Bill Simmons on Josh and Brandon

[Hood President]

Fact: If you made a "Best Forwards in Basketball" list right now, LeBron and Durant would go first and second, obviously, followed by Carmelo Anthony, Paul George and Dirk Nowitzki. If Kevin Love is healthy, I'd have him sixth, followed by Blake Griffin seventh.8 You know who's eighth if you threw out salaries and just based this list on "What am I getting every night on both ends RIGHT NOW if I need a quality forward to play 36 minutes a night for me as my best or second-best player on a playoff team"? That's right, Josh Smith. You'd take him over Serge Ibaka, Anthony Davis and everyone else except mayyyyyyyybe David West.

So Detroit paid less than max money for, right now, the eighth-best forward in basketball. That's a bad idea??? Now they can build around Andre Drummond, Smith, Greg Monroe, Brandon Jennings (more on him in a second) and $17 million in expirings (Charlie Villanueva and Rodney Stuckey) that could absolutely be flipped for one more asset. What's wrong with that? Especially if Drummond (a potential stud who blossomed this summer into a 290-pound, 6-percent-body-fat Dwight Howard look-alike) continues to improve? Hold on, one more Pistons quote.

To Brandon Jennings, who went from "Oh God, someone's gonna give him the max this summer and it's gonna be a calamity" to "Good Lord, getting that guy for three years and $25 million is a borderline hijacking!" I loved that trade for Detroit, if only because they're going to be 2014's most entertaining crunch-time team on League Pass: I can't even imagine how many different ways Twitter is going to ridicule Josh Smith and Jennings fighting to outdo each other on off-balance "no-no-no-YES!" shots with 17 seconds left on the shot clock. Regardless, that's an entertaining team. Even if this ruined any chance of my dream New Year's Eve mega-tank deal for the Celtics: Rondo, Courtney Lee and Wallace's $30.3 million basketball cadaver for Monroe, Knight, the Villanueva–Stuckey expirings and a 2016 unprotected no. 1 pick. Sayonara, my Trade Machine fantasy.

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- ajaX

[The Penguin]

I read the whole article and was shocked when I got to this section. I was mentally prepared for him to show his bias and trash our offseason (like he did Cleveland) but I'm happy to see he recognized our work in landing two young and undervalued assets in FA (which almost never happens). We signed Josh & Jennings for the same amount of money as Al Jefferson & Jarrett Jack got per year, great job by Joe.

[vic]

Yes when the dust settles, what Joe D has done is basically epic.

2 beasts, allstars, USA olympic bball level talent, at 4 & 5 - Drumroe
All star potential rookie SG, at very least a plus defender and floor spacer - KCP
That's potentially a big 3 of efficient basketball players you can build a team around for the next 8 years.
That would have been enough to get excited...

Then you add two super talented, under appreciated players who happen to be the best shot creators on their respective playoff teams- Josh Smith and B Jennings. All they have to do is improve their shot selection and you have a top 10 team overnight.

And you did all this with money left for next year, and with a deep bench to fill in the gaps this year.

[Pharaoh]

I believe the perception of Smith and Jennings is based on what people have seen for the last 4 years and it's not going to change simply because we signed them to reasonable contracts

Time will tell but I'd like to think that when surrounded by "better" talent Smith and Jennings focus on their strengths and don't have to do most of the damage by themselves.

Those facts about Josh Smith got me pumped

Fact: For the past five years, he's been the best or second-best player for a team that went 228-166 and made the playoffs every year.

Fact: Since 2008, Josh Smith has won more playoff series (three) than Chris Paul (two).

Fact: In the last four seasons, Josh Smith averaged 17.0 PPG, 8.8 RPG, 3.9 assists and 3.2 stocks (steals + blocks) while shooting 47.5 percent and missing just 12 games total.

Fact: In nine years, Josh Smith never missed more than 13 games in one season, and he's missed only 46 games total for his career. He's durable as hell.

Fact: If you made a "Best Forwards in Basketball" list right now, LeBron and Durant would go first and second, obviously, followed by Carmelo Anthony, Paul George and Dirk Nowitzki. If Kevin Love is healthy, I'd have him sixth, followed by Blake Griffin seventh.8 You know who's eighth if you threw out salaries and just based this list on "What am I getting every night on both ends RIGHT NOW if I need a quality forward to play 36 minutes a night for me as my best or second-best player on a playoff team"? That's right, Josh Smith. You'd take him over Serge Ibaka, Anthony Davis and everyone else except mayyyyyyyybe David West.

So Detroit paid less than max money for, right now, the eighth-best forward in basketball

Anyone got the link to the full article?

[OneBadMutha]

He's accurate on Josh Smith. People hone in on what he does really poorly (shooting and taking bad shots) but when you factor his all around game, he impacts the game in numerous areas even when he's not hitting shots.

Jennings is a little bit of a different story however. Not really sure what he does well when he's not hitting shots (which he usually isn't). He has potential and upside as a pure playmaker. Much better vision than either Knight or Stuckey. But he wants to shoot so I'm not sure if that matters.

[vic]

It all boils down to Cheeks. He can turn himself into a legendary coach, or he can let the players run the team.

He's got all the talent he needs and all the depth he needs. Doc Rivers had a horrible record before the Big 3. Coaches don't become good until they get great players. Literally all he has to do is let the best players play, reign in bad shots, and give them appropriate rest.

[ImHeisenberg]

It all boils down to Cheeks. He can turn himself into a legendary coach, or he can let the players run the team.

He's got all the talent he needs and all the depth he needs. Doc Rivers had a horrible record before the Big 3. Coaches don't become good until they get great players. Literally all he has to do is let the best players play, reign in bad shots, and give them appropriate rest.

Great points. I've often pointed to Doc Rivers as a coach who's universally respected, who was considered one of the worst coaches in the league prior to 2008.

The Pistons have turned more into a team that needs to coached up to playing the right way, than a team that needs to be coached on how to play the game.

[kurtis48239]

Now watch how the perception of the pistons change on the GB and other basketball sites just because simmons put his stamp on it.

[ImHeisenberg]

I love Grantland and Simmons. I wasn't expecting him to bash Detroit much, he doesn't buy into the hive mind mentality that many pundits share.

Simmons is in love with Drummond. He was blasting teams in his draft diary when so many teams passed on him, especially the Raptors. Andrew Sharp has already written two articles declaring his love for this Pistons roster.

[Brapman]

From a raw talent perspective, the Pistons are right up there with any team in the game. Of course, a lot of that is based on guys who are extremely young: Drummond, Monroe (who's just now showing he could develop into an all-star caliber player), KCP, Singler, Datome, Mitchell, and Jennings is just entering his 5th year. Some of these guys are unknowns, but with a ton of ability.

Adding Smith, Billups, Bynum to a mix with a couple players who are talented but on expiring contracts and likely to be moved (Stuckey and CV), and a major hustle guy like JJ and offensive 1-man wrecking crew in Bynum, and the truth is we're really a hard team to predict this season.

The coaches have a huge job to do to sort this all out, and to prevent a bunch of egos (all pro athletes are big-time ego's) from blowing themselves up and failing to live up to their incredibly high ceilings. It really would be a sensational coaching job to turn our team into something cohesive. I think it helps that our best two young players seem to be unselfish team oriented guys (Drummond and Monroe).

IMO, this is pretty exciting, but it's very hard to know if this exact group of guys can get it sorted out, or whether it'll take a couple more years of tweaking the roster to find the right chemisty. All I know is that it's good to be operating from a position of sorting out a lot of talent, then it was trying to make this work with a group of guys who were talent shy.

[triplet1984]

Actually Simmons has been positive on us this entire offseason. At one point he was underselling Drummond - but that was because he was trying to pitch a homer Rondo-Drummond trade idea, in the past he's written and talked about Drummond as a stud. There really hasn't been much Pistons-hate. He jsut can't seem to go two sentances without slipping into Celtics homer mode which is annoying - but he also calls himself a homer so it's more tolerable.

[kurtis48239]

Alot hinges on wether or not cheeks can command the respect from his players and if he can keep them under control.It really is helpful to have wallace,billups.

[ImHeisenberg]

http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-trian ... -milwaukee

Zach Lowe wrote an article about the Jennings/Knight trade today as well. He compliments Jennings' game, but also doesn't pull any punches, per his usual analysis. It's a good read.

[ImHeisenberg]

Grantland is loving the Pistons this week. They put up another article, focusing on Gigi Datome this time. Not just his ability to play, but the impact it will have across the league if he pans out.

link: http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-trian ... in-the-nba