At the end of his first season as GM of the Pistons, Troy Weaver spoke firmly about the future. Not the distant future that sparkles with playoff runs and parades. The immediate future. Weaver spoke firmly about this season, because he was so eager to leave last season behind. The Pistons played hard, but finished with a record of 20-52.
"20 wins," said Weaver, "don't sit well with me at all. I don’t like anything about it. I don’t like the way it looks, I don’t like the way it smells. The only way to improve that is, I gotta come back better."
"20 wins," said Weaver, "is not happening again."
20 games into this season, Weaver is right. For all the wrong reasons. The 4-16 Pistons aren't on pace for 20 wins. They're on pace for about 16 -- in a season that's 10 games longer than last year's. The Pistons have added first overall pick Cade Cunningham and regressed everywhere else.
20 games into last season, the Pistons were 5-15. But those Pistons were supposed to be bad. They were supposed to finish exactly where they did. And those Pistons were competitive. They routinely pushed the top teams in the league to the limit. In their first 20 games, they lost once by at least 20 points. They inspired hope in spite of their record.
These Pistons were supposed to be better. They were supposed to climb the Eastern Conference ladder and maybe even sniff the play-in tournament. We can sniff another No. 1 pick instead. Worse, these Pistons go down easy. In their first 20 games, they've lost five times by at least 20 points. They've inspired angst.
It's true, the schedule has been tough. The Pistons played eight of their first nine against the Bulls, 76ers, Nets, Hawks and Bucks. They've played their last six against the Lakers, Clippers, Bucks, Heat and Warriors. 14 games against playoff-bound teams. Thing is, they've lost all 14. And only a handful have been close. By this time last year, Detroit had five wins over playoff-bound teams.
Based on the moves he made in the offseason, Weaver expected the Pistons to be better in two areas this season: defense and shooting. They're worse. Detroit is down from 10th to 21st in scoring defense, and down from 22nd to 30th in three-point shooting. It ranks last in the league from the field and from beyond the arc. For a team and a coach that wants to win with defense and threes, not ideal.
At what point does Dwane Casey come under Weaver's microscope? He earned an extension through 2024 at the end of last season after Weaver praised him for being 'A+' in these categories: "Does he get the group to play together, do they have competitive spirit and have they grown?" In the latter category, which defines the Pistons' future, what's Casey's grade now?
It's not all on the coach. The club has certainly been compromised by the loss of free agent acquisition Kelly Olynyk, sidelined by a knee injury. Then again, Detroit has the same record with Olynyk in the lineup as without. The shooting woes should eventually level out, but the struggles of Saddiq Bey are vexing. He's shooting 29 percent from three after shooting 38 percent as a first-team All-Rookie. And every night Cunningham goes 2-9 from beyond the arc, it gets harder to believe he shot 40 percent in college.
OK, patience. The Pistons remain one of the youngest teams in the NBA. With a healthy Killian Hayes, four of their five starters are under the age of 23. Cunningham has the look of a closer. Bey has shown signs of elevating his game. Isaiah Stewart personifies Pistons basketball, as the world found out last week. Hayes is at least one player shooting better from three. (It's just a problem that he leads the team at 37 percent.) As for 27-year-old Jerami Grant, he'd be a perfectly good No. 2 scorer if he didn't have to play like a No. 1.
The Pistons finish a five-game road trip this week with visits to Portland and Phoenix. After that, the schedule lightens up a bit. We're not even a quarter of the way through the season. There's plenty of time for this team to live up to the word of its GM -- and to the modest expectations of its fanbase. No one was asking the Pistons to vault into contention this season. No one was even crying for them to make the playoffs. We just wanted to see growth within the core that would yield progress in the standings. We've seen inertia instead.
If Weaver was serious about the standard he set, the Pistons might be the rare bottom-feeder looking to buy on the trade market. They could badly use a reliable shooter; Wayne Ellington is sorely missed. They could also use someone other than Hayes or Cory Joseph to play next to Cunningham in the backcourt. His development this season has to be priority No. 1 for Detroit. These needs wouldn't be so glaring with more growth internally, but guys like Josh Jackson, Frank Jackson and Hamidou Diallo have stalled as well.
Patience bears repeating. There's a lot to like about the Pistons' future, headlined by a rising star in Cunningham. It was just a couple months ago that opposing GM's named Detroit's core 'one of the most promising' in the NBA. 20 games doesn't erase that. But 20 wins? Or fewer? That would erase it, and raise questions about Weaver's vision. If that's not happening again, the Pistons better get moving.