Pistons entering year number 16 of their rebuild

[bison]

When Isaiah Stewart signed to extend his rookie contract this week, I had read this is the first time the Pistons extended one of their rookie's contracts since Maxiell in 2008. So for 15 years, not a single guy they drafted has ever been worth keeping or building around (aside from Middleton and Bruce Brown who they traded for scraps.) And their current crop of young guys don't look promising either.

How the hell is a team so atrocious at drafting? Bad luck or bad scouting?

[Dbrog]

I actually thought the team last year was going to do better than they did (maybe around 30 or 40 wins). It didn't help that Cade was injured for nearly the full year. Ivey seems like he will figure it out this year or next and they do have a bunch of versatile guys (which continues drafting Thompson this year). They are just extremely green. Wiseman actually came in a played somewhat decent for them. Duren is probably the starter in their front though as he's a much better rebounder and higher ceiling at this point.

Anyway, point being, I can see a world in which a starting core of Ivey, Cade, Thompson, Stewart, and Duren become actually quite good collectively. You have some decent shooting and nice athleticism with that lineup and some dudes that can really create plays, but also do the dirty work. I guess we will have to wait and see since they are all like...21 or less

[dd24]

I'd say they have a ton of young talent. Cunningham, Duren, Ivey, Thompson, Wiseman. And it's not like Stew, Bagley, Livers, etc are old. Killian still could be something if he can develop a shot. He's very young yet. And the build has taken this long because of how poorly SVG ran the team. He completely ran them into the ground. He traded away a ton of assets, brought in a Blake Griffin contract that nobody in the NBA wanted and left the team with no cap space. All to not be good. So while other teams were building through the draft, staying flexible with the cap, and trying to accumulate assets, SVG did the exact opposite. He set the team back years. I think we'll see improvement this year. Just having Cade healthy finally and adding the shooting and defense that they have will get them somewhere between 25-30 wins. They'll likely be in the lottery again, but probably not at the top this time. Then I can see them making a trade or move next season that will make it so they can start competing for a playoff spot. We will still have assets and flexibility at this point. And the young guys will continue to improve. Gotta remember that just in our division alone there's Milwaukee and Cleveland. Indiana is about in the same spot we are. They are up and coming with quite a bit of young talent. Chicago has a couple very good players but who knows what they are doing. So for the next few years it's the Bucs and Cavaliers fighting for the top spot and then the other three duking it out. But Milwaukee needs to do something to remain relevant. Who knows if Giannis stays. Cleveland was already talking about trading Mitchell. The new cap requirements are gonna be hard on those teams so it's only a matter of time at this point.