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I think we all need to take a step back, look at last years team, look at this years team, and re-evaluate what we think this team is capable of.

There is reason to be disappointed in the start to this season. I understand that. But there is also reason to see light at the end of the tunnel.

Let's all take a chance to hit the reset button on our projections and expectations for this team this season, and try and create some positivity around this board. I get that things aren't looking so great, but it's no reason to flip a lid and nuke the whole roster. We're 1/10 of the way through the season, and if we keep this up, this is going to turn into an incredibly toxic place for Pistons fans.

I'm going with 33 wins right now. I think after the All-Star break, we'll really start to see the improvement. In usual lottery-pistons fashion, we'll close out the year on a decent stretch and fall in the lottery.

I think the Josh Smith/Greg Monroe duo at PF actually turns into a plus.

Drummond starts to put together a defensive game that teams must prepare for. He's already showing signs, but I'd bet by the half-way mark, he finally starts reacting, instead of taking a half-second to think before doing.

KCP becomes a defensive specialist, and a key to the offense for the second unit.

Jennings maintains his current play, with the occasional game of 16+ shots, but shooting close to 45% and keeping the offense running fluidly.

And for those interested, i dug up the two threads on preseason record projections.
viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1347445
viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1351338

Reasonable expectations will lower everyone's blood pressure around here

I think I'll stick with my 31-35 win projection. If they surpass it, I would be happy... but if they fall short, that is also a good thing as we will have better lottery odds. I didn't think Drummond would look so bad so far like everybody else, but I thought Jennings would play 'well', he's played great.

38-44

This team has been in almost every game this season, they've yet to be blown out by anyone.

I think they can win 9 more games than last season. They just need to learn how to close. They've played better (mostly) as a team this season, which is promising, regardless of the fact that it hasn't translated into wins yet. They're right on the cusp.

^So you're thinking we're going to play pretty much .500 ball (35-36) for the rest of the year?

That's what would be needed to post that record, and that's a tad bolder than I'm prepared to go at this point. Add in the fact that we frankly haven't had a particularly difficult schedule so far, and yeah....

Snakebites wrote:^So you're thinking we're going to play pretty much .500 ball (35-36) for the rest of the year?

That's what would be needed to post that record, and that's a tad bolder than I'm prepared to go at this point. Add in the fact that we frankly haven't had a particularly difficult schedule so far, and yeah....

I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility

My line of thought is that this team has been in it until the last few minutes of all their losses, against the good and bad teams. I'd believe SVG is coaching them on how to close games.

Their record will probably fall short of that. But, the numbers seemed logical to me that early in the morning and without my coffee.

Yeah, I get it.

I just have a hard time projecting a team that's currently playing 3-8 ball on a relatively lax schedule suddenly kicking things up into borderline .500 ball starting immediately. And if it doesn't start immediately (IE, if we continue to play poorly for another week or 2, which we probably will even if we eventually get better) then we'd have to play BETTER than .500 ball for the rest of the year to hit that mark.

I think people underestimate how damaging doing this poorly in the first 11 games really is.

I probably underestimated that fact myself.

Call it optimism, or willing ignorance.

I'll go with 28 to 30 wins, in no mans land yet again.

I don't think I made an estimate in the last thread but if I did, it would've probably been more like 38 to 42.

Probably around 30 wins again

Snakebites wrote:Yeah, I get it.

I just have a hard time projecting a team that's currently playing 3-8 ball on a relatively lax schedule suddenly kicking things up into borderline .500 ball starting immediately. And if it doesn't start immediately (IE, if we continue to play poorly for another week or 2, which we probably will even if we eventually get better) then we'd have to play BETTER than .500 ball for the rest of the year to hit that mark.

I think people underestimate how damaging doing this poorly in the first 11 games really is.

How quickly you forget The past several years our **** coaches have taken us on a last minute winning spree and have succeeded in lowering our draft position. It CAN be done!!!!

If we go into no mans land again, that might be enough to quit watching this team for a while. Just bottom out before we get to that point...jeesh.

I don't think the Pistons will reach my 50 wins projection, but I still feel this team could end up in the playoffs which is my main hope.

Because, this team should be different with Meeks and Martin back in the mix.

I do feel there will be a trade at some point.

We'll pick between 7-10.


Again.

Whisper wrote:

Snakebites wrote:Yeah, I get it.

I just have a hard time projecting a team that's currently playing 3-8 ball on a relatively lax schedule suddenly kicking things up into borderline .500 ball starting immediately. And if it doesn't start immediately (IE, if we continue to play poorly for another week or 2, which we probably will even if we eventually get better) then we'd have to play BETTER than .500 ball for the rest of the year to hit that mark.

I think people underestimate how damaging doing this poorly in the first 11 games really is.

How quickly you forget The past several years our **** coaches have taken us on a last minute winning spree and have succeeded in lowering our draft position. It CAN be done!!!!

Yeah, I think we'll go on a mini-run that gets us to about 30 or so wins.

I just don't think we'll hit 39 with it.

32-35

I originally predicted 38 wins and I don't see them getting there. They have some individual pieces that are better than their counterparts from last year, they show more future promise than last year, and they're more competitive than last year. But collectively as a team they're not showing much more propensity for wins than last year. All teams that win the same number of games are not equal, meaning they could be a better team than last year and still not win many more games. The only thing that equals wins is winning--not hope, promise, etc. Yes that sounds like a Captain Obvious comment but that's reality. I see them now in more the low 30's range.

somewhere between and 11 13 games.

hard to believe but this team might end up with a worse record than the last couple of years. im going with 22 wins. we are so trash its ridiculous. i need to slap myself for thinking we could get an 8 seed

Eh- I think some people are underestimating how bad the east is. We are 2 games out of the playoffs. If we show any improvement, we'll be in the mix.

38 wins.