Will the Detroit Pistons ever win again in 2023?
Have you ever seen those articles that finish with a ‘too long; didn’t read’ single-line synopsis of the piece you’ve just finished reading? It’s a little bit redundant, don’t you think? You’ve already read the story; you don’t need the author to close caption it for you, do you? Well, here’s the thing: today we’re going to give you the TL;DR right from the top. Ready? Good.
TL;DR: The Detroit Pistons are really bad at basketball. Potentially historically bad.
Breaking news, right? The Pistons currently hold a league-worst 2-16 record, safely ensconced at the foot of the Eastern Conference. Those two wins? They came against fellow strugglers Charlotte and Chicago in Detroit’s 2nd and 3rd games of the season.
The Pistons, following a 2-1 start, haven’t won since Oct. 28, and should they lose to the Knicks in Madison Square Garden Thursday, they’ll have gone through the entire month of November without a victory. Detroit even lost at home to the Washington Generals Wizards! By 19 points! Do you realise how difficult that is?
Here’s another TL;DR for you: Why are these Pistons so bad? They’re impossibly young and can’t shoot.
Now, to be fair, nobody expected the Pistons to pull up any trees, even with the return of former No. 1 pick Cade Cunningham (for what it’s worth, Cunningham has played in every one of the current 15-game losing streak, a franchise record). The team is incredibly green though does contain some serious talents in Cunningham, Jalen Duren, Jaden Ivey and rookie Ausar Thompson.
Despite what some pundits might have you believe, newly appointed coach Monty Williams isn’t doing too bad a job with this ragtag assortment of too-young, has-beens and never will-be’s. According to Second Spectrum’s Quantified Shot Quality metric, the Pistons are allowing the best-expected field goal percentage in the entire league.
In short, they’re playing to a scheme and allowing the best possible diet of shots. Detroit’s opponent’s eFG% lies at No. 16 in the league, which tells you that whilst the scheme is important, actually playing effective defence is where the rubber meets the road.
So, defensively, they’re at least on the right path, and whilst they need to make drastic improvements at the other end of the floor, there are some positive signs for the Pistons. That said, those potential positives are not going to manifest themselves in wins in the next few weeks, which begs the question: When will the Detroit Pistons next win a game of competitive NBA basketball?
Let’s take a peek at their December fixtures:
- @ New York (Nov 30)
- Cleveland (Dec 2)
- Memphis (Dec 6)
- @ Orlando (Dec 8)
- Indiana (Dec 11)
- Philadelphia (Dec 13)
- @ Philadelphia (Dec 15)
- @ Milwaukee (Dec 16)
- @ Atlanta (Dec 18)
- Utah (Dec 21)
- @ Brooklyn (Dec 23)
- Brooklyn (Dec 26)
- @ Boston (Dec 28)
- Toronto (Dec 30)
Now, the scheduling Gods have smiled a little on Detroit, by gifting them a home match with the struggling Grizzlies (as well as an away fixture at Orlando) as a result of the In Season Tournament finals qualifiers.
That game aside, though, where is Detroit’s next eminently winnable fixture? Is it Utah on the 21st? Perhaps one of the Brooklyn games? This is the NBA and any every team can beat any opponent on a given night, but on the balance of probabilities, should Detroit fail to do business against Memphis, they could be on a 24-game losing streak by the time the Jazz come to town.
The longest losing streak in NBA history currently belongs to the Process Era Sixers who dropped a whopping 28 straight decisions spanning the 2014-15 and 2015-16 campaigns. It would take some herculean ineptness to reach those heights. But if you can lose to Jordan Poole’s Wizards by nearly 20 points at home, then beating a Ja Morant-less Memphis is not exactly a given.
The Pistons may be on the verge of history. We just haven’t realised it, yet.
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