Rebuilding is hard work and it takes as much luck as it does skill. One example of this is the Pistons.
Joe Dumars trying to get Pistons back up to speed - The Boston Globe
The building blocks for success are beginning to take hold, and while Dumars has exhibited great patience, he has received his share of criticism during this prolonged rebuilding process. "We like the direction that we’re headed,’’ Dumars said. "We knew that going with some younger guys in key roles, we knew with a new coach coming in, we expected to get off to a bumpy start. But we also expected to get better as well and we’re doing that and we like the growth that we’re showing right now.’’ The Pistons were in a situation similar to one the Celtics are in now. That 2004 team, loaded with unselfish veterans, unseated the Lakers to win the NBA title. The Pistons went to a Game 7 the next season against San Antonio and were perhaps a Rasheed Wallace missed defensive assignment against Robert Horry from winning again.
They tried to rebuild by clearing cap space, just as Danny Ainge plans to do. The kicker is that they used all that cap space on Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva. Their rebuilding process is just now starting to recover and they are finally showing signs of turning a corner. A cautionary tale to be sure.
If the C's miss out on Dwight Howard and maybe Deron Williams, then the free agent prospects this year aren't much better than those two and likely aren't worth overpaying for. Which is why I'm in favor of using the cap space to trade for someone or banking the space for a later date. Cap space is great and all, as long as you use it right.
0 recs | 10 comments
wow, Dumars looks like he ate his last 3 draft picks in that photo
hpantazo - February 19, 2012
lmao
cltc5 - February 20, 2012
The Pistons are my nightmare...
The parallels are frightening. One title, predicated on a tremendous team effort, great defense and everyone buying into the cause. Several years of strong contention, but not quite being able to get back over the hump. A slow decline into mediocrity, with a couple of desperation moves (AI) that completely failed. And, creating a tremendous amount of cap space, then blowing on on a couple of decent-but-not-great players. Ben Gordon’s a good baller, but not at the dollars he earns, and I’m not a fan of Charlie V at all. Both deals looked dumb at the time, and that’s what they have been.
So, my biggest fear about the C’s is that we’re going to continue descending into Pistondom.
theBird - February 19, 2012
everyone knew the Charlie V and Ben G deals were bad, Ben is at best a great 6th man making starter money.
businessbmw - February 19, 2012
Danny is smarter
Danny doesn’t have a perfect track record, but when has he saddled the C’s with a really bad long-term contract. I think it’s perhaps his greatest strength, how he maintains flexibility and always seems to have a bunch of possible moves in the chute. So while I think it’s very possible for the next phase to be difficult – there’s a good chance we miss out in the best fa’s – I would be shocked if we ended up with contracts like Charlie V and Gordon. Danny will go all out to sign a real superstar, but he’s not going to break the bank for flawed semi-stars.
rvr - February 19, 2012
tp to theBird
you have to hope danny would be smarter, but a lot of people thought Dumars was the best GM in the nba for putting together that championship team. they were expected to compete for the services of LeBron, DWade, Bosh, and in one of the most inexplicable moves I have ever seen, wasted that money on Charlie Villanueva, and to a lesser extent, overpaying Ben Gordon. rodney stuckey hasn’t developed into the player many thought he would be, Maxiell, I don’t even know if he’s still on the team.. what an awful situation that would have been to have been a Pistons fan.. at least they got that title
JunkyardDawg - February 19, 2012
Perhaps the best solution is
To bring back Ray Allen, KG, Bass, Wilcox, Pietrus on 1 year contracts at the midlevel. Add best available Big Man at the Midlevel for two years (No not Erick Dampier). Build through the draft. You need to keep some talent base around (Rondo and Pierce). This is what San Antonio does and it works for them.
QuinielaBox - February 19, 2012
Not worried about going down the Detroit path
Dumars made 3 big mistakes – trading Billups for AI to get cap space (Billups was still worth the money he was making back then), and then signing Gordon and Charlie V to big contracts. So…all related to cap space. Danny is a lot of things, but he is not stupid about cap space. He was highly critical of overpaying players (like Antoine) before he got here, and he has been pretty smart about avoiding bad contracts on this team. So…yeah…I doubt we use our cap space poorly. If Detroit didn’t do that, they’d be in much better shape. If anything, I suspect we might overpay guys for very short (1-2 year) contracts, which then become assets.
guy incognito - February 19, 2012
I´ve already posted this under the "Blowing it up is hard to do" article,
but the “use our cap space wisely” strategy is as wishy-washy a statement as it gets, everyone has to do that.
It´s easy to argue this way without giving any specific ideas, something everyone who says “blow it up” is immediately asked to do.
If you could post a specific, realistic idea on how to rebuild next summer, then we could compare this to the “accumulate assets and tank for a higher pick this year” strategy, and at least weigh the ideas against each other.
Until then, this is a pretty meaningless statement in itself.
Casperian - February 19, 2012
Banking the Cap Space?
Not sure you can do that now. I thought I read with this new CBA you have to spend to a certain percentage of the cap. So Ainge will have to spend some money on someone. Of course if he can keep the contracts short term then it helps him if he’s targeting a specific offseason for certain players.
celty86 - February 19, 2012
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