"What does Detroit do to try and start making real progress?" --
Andrew
In fairness to the Pistons, they
have added some quality veterans to their group, only to see the most important of those players (
Bojan Bogdanovic and
Monte Morris) both miss the start of the season due to injury -- compromising their floor spacing. Of Detroit's current starting five, only power forward
Isaiah Stewart is shooting better than 33% from 3.
This puts Cunningham in the opposite situation of Houston's young talent where a lack of floor spacing is shrinking his opportunities. Based on
DARKO projections of current player talent, just two NBA rotation players are playing in lineups with lower 3-point attempt rates around them than Cunningham: teammate Stewart and
LaMelo Ball of the
Charlotte Hornets.
With the loss of Morris' playmaking ability, Cunningham's shot diet is 10th-hardest in the league among players with at least 100 attempts according to Second Spectrum's quantified shot quality (qSQ) metric. Cunningham got substantially easier shots as a rookie when he was teamed with more willing 3-point shooters
Saddiq Bey and
Jerami Grant.
Despite his 44% start from 3-point range, Stewart is also suffering from exclusively playing with another post player. Stewart's rebound and block numbers have dipped, leaving him less valuable according to all-in-one player metrics after signing a long-term extension last summer.
The good news is Detroit's rookies are shining. In the recent
Rookie Power Rankings I did with Bobby Marks, we placed Ausar Thompson third and
Marcus Sasser fourth. Additionally, the Pistons have been more competitive than their record shows. Their minus-4.6 point differential ranks 24th in the league, which counts as progress for a team that was 29th a year ago.
Detroit could look far more functional with Bogdanovic and Morris, particularly if Williams is willing to play Bogdanovic at power forward to keep Thompson in the starting lineup. That would push Stewart to a bench role, which better fits his skill set. Ideally, Morris would cut into the minutes of starting point guard
Killian Hayes rather than Sasser and 2022 lottery pick
Jaden Ivey, who's shown progress in Year 2 after losing his starting job.
Down the road, the Pistons have the opportunity to make a Rockets-style splash in free agency with several large contracts coming off their books next summer, including $20 million for
Joe Harris and $12 million for
James Wiseman -- both on the fringes of their rotation. But Detroit has to spend that money wisely rather than continuing to collect non-shooting big men and lottery picks who have washed out elsewhere.