Is Dillon Brooks on the Detroit Pistons’ radar?
Dillon Brooks has been at the hotbed of NBA media throughout the 2023 NBA Playoffs because of the fairly one-sided trash-talk between him and superstar forward LeBron James, hitting James in the kahunas as well as the Memphis Grizzlies organization allegedly informing him that he would not return under any circumstance in free agency. While his status has etched closer and closer towards the famed “most hated player in the NBA”, he will still have free agent suitors — with one NBA insider believing it could be the Detroit Pistons.
“Detroit has been mentioned to me more than once as a team to watch in terms of potential suitors for unrestricted free agent-to-be Dillon Brooks,” longtime NBA insider Marc Stein wrote Friday in his Substack (behind paywall).
After the Grizzlies’ Game 2 win against the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round, Brooks called James “old” while also saying James isn’t “at the same level” he was in Cleveland and Miami. James, who’s playing on an injured foot, tallied 25 points on 10-of-20 shooting with nine rebounds and five assists in Game 3 and averaged 21.0 points, 11.0 rebounds and 5.8 assists on 41 percent shooting in the final four games of the series.
“He’s a special player. … These special players, they want to play in space, they want to not be touched,” Brooks said after Game 2. “But when you get to the playoffs and bumps are allowed and stuff like that, it wears on him.
“Just wear and tear on him throughout a seven-game series and see if he can take it — see if he wants to play the one-on-one battle, or if he wants to be out on the sideline.”
While Brooks wasn’t the centerpiece to Taylor Jenkins’ defense that finished No. 3 leaguewide in the regular season — defensive player of the year Jaren Jackson Jr. was — Brooks was a huge part of it, especially at the point-of-attack. The 27-year-old could willingly defend the opposing team’s best guard or wing, possessing the size, strength and instincts at 6-foot-7, 225 pounds.
The Pistons, who were the fourth-worst defensive team (117.8 DRTG), might be a good fit for the defensive-minded guard. The head coach is still unknown after Dwane Casey moved to a front office role, but Brooks would be a good start into rebuilding a defensive infrastructure that’s been very poor for the last several seasons.
Offensively, the ball would primarily be in the hands of Cade Cunningham, Jaden Ivey or Killian Hayes, so Brooks wouldn’t be tasked with being a primary initator.
The only are where it could get clunky would be the spacing between Brooks and the Pistons’ hoard of bigs (James Wiseman, Isaiah Stewart, Jalen Duren, Marvin Bagley III), as well as Hayes. Opposing teams routinely helped off Brooks — who shot 32.6 percent from 3-point range this season (34.2 percent for career) — at the nail and from the corners when he was stationed beyond the arc. He did a poor job of making them capitalize.
The Pistons are expected to have cap space this offseason; should they exceed the projected $134 million cap threshold, Detroit would unlock the $12.2 million non-taxpayer mid-level exception that it could use on Brooks, as well as the $4.4 million bi-annual exception.
If he doesn’t want to go to a contender, Brooks will likely accept the team who offers him the most money. Who knows what that ultimate figure will be, but I don’t think — amid the recent turmoil — every team will be completely out on Brooks, who can still legitimately help an NBA team in the right role. All it takes is one team.
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