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Ben Wallace likely solidified a starting spot after pulling down 14 rebounds, blocking two shots, and triggering a much better defensive effort against the Bucks.
"With the energy he showed against Milwaukee, he was awfully impressive, and set the tone for us defensively," Kuester said.
SERVING SUSPENSIONS: Pistons rookies Jonas Jerebko and Austin Daye won't be able to dress Wednesday because of exhibition season fights that resulted in one-game suspensions by the league. Kuester said he would still probably use nine players.
BIG BEN'S BIG JOB Pistons Basketball
In years past when Elden Campbell and Dale Davis were brought to the Pistons by Joe Dumars as veteran backups their roles were clearly defined: sit on the bench, be ready and don't make waves.Bringing Ben Wallace back has been different. Originally brought in to be the fifth big man, the veteran center/forward might be called upon to play more than the team expected. "Q (coach John Kuester) started him for a reason at Milwaukee," Tayshaun Prince said of Wallace. "He came in and got four steals in the first quarter and he set the tone for us defensively. Ben has been an example to the younger guys. He's always in your ear, but it's the things he does out there that helps us."
So much so that he could be in the starting lineup for the season opener Wednesday at Memphis alongside Prince and Kwame Brown. Wallace also had 14 rebounds in the 95-93 exhibition victory at Milwaukee. Only Chris Wilcox and Brown had more rebounds than Wallace's 33 in the exhibition season, which could mean the Pistons' front line might need more of Jason Maxiell, who had 15 offensive rebounds."We were really impressed with his energy and the way he came out and played against Milwaukee," Kuester said. "We really haven't decided yet, but Ben gives us a defensive presence out there and helps set a tone."
Brown has been slowed by a stretched ligament in his left hand. "It hurts when I try to squeeze the ball, but it's just something I'm going to have to play with," Brown said. "It hurts when I get bumped or hit, and at my position that's going to be all the time. I ice it and get it treated every day."
For Antonio McDyess, it's still all about the ring
Former Pistons forward Antonio McDyess has done just about everything one can in a basketball career. All-Star teams, Olympic gold medal, comeback from major knee surgeries. Of course, there's one thing missing from his resume: NBA championship. He tried to get one by signing with Detroit in 2004. But after five playoff trips, four Eastern Conference finals trips and one visit to the NBA Finals, McDyess sought greener pastures in San Antonio.
He recently spoke with the Sporting News about the disappointments with the Pistons. “It was frustrating, to be close and just to come up short,” McDyess said. “We always had very good teams in Detroit. But it just seemed like this thing would go wrong or that thing would go wrong and we were not quite able to get there.”
The Spurs also acquired Richard Jefferson and still have Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker. Many consider them the biggest threat to the Lakers' title defense. “When I first signed here, they made it clear,” he said. “They told me, ‘We are going to prepare to win a championship.’ So it’s all about the big picture here. I had some long years in the middle of my career, those injuries, where I was putting myself on that floor when I wasn’t ready. Everything I went through in my career, to know at the end of the day that I can walk away with a ring …”Here, McDyess’ voice tails off. He pauses, and again, you’ve got to root for him a little. He finally says, “In that case, I’ve done everything.”
Spurs Cut Marcus Williams
Marcus Williams probably knew "The Turk" was lurking at Spurs practice on Sunday. He hadn't played a minute in the team's last two preseason games, while Malik Hairston, the only other player in camp without a guaranteed contract, had logged productive court time in games Gregg Popovich had declared would begin to resemble regular season tests in terms of player rotations.
Sensing a cut might be coming didn't make acceptance of reality any easier after Popovich delivered the news after Sunday's workout.
Williams, an affable guard-forward from Arizona, found a far corner at the team's practice facility and sat, all alone, trying hard to maintain his composure.
Okafor Intends to Play in Opener
Having missed all of training camp and the preseason with a sprained right second toe, New Orleans Hornets center Emeka Okafor practiced almost completely with the team on Sunday and said afterward he feels better than he has in weeks.
Okafor, who sustained a minor setback nearly two weeks ago which cancelled his original plans to play in the Oct. 17 preseason game against Indiana, participated in everything but the five-on-five, contact scrimmage portion of Sunday's practice and reported no ill effects.
Okafor attempted to clear up misconceptions that arose after a Yahoo.com on Friday said he'd been given medical clearance to resume practice two weeks ago, but still wasn't fully participating in workouts. "It made it seem like I wasn't playing for the sake of not playing," Okafor said. "What was left out was that the doctors said it was OK for me to gradually do weight-bearing activities until I felt comfortable to play. The previous week I jumped out there, felt the soreness and got set back."
Raja Bell May Not Require Surgery?
He (Raja Bell) hasn't made a final decision whether to have surgery to repair that torn ligament, and he won't until he hears back from a hand specialist in Chicago. Surgery could cost him four months of inactivity.
But there was Bell, wrist heavily wrapped, working out with a weighted ball, shooting 3-pointers and going through layup drills.
Sure looked like a guy predisposed to toughing it out by skipping that surgery. Is this about obligation? "There is an obligation," said Bell, as savvy a guy as you'll meet in the NBA. "But there are two obligations: one to my family and myself and my career and (another) obligation to the team that I'm a part of. Being a competitor and a businessman, I'm kind of split down the middle. "Hopefully this (specialist) comes back, tells me I'm fine to play, and then I don't have to make a decision.''
Dumars still writing legacy as GM
As Pistons president Joe Dumars enters his 10th season as the team’s general manager, there is no question he’s been one of the better GMs in the NBA during his tenure. Dumars turned a team that went 32-50 in his first year as GM (2000-01), into a 50-32 team during the 2001-02 season. The Pistons went on to win the 2004 NBA championship, reach the 2005 NBA Finals and play in six straight Eastern Conference finals (2003-2008). The Pistons took a step back last season, going 39-43 and were bounced from the NBA playoffs in the first round by the Cleveland Cavaliers. The question now is, “Can Dumars do it again?” Can he rebuild the team and get it back to the level it was at for most of the decade? To be truly considered one of the NBA’s all-time great general managers, Dumars has to show he didn’t just catch lightning in a bottle and that he can build a championship contender again. Dumars overturned nearly the entire Pistons roster in the offseason, bringing in eight new players and a new head coach in John Kuester. The two biggest moves were the signing of Ben Gordon (five years, $55 million) and Charlie Villanueva (four years, $35 million), grabbing two players coming off career years and entering their prime — Gordon is 26 and Villanueva 25. “It was important for us to come out of free agency with a couple of guys who could really grow with us right now,” Dumars said. “All of those guys are around 25 years old, from Villanueva to Ben Gordon to Chris Wilcox. All those guys are right around the 25 range. “Then you have the rookies, who are all around the 21-, 22-year-old range. That’s what you have to do when you’re building, you gotta get the right pieces that can grow with you for the next five or six years. That’s kind of the method we used before. We caught guys like Rip (Hamilton), Ben (Wallace) and Chauncey (Billups) and all those guys were around 24, 25 years old. Six-, seven-, eightyear run, then you have to start looking at doing it again.”
The big story nationally has been the free agent class of 2010, which will feature LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh among others. Many NBA teams have positioned themselves to make a run at some of those big names in 2010. Dumars went another route, adding several pieces this past offseason instead of waiting, and stands by that decision. “The choice was to either sign two really good players like those guys, or do nothing the whole summer and add no one or lesser players for one year deals,” Dumars said. “What we’ve done over the last decade, there was no thinking like that, ‘We’ll just do nothing for a year, lose and then we’ll hope someone comes here in 2010.’ That’s not a strategy. That’s rolling the dice and not knowing what you’re going to get.“It’s easy to say that when you’re not sitting in this seat, but when you’re sitting in this seat and you have to put a product on the floor every year, and you’re trying to tell your guys you’ve built a culture here over the past decade, and then all of a sudden you’re going to do nothing except lose for a year. That’s more fantasy basketball people than real GMs. You can do that in fantasy basketball, but not real GMs.”Dumars’ approach will likely prove to be a smart decision, as most of the 2010 hype will prove to be just that — hype — and most of the big names will resign with their current teams. During his tenure, Dumars has not been afraid to take a different approach, and it has been widely successful. Critics of Dumars often bring up the Pistons drafting Darko Milicic No. 2 overall in 2003, ahead of guys like Carmelo Anthony, Wade and Bosh. But people don’t realize that almost every GM in the league would have made that pick. Dumars’ only other lottery pick during his tenure was also a bust (Rodney White, No. 9 overall in 2001), but most years the draft is a crapshoot if you’re not at the top, and even then it’s not an exact science. The fact that Dumars has found guys like Tayshuan Prince (23rd overall in 2002) and Rodney Stuckey (15th in 2007) adds to his résumé.
People who criticize Dumars’ drafting ability also fail to remember the Pistons didn’t have first-round picks in 2004, 2006 and 2008 because of trades.Dumars’ second major blemish as GM is last year’s trade of Chauncey Billups to Denver for Allen Iverson. The Pistons struggled after the trade, as they got an Iverson who had lost a step or four. Chemistry issues added to the problem. Meanwhile, Billups led the Nuggets to the Northwest Division title and Western Conference finals. The true impact of the trade has yet to play out, though. The Iverson deal was a one-year experiment, which failed, but mostly a salary-cap move.How the deal will truly affect the Pistons begins this season, but will play out over the next few seasons.Dumars said earlier in the offseason this is the first season in a while where the Pistons can’t realistically talk about winning a championship, but followed that by saying he wants to make sure the team is heading in the right direction. “I won’t sit and judge our team based on a championship or not this year,” Dumars said. “I won’t sit and judge our team based on the win and loss record. When you are building a base like we are right now, what you do is, you look to see is your team getting better as the year goes on. You can see that with the naked eye. You can sit and watch and see if a team is getting better or not. There have been teams before that ended up with great records, but you could say, ‘Man they started off hot and faded down the stretch.’“Where we are right now, it would be a disservice for me to sit here and try to put a number on, ‘We have to have this number of wins’ or ‘If we’re not in the Finals …’ That’s not who we are right now. We are a team that is building with a new group of guys. Just as back in 2000, 2001, ’02 and ’03, I didn’t try to start to put numbers on it. I just knew how to build and that’s where we are right now.” How Dumars builds this current group over the next few seasons will help determine his long-term legacy. If the Pistons never return to the Finals, he will likely be remembered as a good GM. But if he can build another championship team, then he will be talked about as one of the great GMs in NBA history.
Pistons Waive Deron Washington
Detroit Pistons President of Basketball Operations Joe Dumars announced today that the club has requested waivers on guard/forward Deron Washington. He averaged 3.3 points, 0.6 rebounds and 6.4 minutes in seven preseason games.
Washington was drafted by Detroit with the 59th overall pick in the 2008 NBA Draft. He played on the Pistons’ summer league teams each of the last two years and averaged 14.8 points and 7.0 rebounds in 27 games for Hapoel Holon of the Greek League in 2008-09. The Pistons’ updated 2009-10 roster is a follows:
Detroit Pistons Roster
NO POS NAME HT WT DOB COLLEGE/COUNTRY YRS
17 G Chucky Atkins 5-11 160 8/14/74 South Florida 10
38 C Kwame Brown 6-11 270 3/10/82 Glynn Academy HS 8
12 G Will Bynum 6-0 185 1/4/83 Georgia Tech 2
5 F Austin Daye 6-11 205 6/5/88 Gonzaga R
7 G Ben Gordon 6-3 200 4/4/83 Connecticut 5
32 G Richard Hamilton 6-7 193 2/14/78 Connecticut 10
33 F Jonas Jerebko 6-10 231 3/2/87 Kinna, Sweden R
54 F Jason Maxiell 6-7 260 2/18/83 Cincinnati 4
22 F Tayshaun Prince 6-9 215 2/28/80 Kentucky 7
3 G Rodney Stuckey 6-5 205 4/21/86 Eastern Washington 2
35 F DaJuan Summers 6-8 240 1/24/88 Georgetown R
31 F/C Charlie Villanueva 6-11 232 8/24/84 Connecticut 4
6 C Ben Wallace 6-9 240 9/10/74 Virginia Union 13
9 F/C Chris Wilcox 6-10 235 9/3/82 Maryland 7
Deron Washington waived, Atkins stays and Pistons' roster at 14 heading into opener
Deron Washington, arguably the most athletic player on the Detroit Pistons' roster, has been waived.The move is a bit surprising considering the biggest knock on Washington's game -- shooting the ball -- was not a major issue in the preseason.
In fact, he shot 64.3 percent from the field (9-for-14) and was a perfect 3-for-3 on 3-pointers. Detroit could have kept Washington, but the Pistons prefer to go into the regular season with 14 players on its roster instead of the league-maximum of 15. The 14th roster spot went to Chucky Atkins.
Atkins, now in his second stint with Detroit, has played sparingly during the preseason. But head coach John Kuester said the 10-year veteran has contributed in ways that may not necessarily show up in games. "He has been a great role model for our young point guards," Kuester said. "He's really done an outstanding job of running the team in practice. I think that's one of the reasons it came down to us keeping him."
Short-handed in opener
Detroit will only dress 10 players for its season opener against Memphis on Wednesday because rookies Austin Daye and Jonas Jerebko will be serving one-game suspensions.
Jerebko and Miami’s Jamaal Magloire got tangled up in a preseason game on Oct. 5 in which Jerebko responded with a blow to Magloire’s face after Magloire caught him in the face as both players were falling toward the floor while battling for a rebound.
Magloire was given two games for his role in the incident. And Daye’s suspension came following an incident on Oct. 7 against Milwaukee involving ex-Piston Carlos Delfino. Like Daye, Delfino will also serve a one-game suspension..
Mildly surprising: Deron Washington waived
Deron Washington's potential has Pistons coaches impressed.
When previewing every player on the Pistons roster, I had high hopes for Deron Washington as a potential defensive stopper and crowd favorite at the end of the bench because of his freakish athleticism. Unfortunately, he'll develop those things elsewhere because the Pistons waived him today. ASB has a few details, but it's not really clear why the move was made. It was assumed the Pistons would only keep 13 or 14 players on the roster instead of the allowable 15 as a way to save money.Three guys -- Washington, Chucky Atkins and Maceo Baston -- came into camp without guaranteed deals, and it was assumed Atkins and Baston would both be waived at some point. Baston was released last week. No word on whether Atkins is officially going to make the team, but it seems like the Pistons will keep 14 players. If that's the case, and Atkins is staying, and there is not another non-guaranteed signing (perhaps a big?) in the works, I'm not sure I understand.
- Atkins is strictly a point guard. With his shooting touch and experience, Atkins can be a capable backup somewhere, but there's barely enough backcourt minutes for Will Bynum. What's the necessity of having a third point guard?
- Washington can play two positions (SG/SF). His weakness, shooting, was actual not bad in the preseason. There's not a ton of minutes to go around at the 2/3 spots either, but as a young player with potential, Washington would at least seemingly have some value as a spare part in a trade, if the Pistons make one, at some point this season. More value than Atkins would have, at least.
- The move is a little surprising, considering that coach John Kuester was praising Washington's improvement just last week, saying: "He has a ways to go, but it's been neat to watch how he's progressed," Kuester said. "That first week of practice, he was lost. Now, all of a sudden, he's starting to understand and figure out some things."
That's certainly not a glowing endorsement, but also doesn't sound like what a coach would say about a rookie on the verge of being cut. Washington was never going to help the Pistons much this year, so it's not like this is a big travesty, but for a team that is allegedly in rebuilding mode, it makes little sense to keep a vet who's not going to play over a rookie who's shown a few flashes, unless the team was a bit overzealous in selling Washington's improvements to reporters.
Detroit Pistons should start Ben Wallace at power forward
After watching Ben Wallace's high-energy defensive performance during the Detroit Pistons' final preseason contest, it has become clear coach John Kuester should consider starting Wallace. In a whopping 33 minutes of action, Wallace showed flashes of the dominant defensive player that prowled the lane at The Palace for the first half of this decade, packing the stat sheet with 14 rebounds, four steals and two blocked shots.
Playing in six of the eight preseason games, Wallace averaged 16 rebounds per 48 minutes and set an aggressive tone on the defensive end that the Pistons will desperately need this season. In the two games Wallace missed during the preason, Detroit's opponents shot a staggering 57.1 percent from the floor. Considering Wallace's age, he would be best suited to start at power forward. The physical grind required to guard the opposing center could take away from his effectiveness. Assuming Kwame Brown is ready to go, the Pistons should start Wallace at power forward and Brown at center.
Yes, this will put the burden of the offense on the guards and Tayshaun Prince to start the game, but that was largely anticipated anyway. It also leaves the Pistons with an absolutely explosive second unit, led by Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva. It's safe to say none of the Pistons' potential starting lineups will be ideal. There are several weaknesses, but none more glaring than defensive consistency to start the season. By opting to start Big Ben, the Pistons can commit to playing aggressive defense from the opening tip.
Pistons Links: Some love for Will Bynum and Rasheed Wallace sure does enjoy giving quotes this preseason
Ball Don't Lie: The Pistons have 20-to-1 odds in Vegas to win the Eastern Conference. That's actually better than I thought they would be
SLAM: The magazine takes a look back at its 2005 NBA preview, when the Pistons were coming off a title. Fun to look at how much the NBA has changed in just a few years.
The Baseline: Rasheed Wallace really believes he's on a title team in Boston. It seems like Sheed has done a lot of interviews this preseason ... don't ever remember him granting that many when he was in Detroit.
Hoops Addict: Speaking of Sheed, the Celtics say he's fitting in nicely.
Need4Sheed: Natalie has some highlights of the last preseason game against Milwaukee, which featured some vintage Ben Wallace.
Life On Dumars: A few interesting numbers from the boxscores in preseason games.
Motown String Music: Kwame Brown is expected to play in the season opener.