We need a bench quick!

After realizing that our team usually only plays 3 guys off the bench each night, I had an epiphany. This is going to screw us over later in the season. Right now, we usually only have Maxiell, Rip, and and McDyess come off the bench in games. Occasionally we will see Kwame, Afflalo, or Bynum get some good minutes, but we don't blow anyone out anymore, so this is barely happening. What we need is to rest our guys so we can do something in the post season. I don't see Joe D. making a big move at the deadline. But I think we may see him bolster the bench. The Pistons do not have a good backup PG or SF. We need to make a deal. There are plenty of teams willing to trade PG's right now (Hello, Earl Watson.) SF's are a bit more difficult, and that isn't as big of a need, because Tayshaun is younger and capable of going with less rest. However, the question remains, who would we have to trade? If we are not going to play Afflalo or Hermann, I think they should be sent elsewhere. We could package them together and get a decent PG, and that would create room for us to give a shot to Alex Acker or Walter Sharpe. If you have ideas, send me a link to the ESPN trade machine

Good Stuff

If you need a laugh, check out the new comic at Garbage Time All Stars (Well, technically go there, then follow the link to Ball Don't Lie.) It really has nothing to do with the Pistons, but is still funny.

Good News and Bad News

The bad news is that we lost. We went 6-9 for the month of January The good news is that we only lost to the defending champs by 8 points. We played a tough game and finally showed up defensively. The even worse news is that we have to take positives out of losing games because it happens so often now.

We actually gave the Celtics a game. Their last 7 wins have all come by double digits, so I guess that is sort of a small victory for us, right? I expected the game to have more points, but the gap between the teams was as I expected. The Celtics don't blow us away. They lull us into thinking that we are close enough to come back at any time and we never do. They never stop defending, never. Marc Jackson pointed out that when the game finished, the Pistons were attempting just to score before the horn, even though it didn't matter at all. The Celtics shut them down. Not many teams do that.

The Celtics didn't do anything exceptional on the offensive end. We actually played pretty solid defense and held them to 45% shooting. The Boston 3 Party combined for 56 points, which is about average for them. Rondo had 12 assists, but we managed to keep Kendrick Perkins in check. He was getting so frustrated that he headlocked Maxiell and threw him down, so he was ejected. We stuck to one of my keys to success, not shooting more than 10 3-pointers. We shot 8, but only made 1. Overall, we shot only 40% from the floor. The Celtics defense just squeezed the life out of us.

Other things of note:

• The Celtics were able to score on us because of excellent ball movement. They had 25 assists, and were seemingly always able to find someone for an open jumper
• Iverson and Stuckey each had 19 points, but they combined for only 5 assists
• Tayshaun had a bad night, going 1-7 for 4 points. Paul Pierces defense is underrated
• Rip was instant offense off the bench. He had 14 points
• McDyess had 14 rebounds
• AI passed Charles Barkley for 16th on the all-time scoring list'
• In case you haven't heard, the Celtics have now won 10 in a row

Game 45 Preview

PG: Hey, Rajon Rondo has been putting up pretty decent numbers. However, his jump shot is still ugly. Some people are calling him an All-Star snub. No way. Stuckey isn't as good at distributing, but he is the superior scorer

Advantage: Draw

SG: I wouldn't count on us holding Ray Allen under 10 points. No one has done that this year. However, it is not every night that he has to defend someone as quick as The Answer. This should be interesting

Advantage: Draw

SF: Most people either love or hate Paul Pierce. I don't really fall in either category. I think he is very good, but I don't think he is a Top 10 player like he thinks he is. Prince will be all over him tonight

Advantage: Draw

PF: Regardless of whether he is at PF or C, Sheed will be on Garnett and vice versa. Sheed was hot against the Wolves, but tonight is the man Al Jefferson got traded for. Garnett could go off tonight.

Advantage: Celtics

C: I have a feeling we will see Kwame in the starting lineup. He weighs 60 pounds more than Amir, but still gives up 10 pounds to Kendrick Perkins. Perkins is kinda streaky. He is either devastating or non-existent. We will see tonight

Advantage: Celtics

Overall: The Celtics just methodically wear you down. I went to Game 6 against them last year. We never really seemed down that far, but we never got close. They are a defensive machine. But all the Pistons have heard lately is that things are falling apart. Even Yahoo Sports thinks so. The Pistons are angry and ready for a battle. Meanwhile, the Celtics have been coasting. They are going down tonight. I think we beat them by 8 in a surprisingly high scoring game.

The One We Call Amir

The blog on MLive just posted something quite interesting. After some quantitative analysis, they found that the Pistons are a much better rebounding team when Amir gets more minutes. This is news to me. Besides McDyess and Sheed when he is motivated, Amir is the best rebounder, but I think I would still rather see more Dyess. However, the numbers don't lie...always

Boom!

Even Luis Scola is pumped!

I don't like to brag, but I was pretty close to nailing the Rookie-Soph teams. Granted I just picked these teams like two and a half weeks ago, and I picked 12 man rosters, but I was close. My two errors were leaving Rudy Fernandez and Greg Oden off the Soph team. Who cares. I thought we abandoned basketball in the Pacific Northwest? But seriously, Oden has been coming on lately. In his last 5 games, he has averaged 16 points and 11 rebounds. He could be the next Chris Kaman. Wait, is that good or bad? As for Rudy Fernandez, I stick by my exclusion of him. He is more style than substance. I would take my boy, LRMaM anyday.

If you dont know what I am talking about, here are the old posts

Sophs Picks

Rookie Picks

Thanks for making me look stupid

One day after I post on how poorly Rasheed has been playing as of late, he decides he wants to score 25 points and grab 10 rebounds, against Big Al Jefferson to boot. Yes, I am impressed. He was even scoring on the low post, with his sneaky turnaround jumper. However, I want to see this sustained through at least a couple of games. Blaha and Kelser complemented Sheed's defense, which was good near the end of the game. I would like to see it at the beginning though too. Allowing Al Jefferson and Kevin Love 41 point and 16 rebounds isn't exactly exceptional.

As for the game itself, we won 98-89 over the hottest team in the NBA. Yeah I know the Wolves stink, or at least they should. However, I feel like this is a big win for us. We always seem to doze off on opponents like the Wolves. Sheed knew he would have to perform and he did. Hopefully, we can use the momentum to beat Boston and Cleveland.

The other man I considered tradeable, The Answer, did not impress me last night. He once again did not shoot all that well, going 5 for 15. He had 19 points, but he needs to start cutting when Sheed or any other post guy has the ball. He needs to make stuff happen. Stuckey had another solid game and McDyess was once again beastly off the bench, scoring 14 points with 10 rebounds.

Other things of note:

• We only attempted 8 3-pointers. I think was a key to victory. We have to realize we are not shooters
• We only had 7 turnovers
• Rasheed had 5 steals!

Game 44 Preview

PG: Sebastian Telfair was supposed to be big. Not so much

Advantage: Pistons

SG: Isn't Randy Foye a PG? AI should get his groove back tonight. If not, than something is seriously wrong

Advantage: Pistons

SF: This isn't close. Prince will dominate shooting tonight

Advantage: Pistons

PF: Craig Smith is underrated. I think he is a decent low post guy and a good rebounder. Amir will have his hands full

Advantage: Timberwolves

C: Big Al is pretty close to dominant right now. Sheed needs to take notes

Advantage: Timberwolves

Overall: These teams are polar opposites. One is a good team that is playing almost as poorly as it can play. The other is a bad team that is play about as perfect as it can play. The Wolves have won 10 of 12 games in January. We didn't play awful against the Rockets, we just ran into them at the wrong time. We should win this game by 10 points. But right now, who knows.

Change we can believe in?

You know how when we traded for Allen Iverson things were supposed to change. He was supposed to be the missing scorer that would finally unlock our offensive potential and combine with our stellar defense to create a team that would dominate the universe. Yeah, that didn't work out so well. Well Iverson really isn't a premier scorer in the NBA. Oh yeah, that Chauncey guy we traded, he was pretty good. Especially defensively and in clutch situations. Well, stop your whining. Both I and Baron Davis know it is too late to call backsies. But what should we do know. We have lost 7 of the last 9 games, generally leaving us fans feeling like the feline below.

What should be done. I believe if a team is going to play together, they will at least show signs through their first 25 games. We really have not. I don't see us winning a playoff series, but as always, we are one piece away. I believe that piece is a defending center, just like Ben Wallace used to be. A center is not obtained easily though. So who should be the trade fodder. Let us go through the starting lineup...

Rodney Stuckey-He was one of the main reasons we traded Chauncey. He has lived up to his potential so far and trading him is out of the question.

Allen Iverson-If Stuckey has filled part of Chauncey's shoes, then AI has left the other part unfilled. He can still score 15-20 per night, but he creates bad matchups when he has to defend a 2, and he doesn't play that hard defensively. In my mind, he should be traded. So what if we just got him. The Hawks did the same thing when they traded for Rasheed. The question is who would want him

Tayshaun Prince- No, he will not be traded. He is the current face of the franchise

Rasheed Wallace- He is the second part of the problem. He has become indifferent to going for rebounds, and doesn't post up much anymore. He is very capable of doing this, he just doesn't think he should. He can be traded

Amir Johnson-He has still has not reached his full potential, so it wouldn't make a lot of sense to trade him right now. If he was requested in a reasonable trade offer though, I don't think the Pistons could refuse, especially because we have Jason Maxiell

Here are some of my potential trade ideas. If you have a better one, send me a link on the comments:

• Rasheed Wallace for Sam Dalembert and Jason Smith

• Pistons get: Andris Biedrins, Marcus Williams, Hamed Haddadi

Warriors get: Hakim Warrick, Marc Gasol, and Kyle Lowry

Grizzlies get: Rasheed Wallace

• Allen Iverson and Will Bynum for David Lee and Stephon Marbury

So what do you think?

How did we give up 39 points in one quarter?

Yes, that is not a lie. The Mighty Mighty Pisstones defense allowed 39 points in the first quarter. Isn't the first quarter where we usually play out of our minds, then our play slowly declines as the game goes on tonight. Not tonight!

How was this scoring possible? Excellent question. First of all are not designed to be a jump shooting team. Without Yao, they were forced to be last night. Oddly, they were just hitting everything they threw up. They ended the game shooting near 53%. We just played lazy defense. No one really stayed down in the post, hence Luis Scola's 9-11 shooting for 21 points. In fact, every Rockets starter scored in double digits, even lowly Rafer Alston

One good thing coming out of this game was our shooting percentage though. We actually shot better than the Rockets, shooting 56%. I think if Yao had played that number would be much lower, but it still is ridiculous. Rip led the team with 27 points, while Sheed had 22 and 11 boards. Tayshaun was locked up all night by a combination of Ron Artest and Shane Battier.

Speaking of Ron Artest, I wasn't surprised when the boos rained upon him. It was kinda funny watching him sink the free throws that won the game. I really don't have a problem with the guy. He was just chillin on the scorers table when somebody hurled a beer at his face. I can't blame him for getting angry. Anyways, he and McGrady both looked good coming off of injuries. McGrady had 15, 4, and 4, while Artest had 24 points and 9 rebounds

Other things of note:

• We started Kwame Brown? I guess we were expecting Dikembe to start because Kwame only played 6 minutes
• The Rockets hit 12, yes 12 3-pointers
• Both teams grabbed 35 rebounds. The Pistons should have won this battle though because the Rockets didn't play an actual center at all. To start the game, Sheed tipped off against McGrady
• Stuckey had a quiet but decent game, scoring 14 points, with 8 assists and 5 rebounds
• Iverson had 17 points and 8 assists

Game 43 Preview

PG: As long as Rafer doesn't break Stuckey's ankles we should be good here. We should hope that Rafer takes a lot of shots tonight. That is how the Rockets lose

Advantage: Pistons

SG: McGrady could be back for the game, but he probably still wouldn't be able to hang with Iverson. Wafer is fun to watch and has been hot lately, but he's no Iverson

Advantage: Pistons

SF: I think Shane Battier must be Tayshaun's hero. They both have similar games, except Tayshaun is a better scorer and Battier takes a ton of charges'

Advantage: Draw

PF: Amir got torched by Dirk. Things won't get much better here. Scola is very underrated and is really crafty in the low post.

Advantage: Rockets

C: Yao may start in this game, depending on how his knee is feeling. On the off chance, that he does, I think this will be a very close matchup. Mutombo isn't gonna like having to follow Sheed outside though. We probably wil see more Chuck Hayes if Sheed decides he wants to shoot.

Advantage: Draw

Overall: Even with the injuries, this looks to be an excellent game between my two favorite teams. Luckily, I will be going to this game. I think the Rockets will somehow escape with the win, but only by a basket.