Trajan Langdon knows what Pistons need. How much will he pay to add it?

Trajan Langdon knows what the Pistons need, and what it might cost. Question is, will he be willing to pay it?

Langdon wants to add ball-handling, shooting and spacing around the Pistons' young core. He sees how far they just went in the playoffs, and how much further they have to go. He watches the best teams, those that are still playing, and notes their wealth of offensive operators, "whether it’s initiating and bringing the ball up or actually executing in the half-court in terms of getting paint touches and making decisions."

"The more guys like that you have, the more difficult it is to guard," Langdon said Tuesday after the Pistons' season ended a win shy of the Eastern Conference Finals. "And just spreading the floor and shooting. I think everybody knew that was something that we might struggle with a little bit, so addressing some of those things could help. But again, those things are hard to find. And they’re expensive sometimes, and sometimes other teams don’t want to part ways with them."

The Pistons' deficiencies were clear for most of the season, and glaring by the end of their second-round loss to the Cavaliers. They lack shot-creators outside Cade Cunningham and shot-makers around him. Cunningham and the Pistons' defense could only carry them so far, especially once the tired legs of Tobias Harris gave out. Langdon vowed "a deep-dive into what made us successful and why we feel we came up a little bit short."

"And we won’t look at us as a 1 seed," he said. "We’ll look at us as, how do we get better?"

Langdon is confident the Pistons will continue improving from within. He answered the first question he faced Tuesday by pointing out that the Pistons were one of the youngest No. 1 seeds in NBA history and that they won half as many games (7) in the playoffs as they did just two years ago in the entire regular season. That is real, tangible growth.

But that alone won't be enough. There isn't a player on the Pistons' roster who looks capable of becoming the No. 2 scorer they need, unlike a year ago when there was optimism in Jaden Ivey. Jalen Duren was exposed in the playoffs. Their days of picking in the lottery are behind them. To find that player, they will have to pursue him.

They will have to import him, likely via trade.

Is it Trey Murphy III of the Pelicans, a 6'8 wing who can shoot the three, guard multiple positions and averaged more than 20 a game the last two seasons? Is it Lauri Markkanen of the Jazz, a 7-footer who can stretch the floor and scored a career-high 26.7 points per game this season but has had trouble staying healthy? Is it Kyrie Irving or Jaylen Brown, two established stars who could be on the move, with the ball-handling, shot-making and championship pedigree to take some serious weight off Cunningham's shoulders?

Is it someone else entirely? Kawhi Leonard? Michael Porter Jr? Sitting at the same table a year ago, in the same end-of-season setting, Langdon signaled the Pistons would take a conservative approach to the summer. He all but ruled out making any "super aggressive" moves coming off a first-round loss to the Knicks, then followed through on his plan to "add around the margins." He sounded a little more flexible this time around.

Asked if the Pistons' 60-win season accelerates the timeline for an all-in type of move, Langdon said, "We’re going to evaluate that. We’re going to evaluate everything. We’re going to figure out what we feel is the right move for us at this time."

"It’s a lot of options, but there’s a lot of factors that go into making that move," he said. "Is it the (right) player? Is it the time? What's the salary coming back? How many assets do we have to give to get said player or players? There’s a lot of things that come into the decisions that we’re going to need to make to get better."

At the same time, Langdon is doing a delicate dance. He says the Pistons intend to re-sign Duren and possibly extend Ausar Thompson this summer, but one of them would almost have to be included in any trade package for a star. He says they want to continue building gradually -- without skipping steps -- but the step that comes next might have to be bigger. Their "best path," he says, must make sense "not only for next year but also moving forward."

"This isn’t a one-year thing," Langdon said. "The thing that I’ve always said is, sustainability in terms of being competitive. We have to keep that in mind as well and not just say, ‘OK, we’re going to just do this next year just because of what happened.’ No, it also impacts our future planning, so we’re going to be very mindful of that."

The East should be even stronger next season as stars like Jayson Tatum and Tyrese Haliburton return to full health, and the Pistons barely made it out of the first round as it was. (Indeed, an injury to Magic star Franz Wagner probably punched Detroit's ticket to round two.) This is to say nothing of the two giants to slay in the West. The Pistons should be stronger themselves, but strong enough to stay the course?

Can they be a championship-caliber team without a major addition?

"Man," Langdon sighed, "I wish I was clairvoyant."

He thought about it some more and said, "I think so, yeah."

The degree to which he believes that is one question. What he's willing to pay, if he believes otherwise, is the other.

"That’s the goal, to be a championship contender," said Langdon. "That’s what we’re always thinking. We didn’t think it would come this fast, these questions about being a championship contender, so we have to factor that into the equation as well. When I took this job, nobody in here thought I would be getting championship contender questions two years later, but here we are."

Where they're headed remains to be seen.