high pick they got in the draft.
Offseason moves 2012-13:
Detroit had the 9th pick in the draft, in a class full of talent, and they ended up choosing Center Andre Drummond. The team believes in the incredible physical potential that Drummond possesses even though at the same time, Drummond is still raw offensively and there are some doubts about his mentality. Anyway, these problems didn’t seem to be important enough for the Pistons and they eventually chose him with the 9th pick.
Detroit got rid of Ben Gordon’s contract, even though they had to sacrifice a future first round pick to send him to Charlotte. They got the expiring contract of Corey Maggette from that deal.
Besides these two transactions, the Pistons didn’t do much more to improve their roster, something that makes me believe that the organization thinks that the work made in the second half of the past seasons gives enough guarantees that they can be competitive on this new season.
Can Monroe become the Pistons “franchise player”?
After a pleasant season on his rookie year, Monroe gave sequence to that with another good season last year.
He played in every game of the past regular season, while being a starter in all of them. In comparison with his rookie season, Monroe practically improved all his stats: minutes, points, FT/A’s, rebounds, assists, blocks and even steals!
He was without a doubt the best player of Detroit last season, but unexpectedly, he wasn’t the player who shot the most to the basket:
Field Goal attempts per game:
Tayshaun Prince 12.7
Greg Monroe 11.8
Brandon Knight 11.7
Rodney Stuckey 10.9
Ben Gordon 10.2
Exactly! Tayshaun Price was the player from Detroit who attempted more field goals last season! That wouldn’t be problematic for the team if Price didn’t just shoot 42.1% FG, while having just 1.8 FTA/game – his worst mark over the last 9 seasons!
This just can’t happen once again this season and Lawrence Frank knows that. Monroe will now have a rookie with tremendous potential in Andre Drummond to play alongside him and he will have to be the player who leads the team in attempted shots this season.
Do Stuckey e Knight form a good backcourt duo?
Brandon Knight didn’t have an easy season last year, alongside the other rookies who debuted in the league on a very exigent schedule. He was never seen as a guard with good offensive skills and after the All Star break, Knight shot just 38.4% FG. However, Knight raised his number of assists per game after the league’s break and it will be up to Lawrence Frank to develop him, as Knight is a guard with good defensive instincts, while being a good playmaker (like for example Jason Kidd). However, he will never be a scorer.
For this task of being a scorer, Stuckey is the indicated player in the roster and the fact that he is now the team’s starting SG will only benefit him. A couple of years ago, Stuckey was quickly appointed as Chauncey Billups’ successor in such a way that Joe Dummars didn’t have problems in trading him to Denver, while promoting Stuckey to the job of being the team’s starting PG. Now looking back to this decision, this wasn’t a good idea and the Pistons’ records over the last few seasons easily prove that.
Last season, Stuckey kept improving throughout the whole season and with that, the Pistons also become more competitive as the season went by. During the month of March, on a total of ten games, Stuckey shot 48.9% FG, 41.4% 3pts and almost 85% FT! These are the numbers of an All Star player and Stuckey managed to achieve that in a month (in fact, he had already been very impressive in February).
The Pistons decided to get rid of Gordon for financial issues, but also to give more importance on the team to Stuckey and Knight. They were able to show last season that they can play very well together on the backcourt for a short period of time, with the million dollar question being to know if they can do the same thing for a full season.
Final Thoughts
Tayshaun Prince remains in the team and he is the last player from the excellent era the Pistons had in the previous decade. Detroit has a very young roster and it will be up to Prince to lead his teammates, without having to be the player with the highest shot volume in the team.
If Drummond is able to reasonably adapt to the NBA, then Detroit will have a good frontcourt in the following seasons. The organization isn’t expecting a lot from this season and the Pistons are probably one good player away from being competitive and this player might come to the team in the following draft, so I don’t expect to see Detroit will a lot of sense of urgency during this season.
Brandon Knight, Rodney Stuckey (who is only 26 years old), Jonas Jerebko, Greg Monroe and Andre Drummond are the future of this team and Frank will have the goal of keep developing them throughout this season.
Follow Andre Gomes on Twitter @GomesCapper
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