https://youtu.be/zpQzHvHfo2s
Tough luck for Pistons fans this season. This was finally going to be the year where the franchise threw up their hands, said “screw it”, and tanked. And that’s what they did. Some signings were made that may have made it look like tanking wasn’t happening, but those were just smokescreens. Forget trying to get the 8th seed over and over again only to get smushed in the first round of the playoffs. The league may have messed with the draft lottery odds to make the entire concept less appealing, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t want to still give your team the best shot at the top pick.
But there are two problems. Problem numero one: a bunch of teams who weren’t even supposed to be really bad this year ended up really bad. Like, everyone knew the Cavaliers were going to suck, but who could have predicted what happened in Houston? Totally unfair to fans of teams who are tanking the RIGHT WAY, not the WRONG WAY, which is trading your disgruntled superstar and losing nearly 20 games in a row because of it. Or the Timberwolves. I mean, it’s the Timberwolves, and they regularly plumb the depths of suckage that other teams can hardly fathom, but still. Shouldn’t they be at least reasonable at winning games? I thought reuniting KAT and Rubio would be better than this.
So that’s the first problem. Too many other crappy teams who didn’t earn their crappiness like the Pistons did. Problem numero two: the Pistons accidentally ended up with too many good players. I’m using “good” rather loosely in this instance, but looking at their roster, that’s a really reasonable collection of dudes. Some vets (Plumlee, Ellington) who you look at them and say, “yeah, that dude is a good role-player”. Some nice reclamation projects (Smith Jr., Jackson, I was going to put Okafor here but nah). A role-player who magically turned into a scoring stud (Grant). Young players. Good young players. Good young players like Saddiq Bey.
Basically, I’m blaming the fact that the Pistons aren’t the worst team in the league on Saddiq Bey. That’s all there is to it. If he wasn’t on the team, I don’t think they would’ve won a game, and it wouldn’t matter that the Cavaliers are in a constant state of implosion or the Magic are doing what they do every year but 100 times worse. When’s the trade deadline again? Bucks offer Thon Maker for him. Maker for Bey. Straight up. Pistons fans should like the sound of that.