I don't even know where to start. I can't even begin to write an intelligible post about the most recent example of a far superior Piston team pissing away yet another opportunity to take advantage of a wildly pathetic conference and get to the finals. Instead I'll ramble incoherently for a little bit:
How in God's name to they lose to Cleveland? The Cavs seemingly got to every loose ball, hit every open shot and were fairly clutch down the stretch. This wasn't supposed to happen and the Pistons played with some ridiculous sense of entitlement like it wasn't. It bit them squarely in the arse.
Basically every intangible the Pistons were supposed to have due to their experience swung the Cavs way. Conversely, the Stones made terrible decisions: Chauncey launching that ridiculous 3-pointer at the end of regulation in Game 5. I don't care that it went in and Doug Collins got all moist over it. Figure that even the best 3-point shooters still miss that shot 65% of the time and what would the Stones have been left with? Having to foul down by three b/c he launched it with less than 25 seconds on the clock. Flat out stupid.
They made costly turnovers at the end of the game: See Tayshaun Prince.
They flat out imploded: Rasheed was the obvious instance, but the papers were all over Chris Webber yelling at the assistant coaches to "Let me play my game." What non-existent game he wanted to play is beyond me. It was clear that "his game" did not involve even a mediocre defense of the pick and roll. Sheed cussed out Flip Saunders from the bench. Tayshaun looked like he wanted to kill half the team was playing stupid and not giving him any help with Lebron. It was disgraceful really.
In the scheme of things I don't think the coaching was too terrible. It appeared as though the approach taken was to let Lebron get his points (hoping that Prince's defense would keep him from going on an insane scoring streak) and force the rest of the team to beat you. In theory, not a bad idea. Further, I doubt that anyone could predict that Daniel Gibson would turn into Steve Kerr. Incidentally, it does make me feel good that Gibson played well and Shannon Brown wasn't on the playoff roster (I don't care if he's hurt). With that plan in place, you spot the Cavs one game where Lebron goes ape shit (Game 5) and figure your superior talent wins you four out of six.
The problem comes where you have players that don't think they need a coach despite this attitude killing them in the conference finals last year. Changes have to be made.
First: Don't resign Chauncey Billups. I said it. Don't do it. The main culprit of the Pistons offensive woes is Chauncey's flat out refusal to ahead to Flip Saunders scheme. He takes far too many ill-advised shots and his ad-libs take the Stones out of any offensive rhythm they may have. It has become all too apparent that he wants nothing to do with running Flip's system and does so only begrudgingly. There is simply no excuse for the Pistons to ad-lib the final few possessions at the end of regulation and overtime in Game 5, although anyone who follows the team could have predicted it: Chauncey or Rip takes the ball, pump fakes up, jumps into a defender who doesnt leave his feet or jumps straight up, throws an off-balance shot up with no chance of making it and them complains because they didn't get a foul call. Again, disgraceful. Further, I can't believe this was the call from the bench. If is was...fire Saunders.
I'll temper my don't re-sign Chauncey position a bit. This is predicated on two occurrences: First, that the Stones can draft Acie Law (or move up and draft Mike Conley) with their initial first-round pick. Law appears to fit the mold of successful Piston players and, more importantly, is can be molded by the coaching staff.
Second...I couldn't seriously argue this point if the Stones could keep Chauncey for a relative value. I know the guy is due more money, but he's not a max contract player and (much like Ben Wallace) Joe D would be mortgaging the team's future overpaying in this case. If he does...his next move has to be to can Flip Saunders. The problem with canning Flip is there isn't anyone out there who the Pistons are going to respect enough to play for. Larry Brown isn't coming back, nor does anyone want him.
The safe thing to do is probably to overpay a bit for Chauncey and keep the nucleus of the team together. However, the results aren't going to be any different than this season or the season before.
