Last game: Jan 20, Detroit Pistons 92 – Boston Celtics 86
Next game: vs. Indiana Pacers, Jan 22 8:00pm ET

The Pistons lack size, but have a back court that can shoot them in and out of games.

The Pistons should start exploring trade options for Rip if they haven’t already, the 3 small guard combo of Stuckey, Bynum and Gordon is playing as good as any backcourt in the NBA. I wanna see Will “the thrill” Bynum in the dunk contest.

The Pistons certainly made a splash in free agency adding Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva. Look for the pistons to use alot of three-guard offense which should improve their transition game. Rodney Stuckey has alot to prove this season, his decision making and shooting need improvement. With the departure of Rasheed Wallace and Antonio McDyess, the Pistons will be counting on Kwame Brown, Chris Wilcox and Ben Wallace’s corspe to provide rebounding and toughness inside. The Pistons took a huge step in the wrong direction on defense and didnt improve enough on offense to make up the difference but this is the eastern conference so they got a shot at the 8th spot.

Key Additions: Ben Gordon, Charlie Villanueva, Austin Daye, Chris Wilcox, Ben Wallace

Key Subtractions: Rasheed Wallace, Allen Iverson, Antonio McDyess, Arron Afflalo, Amir Johnson

Projected Starting Lineup: Rodney Stuckey/ Richard Hamilton/ Tayshaun Prince/ Charlie Villanueva/ Kwame Brown

-Bennice

And the season begins!

This could be a trap game on the road in Memphis against a team that many people severely underrate. The Grizzlies have a couple of really decent players in Rudy Gay, O.J Mayo, Hasheem Thabeet, Zach Randolph, Mike Conley just to name a few of them.

The Pistons Starting Lineup has also been announced:

PG: Rodney Stuckey
SG: Richard Hamilton
SF: Tayshaun Prince
PF: Charlie Villanueva
C: Ben Wallace

Pretty much what I expected. What is more of a question is how the minutes get distributed between the starters and the bench players. I think you absolutely have to start Ben Wallace though to establish some sort of defensive tone to start the game, so I like that move.

I think it’s extremely important to get this first win of the year and establish some sort of confidence in your team. I can’t think of any way worse to start the season off than to lose to the Grizzlies. But neither of these teams tonight play a ton of defense, so it should be a very high scoring game.

Prediction:
Pistons 110
Grizzlies 102

NBA’s rule of thumb, try not to trade within your own conference and whatever you do, do not trade without your own division. That’s usually how trading is mapped out for NBA teams. Although it wasn’t via trade, the Pistons took players from the Bulls and Bucks and a coach from the Cavaliers to begin reshaping their franchise. What do those teams all have in common? Each one of them resides in the Central Division in the Eastern Conference. Shortly after players were allowed to verbally commit to sign contract sheets, the Pistons landed Ben Gordon (from the Bulls) and Charlie Villanueva (from the Bucks) via free agency. The former Uconn Huskie teammates will join another Uconn Huskie in Richard Hamilton to try help restore some pride in the Pistons franchise and fan base. It wasn’t long ago (try a couple of seasons) when the Pistons were the dominant team in the Eastern Conference and all roads to the Finals in the East went through Detroit.

When Michael Curry was fired after just one season of being a head coach, the Pistons needed to find a coach who could get the job done. Their first choice was Avery Johnson, but after a disagreement with the money, they opted to look elsewhere and had their sites set on two of the better assistant coaches from two of the best teams in the league a season ago. In the end, Cavaliers assistant coach John Kuester won over Joe Dumars and the Pistons front office. Kuester is credited with being the guy who helped the Cavaliers offense take off last season.

The Iverson-experiment failed and the Pistons are no longer one of the elite teams in the NBA. Rasheed Wallace will now become a free agent and there are Pistons fans questioning whether or not Michael Curry is the right man for the job. Joe Dumars has a lot of work to do this off-season if the Pistons are to become a formidable team next season. There have been rumors and reports floating around that if Boozer was to opt-out of his contract, the Pistons would be a likely destination for him. Regardless of what is done this off-season, the moves cannot mimic the the results of the Chauncey Billups trade.

Detroit needs to come across someone who can and will play near the basket. There is nothing wrong with a jumpshooting big man, but someone still needs to do the dirty work near the basket and with the 15th overall pick, the Pistons should be looking towards that direction, unless they are confident they can address that need during free agency.

Fresh off a four game Western Conference road trip  the Pistons will return home to and have to defend their home court  against Lebron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. These two teams have  sort of built a little bit of a rivalry over the last few years and now  that Ben Wallace is wearing a Cleveland Cavaliers uniform it makes the  rivalry a little more personal…..at least to the fans.

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Iverson will make his team debut tomorrow night in Toronto against the new looked Toronto Raptors. Some of us have been waiting 8 years for this moment, goes back to when Dumars tried to acquire AI from Philadelphia in 2000 but the deal fell apart after Matt Geiger waived his no trade clause.

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NBA sources said the Nuggets have inquired about obtaining Denver native Chauncey Billups from the Pistons for Allen Iverson. Because of Iverson’s lucrative contract ($20.8 million) it would take more than Billups ($11 million), though .There is probably small chance that Dumars send Billups to the Nuggets for Iverson. Dumars would need to send out around 16 million dollars in contracts to come within the 25% + $100,000 of Iversons’ 20.8 million dollar contract. A deal sending Chauncey and McDyess to Denver for Iverson would work under the cap rules, but probably not in the rules of reality.

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AUBURN HILLS — Detroit Pistons forward Jason Maxiell has agreed to a four-year, $20 million extension with the Pistons.

The 6-foot-7 forward had until tomorrow to reach an agreement with Detroit. Otherwise, he would have become a restricted free agent this summer.