Joe D

[Goldtop]

Watch this year. Indiana of all places, will suddenly be a very attractive franchise for players to sign with. I'm taking the long view of franchise building. The Pistons are a very young team that now has the seeds in place to grow into a very signficant team. We don't have to have this all sorted out this season. Just keep making intelligent team building choices, including not killing our flexibility with contracts that result in overpaying guys who aren't big stars. If Joe can do this well now, and the team stays relatively patient, in two or three seasons we can look to make a Pacer's like leap.

idk, to me the Pacers scream of a team that's always going to finish in 2nd. If I'm building a team, I'm patterning it after MIA, not IND.

Yeah cause using the Heat blue print for success is plausible for Detroit. LMFAO!

I was just saying that if we are going to pattern ourselves after anyone, it should be after the teams that win it all, not the teams that lose in the ECF. If we wanted a blueprint for how to lose in the ECF, we could just go to our own archives from 06-08.

Same reason why we shouldnt be patterning ourselves after OKC either. For some reason fans always want us to model ourselves after teams that don't win championships, instead of the ones that do. That's all I was getting at.

[Pharaoh]

The only "blueprints" for success we can follow are:

The Thunder model - also known as tanking, also known as losing the right way.... you trade away talented veterans for expiring contracts and future picks... draft kids and play them... hope to hit some home runs

The problem with this blueprint is that it's never worked for anyone except the Thunder... (unless someone can jog my memory)... because what usually happens is teams get impatient and go with the next model...

The Boston model - after acquiring future picks and loads of young talent the franchise combines those assets with a large expiring contract to trade for an absolute stud who is sick of losing at his current location!

Thunder went with the Draft... got Durant, Westbrook, Ibaka (and Harden)... very nice core... how they manage to maintain cap flexibility and add pieces to their core will be the key to their long term success

Boston went with the Draft (and already had Pierce and Walker on the squad)...but the needle didn't move much... so they chose to part with the majority of the team to land Garnett and also managed to get Ray Allen... because the Thunder were starting their tank job!

Any other model you want to use is not going to work for us. The Spurs can't be copied... they're far and away the best organisation in the league and if anyone could copy them everyone would have done it by now.

Due to Mr D passing away Joe had to sit on his hands to a certain extent... then the lockout happened... but now we've got a "perfect storm"

Cap space, some young pieces, some soon to be expiring contracts... and the fact the Draft is "weak" could work in our favor IF our scouts and Joe are willing to go balls to the wall!

Bazz, MCW, Zeller, KCP, Schroeder, Dieng, Crabbe, Rice, Hardaway Jr, Adams, Saric, Greek Dude... lots of potential in this Draft and if we can get an extra pick or 2 we would be hedging our bets.

Best case scenario we hit home runs in this Draft and follow the "Thunder-model"... worst case scenario we choose the "Boston-model"....

Getting additional picks in this Draft is actually a win-win for us IMO

Can Joe swing it? Can he catch lightning in a bottle again? Can he get creative? I hope so! If McDonough and/or Hinkie kill it in Phoenix and Philly while Joe twiddles his thumbs I'll go postal

[ImHeisenberg]

There really isn't a "model" out there. It's either, build through the draft and get lucky, or acquire players through free agency and trades.

Thunder got the second best player in the league through the draft, and a top 5 PG. Spurs have enjoyed the enduring play of arguably the best power forward in the history of the NBA.

[The_Irony]

Monroe, Knight, and Drummond being obvious choices to fans is a silly reason to take shine from Joes really good recent draft picks.


If it were so obvious, why did Udoh get drafted first?, what about Derrick Favors? Where is Wesley Johnson these days? Remember when people were mad they didnt tank to get Evan Turner? LOL


Oh yeah Byombo is LIGHTING up the NBA isnt he??? Derrick Williams is a FRANCHISE player @ #2 LOL


MKG is a lifelong 7th man, and Thomas Robinson is about to be on his 3rd team in 2 years(who i'd take a chance on btw)


I dont want to hear about Joe D making the obvious choice. CLEARLY IT WASNT.



He needs to get back in the trade game, thats what separated him from the best, Joe D is the least of our worries.

[Piston Pete]

Monroe, Knight, and Drummond being obvious choices to fans is a silly reason to take shine from Joes really good recent draft picks.


If it were so obvious, why did Udoh get drafted first?, what about Derrick Favors? Where is Wesley Johnson these days? Remember when people were mad they didnt tank to get Evan Turner? LOL


Oh yeah Byombo is LIGHTING up the NBA isnt he??? Derrick Williams is a FRANCHISE player @ #2 LOL


MKG is a lifelong 7th man, and Thomas Robinson is about to be on his 3rd team in 2 years(who i'd take a chance on btw)


I dont want to hear about Joe D making the obvious choice. CLEARLY IT WASNT.



He needs to get back in the trade game, thats what separated him from the best, Joe D is the least of our worries.

Pointing out flops (at least so far) isn't proving anything.

Point is, GS DID pick Udoh and passed on Monroe -- thus making Monroe the clear BPA

Knight was supposed to be off the board by the time we picked him - he fell, so Dumars took the BPA

Drummond was expected to go top-5....him falling into our laps was an easy choice to make.

Point is, post-McDyess signing version of Dumars has made terrible trades, has not made trades when he should have, has made terrible signings and re-signings, and can't hire a coach to save his life.

[The_Irony]

If he were as horrible as Piston fans say he is, he would have passed on them as well. Or atleast on 2 of them.


You dont get "lucky" 3 years in a row.

[pistons]

Joe D is better than 90 % of the GMs out there . .

When he has had full control ( pre-Davidson passing and the last two years with Gores) , he has made exceptional moves. He had one bad summer , that unfortunately set us back a few years ( signing Gordon and Villanueva , trading Afflalo) . But even in the midst of that bad , he also had a trade of Rip Hamilton for Carlos Boozer set up that summer that would have at least made us a playoff team, had it not been nixed by Mrs. Davidson.

We know Joe. We know that Joe has made us a Championship team before. I don't think you can say the same thing about any potential replacements. . .

[pistons]

Also , if you compare Joe's drafting record against any GM , except maybe the Spurs or Thunder , he beats them hands down. You can say he made the common sense pick all you want ... If it was so obvious , then the other teams in front of us would have made the same pick.

[Goldtop]

I don't buy the "common sense" pick theory either. Joe didn't have to take them, he had a choice of others and he CHOSE them. He wasn't gifted them. Gifted implies the league made him take them and he had no say in the matter, then got lucky when they panned out. No, he took the gamble on them that the other teams were too afraid to take, and it paid off for him. Thats shrewd drafting, not getting lucky or being gifted anything.

[Pharaoh]

Let me understand the logic bere:

Joe deserves a wholw lot of credit for picking Monroe... because if Joe was stupid he would have passed on Monroe like a few other idiots did?

Essentially we should give Joe credit for not being an idiot?

And Joe didn't get "lucky" 3 years in a row. I don't think Knight was BPA... just the obvious pick to at the time

But I'm happy to let the Joe topic slide. What I wanted didn't happen and it's too late to change it.

I do hope Joe does some serious heavy lifting this off-season and proves me wrong

[The_Irony]

Let me understand the logic bere:

Joe deserves a wholw lot of credit for picking Monroe... because if Joe was stupid he would have passed on Monroe like a few other idiots did?

Essentially we should give Joe credit for not being an idiot?

And Joe didn't get "lucky" 3 years in a row. I don't think Knight was BPA... just the obvious pick to at the time

But I'm happy to let the Joe topic slide. What I wanted didn't happen and it's too late to change it.

I do hope Joe does some serious heavy lifting this off-season and proves me wrong

Dude its not about deserving a lot of credit

Its posts made by people like you and on the radio like Mike Valenti who don't give Joe any ounce of credit on anything he does right. Piston fans think the world is black and white, Joe has made bad moves and hes also made great moves. Can people say hes made 3 good picks without backhanding them? Jesus.

What i hate most about this organization is the hiring our the last 3 coaches. I'd fault Joe for Curry and Kuester if that was his choices, we all know frank wasn't his choice.

[Pharaoh]

Ok... you want Joe to get the credit he deserves? Fine by me:

Great trade getting Rip, great signing getting Billups, great job getting Big Ben and Chucky, great trade getting Sheed, great move signing Dice (he chose us over Boston at the time IIRC) and so on and so forth....

Many many moons ago in a galaxy far far away Joe was a damn good GM... but after defeating the evil empire he got fat and lazy and watched this team decline for how many seasons now? 7? 8?

I raved about him as a GM way back when all that stuff was going on... though I constantly attacked him for his poor drafting!

There is no way I'm going to give Joe credit for dumping Rip, Prince, BG... he signed those deals all on his own and correcting your mistakes doesn't make me want to applaud

Drafting Monroe? Yay! Well done Joe! Good to see you're not as dumb as some other GMs!

Drafting Knight? Ummm, not sure on him so I'll take the wait and see approach before praising Joe on this.

Drafting Drummond? Yay! Well done Joe! Good to see you took the potential franchise big man when he fell!

FFS - it seems some people do think it's black and white when it comes to Joe!

He used to be amazing at making trades and signing free agents... but sucked on Draft Day

Now it seems he's pretty damn good on drafting, but sucks on signings and trades!

BTW, the fact he chose Curry and Johnny Q and they both sucked is why we ended up with Frank (Gores had little faith in Joe's choice)... and why we'll likely end up with Cheeks or McMillan

I love Joe... he had a great run! Was a great player... got so much respect for him.

But as a GM now? No thanks! Promote him to some invented position within the organisation so he can see out his days here... I believe Mr D would have done that for Joe.... but we need a fresh set of eyes, fresh ideas and a fresh look.

THIS was the off-season to do it... but Gores didn't pull the trigger.

Time will tell if we'll regret that