I posted this on Bluesky before the season started, but I’m optimistic that the Detroit Pistons will have a much better season than the oddsmakers predicted at 24 wins.
Here are my 5 Reasons to Believe the Pistons will hit the over this season:
1. Coaching. Monty was more than abysmal last season. He was checked out from Day 1, benched Jaden Ivey to start Killian Hayes and after this top assistant and defensive coordinator left the team didn’t bother replacing him.
2. Veterans. It’s only training camp, but the feedback is that this year’s crop of veterans are way more impactful and helpful toward the younger players than anything they saw last year. Tobias, Beasley, THJ, Reed > the corpse of Joe Harris, injured Montae Morris, injured Bojan and streaky Burks.
3. Roster fit. Surrounding cade Cunningham with shooters and a legit lob threat is what fans have been asking for since he was drafted. The Pistons finally have the option to play big, run Beef Stew as a stretch 5 small ball center and so much more.
4. Minutes. under Casey, young guys were given the opportunity to play and fail. Under Monty, absolutely nothing made sense. Some guys had extremely short leashes, others allowed to fail hard without being pulled (Hayes). JB has implied if the young guys can’t hack it a veteran will replace you.
5. Health. This is the first season where Cade Cunningham has not been entering the season coming off of or rehabbing from an injury. And while the record was horrific last year, if you look at the first 4 games before Duren injured his ankle they were defensive monsters with him as an anchor.