Pistons trade in rebuild for reboot
Drummond and Jackson spark surprising ride in Motor City
It is true that sometimes the best moves are the ones you don’t make.
If summer reports are to be believed (and generally they are) and if the off-the-record chatter around the NBA is to be trusted (and for the most part it is) the Detroit Pistons spent a lot of the off-season trying to offload a player or two. Andre Drummond could be had and wasn’t. Reggie Jackson was on the market and there were no takers. The Pistons were looking for some kind of roster reset and content to start a rebuilding process while keeping fans happy with the bells and whistles of a new downtown area to buy themselves time.
Well, they couldn’t find a taker for Drummond, Jackson’s still the starting point guard and the Pistons are enjoying a solid start to the season. Even a four-game losing streak that included a loss in Milwaukee on Wednesday shouldn’t dampen what’s been one of the feel-good stories of the season so far.
The Pistons have had a hellacious schedule — nine of 11 on the road, basically every one against a good opponent, and they’ve got Golden State and Boston this weekend — but they are still14-10 and, eventually, the schedule will ease.
“It’s a long season,” guard Avery Bradley told reporters after Wednesday’s loss. “I feel like . . . most teams in the NBA go through a stretch like this. You have to stay positive, focus on the next game. “We have some tough teams coming at home, so we can’t get down on ourselves. We have to get in the gym and prepare for the next game and go out there and get some wins.”
Bradley, a tough-nosed defender gifted to the Pistons in the summer by the Celtics so they could make a run at free-agent Gordon Hayward, is having a good year and is largely responsible for Detroit’s good start. But it is Drummond, who had been something of an enigma for chunks of his career, who has turned himself and the Pistons around. He remains one of the toughest big men in the game and leads the league in rebounding, averaging 15.3 boards per game going into Thursday action, but he’s also become an effective free-throw shooter, which allows coach Stan Van Gundy to leave him on the court late in close games. Drummond hasn’t turned into some Steve Nash clone at the line, but he is shooting free throws at better than a 60-per-cent clip. Considering his previous best for a season was 41.8 per cent in his second year, and that he shot 38.6 per cent in 2016-17, the turnaround has been startling.
Earlier this season, Drummond said the improvement was chiefly because of his mental approach. He worked extensively with a shooting coach in the off-season, and that plus a more relaxed frame of mind have done the trick: “I think for me it’s just the mental aspect. I took the time to really find what keeps me at peace while I’m at the line. When I found it, I kind of stuck with it. Even if I miss a shot, I think back to the same things that kept me positive and I shoot it again, and more times than not it’s been going in. It’s just been a focus thing and really just sticking to my routine.”
Whether or not the Pistons can hang on to a spot near the top of the Eastern Conference standings as the season rolls on is impossible to tell. But weathering the most difficult part of their schedule and having a big man who is now more of a key piece of the late-game offence certainly bodes well.
“I took the time to really find what keeps me at peace while I’m at the line.” ANDRE DRUMMOND ON FREE-THROW SHOOTING