“We are shifting priorities to aggressively develop our younger players while also expanding the roles of other players in the current rotation to improve performance and build for our future. As we expand certain roles, others will be reduced. In fairness to Josh, being a highly versatile 10-year veteran in this league, we feel it’s best to give him his freedom to move forward. We have full respect for Josh as a player and a person.” – Stan Van Gundy
And then Detroit unleashed absolute terror on the league.
Ever since trading away Josh Smith, Detroit has gone undefeated, winning more in the six games since the trade than they had in the 28 games that they had Josh Smith this year when they went 5-23. They best divisional foes Indiana and Cleveland. They knocked off the dregs of the East in Orlando and New York. Then they went west and dismantled Sacramento. All of these games were double digit wins. They saved their best work for tonight, when they knocked off the defending champion, San Antonio Spurs. This isn’t quite revenge for Game 7 of the 2005 NBA Finals, but it’s a quality win for a team that absolutely needed it.
Tonight, Detroit was down by 18 points against a Spurs team that will probably win 50 games this year. Andre Drummond had another monster game going for 20 points and 18 rebounds. Where they otherwise would have wilted down the stretch, the Pistons kept fighting until they were down by 1. The Spurs had possession of the ball with 8 seconds left, up by a point. The Spurs inbound the ball on their side of the court. All the Spurs have to do is make a successful pass and the game is pretty much over. Tim Duncan’s inbound pass is thrown a bit behind Patty Mills. The pass bounces off of Mills’s hands where Andre Drummond retrieves it. He passes it away to KCP. KCP gives it to Brandon Jennings who, with no Josh Smith at the 3 point line to pass it to, drives to the basket. Danny Green loses Jennings temporarily only to find him again as the game winning layup is headed towards the rim for 2 points. Pistons win.
This is how I imagine that most Pistons fans pictured the post- Josh Smith era going. Of course, depending on how you look at it, there is precedent for this. In 2004, the Pistons made a trade to help bolster an already strong lineup. Detroit traded a 1st round pick to Atlanta in a three team deal that allowed them to obtain the services of Rasheed Wallace. Giving up that pick helped them achieve championship contention for the next few years. I’m not going to as far to say that this is where Detroit is headed (they still need to solidify their wing scoring and figure out whether Greg Monroe is part of their future or not), but it’s certainly possible that waiving a player might have been the first step to the return of Detroit Basketball in the playoffs.
If you were wondering who the Atlanta Hawks drafted with that 1st round pick, it ended up as the 17th overall pick in the 2004 draft. The Hawks drafted a young forward directly out of high school named Josh Smith.
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