Gary Porter

MJS/Gary Porter

For a franchise that has been as consistently good as the Detroit Pistons have been since the turn of the century, there sure have been a lot of mistakes.  Although the team has made two NBA Finals appearances since Y2K, won one Championship, and had a streak of seven consecutive 50+ win seasons, the Pistons could have become a dynasty had they made a few smarter decisions along the way.

In 2003 the Pistons had an opportunity to draft Carmelo Anthony, Dwyane Wade, or Chris Bosh. Instead they selected Darko Milicic.  In the six years that have passed, Anthony, Wade, and Bosh have won Gold medals for the United States in the Olympics, have been voted by fans and coaches to a combined nine All-Star games, and are all the faces of their respective franchises.  Milicic, meanwhile, is now on his fourth NBA team after being traded on Draft night from Memphis to New York in a deal of expiring contracts.  His career scoring average is 5.5 points per game, while adding only 4 rebounds.

Yet, despite that obvious blunder, the Pistons continued to win thanks to a superb nucleus of Chauncey Billups, Rip Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince, and Rasheed Wallace.

But after winning the NBA Championship in 2004, complacency began to set in.  They seemed to believe that they were so good that they could turn it on and off as needed and still get the job done.  But after coasting through most of the next four seasons and still winning an average of 57.5 regular season games each year over that span, they weren’t able to flip the “on” switch with enough leverage to ever repeat as champions, and were knocked out in the Eastern Conference Finals in three consecutive seasons.

It was during the 2008 Eastern Conference Finals that Billups was injured and rookie point guard Rodney Stuckey stepped in and filled the void admirably.  Unfortunately for Detroit, that playoff performance by Stuckey may have been what led to Billups being traded one week into this past season, when he was dealt to Denver in exchange for Allen Iverson.

While Detroit believed this was the shake-up their players needed to kick things into high gear once again, it proved to do the exact opposite.  The Pistons went from winning 59 games in 2007-’08 to 39 win in ’08-’09.  Iverson did not fit in with the team concept that Detroit had thrived on the past several years and eventually was asked to stay home (even during the team’s brief and embarrassing playoff “run”) after expressing frustration about his role on the team.

As the Pistons faded into mediocrity, Billups proved to be the floor leader that the Nuggets had been missing as he helped Denver advance to the Western Conference Finals before bowing out to eventual-champion Los Angeles.

The one bright spot of the trade for Detroit was that Iverson was only under contract for the remainder of the season, so if the experiment didn’t work, then the Pistons would have Iverson’s $20 million off the books and could hit the 2009 free agent market with the ability to afford even the most expensive player available.

So how did they spend the money they had just “saved” by dealing the glue that held everything together (Billups)?

They gave Rip Hamilton a 3-year, $34 million extension on the same day they traded Billups, and then yesterday agreed to terms on a reported 5-year, $55 million deal with former Bulls shooting guard Ben Gordon and a reported 5-year, $35 million deal with former Bucks power forward Charlie Villanueva.

Gordon and Villanueva are both good players, but would fit best on a top-tier team as powerful scoring threats off the bench or as starters with secondary roles (ala Mo Williams in Cleveland).  In Detroit they will probably end up being the Pistons top two scorers, and it won’t result in wins.

It should also be pointed out that Detroit could have had even more money to spend this summer had they not gambled (and lost) by signing former number one overall pick Kwame Brown (averaged 4.2 points and 5.0 rebounds this season) to a deal last summer that allowed Brown to exercise a $4 million player option for 2009-‘10, which given his performance, he obviously used, knowing he could not get that much in free agency.

This certainly cannot be the way that Joe Dumars could have imagined things playing out.  Trade Chauncey Billups.  Lose 20 more games than the year before.  Use the money from Iverson and Rasheed Wallace’s expiring contracts to sign another shooting guard (Gordon) and an offensive-minded power forward (Villanueva).  I can’t picture this ending well for Detroit in the short-term or long-term.

In essence, Billups was traded for Gordon.

With no head coach in place after firing Michael Curry a few days ago, it’s tough to say for sure if they would sign Gordon to a contract that large and then make him their sixth-man.  But unless you genuinely think that you are going to be one of the top four teams in the NBA over the span of Gordon’s contract (which the Pistons won’t be as presently constructed), why spend all that money on a reserve?

Or do they attempt to find a taker for Hamilton?  If so, do you really want to spend $55 million over five years on a starting guard like Gordon who is a streaky shooter and a defensive liability?

All in all it’s safe to say that Dumars would love to hit the reset button to June 26, 2003 and select Wade, Bosh, or Anthony and let another franchise endure the Milicic experiment.  Then fast forward to November 3, 2008 when Dumars is being swindled by Denver to give up Billups for Iverson, and respond with a resounding “No, thank you!”