Gecko
02-17-2006, 03:53 PM
I am sure this has already been posted so swat if that's the case.
Q: What do you think of the Darko deal? Speaking from a Pistons fan perspective, I love it. If you look at Darko for what he is (NOTHING), then we're basically getting a (Top 5 protected) draft pick for 2007, which will be one of the deepest drafts in a decade, and clearing a bunch of cap space to re-sign Ben and Chauncey for Carlos Arroyo. Hmm, an erratic, pouting, showboating backup point guard for a first rounder and cap space?-- Tad Dixon, Kalamazoo, Mich.
SG: What did I think? I think you could have had Dwyane Wade, Carmelo Anthony or Chris Bosh three summers ago. Maybe Joe Dumars is an excellent GM, and maybe this current Pistons team was one of the most thoughtfully put-together teams of the last 25 years. But I'm tired of reading how the Darko pick was defensible. There's no way to predict how an under-20 foreign player from a small country will adapt socially, mentally or physically to riding an NBA bench for a couple of years. It's an enormous risk -- like taking a baby on a cross-country flight. You just don't know. So why take that risk in a loaded draft when you don't need to do so?
Here's the crazy thing: People are still defending the pick. For instance, Mitch Albom wrote on Wednesday, "As for those who say the Pistons blew it with Darko -- they could have drafted Carmelo Anthony or Dwyane Wade instead? Well, factually, that's true. But had that happened, these Pistons wouldn't be these Pistons, because somebody else would be gone. And these Pistons, during Darko's stay, have one championship and one near-championship."
No offense to Mitch, but what the hell does that mean? Who would be gone? Why couldn't they have kept everyone and the No. 2 pick? You're telling me the last three Pistons teams wouldn't have been better off with Carmelo as a sixth man, Wade as a third guard or Bosh as the backup big guy ... especially last year's team, that was forced to play six guys in Game 7 of the NBA Finals? Really? You're making that argument with a straight face? Having a better player would have held the team back?
Another Darko defense, this time from our own Chad Ford, who was Darko's biggest advocate in the summer of 2003 and now admits that "hindsight being 20-20, it's impossible to say the Pistons made the right decision when they chose the 18-year-old 7-footer from Serbia." I'm glad he came to that conclusion. But here's the part that got me:
"Darko sat. And stewed. He lived alone, one of his first mistakes. He got homesick. Started listening to the hecklers. Lost his passion for the game. By midseason of his rookie year, he spent more energy living the life of an NBA player off the court than playing the game that an NBA player is paid to play. When he did get into the game, typically only seconds before everyone went home, he looked out of place. 'Awkward' barely captures how lost the big kid looked. He tried to do too much, with too little time. Then, after a while, he just quit trying. He was awful and he knew it. The shame and embarrassment of it all, for a kid as proud as Darko, was too much to bear."
Precisely! Precisely! This is why you don't pass up blue-chip players in a loaded draft to roll the dice with a talented foreigner who could possibly have adjustment issues playing in a new country on a good team! Why not take a sure thing? Especially when you have an immediate chance to become a title contender? That's what never made sense. Plus, Dumars waited a year too late to trade Darko -- if he was moved for bench help last year, the 2005 Pistons probably would have won the title. If he was moved for bench help this summer, the 2006 Pistons probably would have won 70-plus. Instead, he was moved for cap space and a future first-rounder in 2007. In other words, through 2007, this current Pistons team will have had a four-year window in which it's been (A) exceptionally healthy, and (B) one of the best two or three teams in basketball each year, and somehow, it didn't get any help from the No. 2 selection of the most loaded draft of the decade (which happened at the start of that four-year window). I would say that's a complete disaster.
The bottom line: They could have won four or five straight titles with this current nucleus if Dumars didn't pass up three of the top-eight young assets in the league with that pick. As it stands, they're going to struggle to win two. That's why I believe that, other than Bowie-over-MJ, that was the most damaging draft-day decision of the last 20 years. And anyone who says otherwise is crazy.
Q: What do you think of the Darko deal? Speaking from a Pistons fan perspective, I love it. If you look at Darko for what he is (NOTHING), then we're basically getting a (Top 5 protected) draft pick for 2007, which will be one of the deepest drafts in a decade, and clearing a bunch of cap space to re-sign Ben and Chauncey for Carlos Arroyo. Hmm, an erratic, pouting, showboating backup point guard for a first rounder and cap space?-- Tad Dixon, Kalamazoo, Mich.
SG: What did I think? I think you could have had Dwyane Wade, Carmelo Anthony or Chris Bosh three summers ago. Maybe Joe Dumars is an excellent GM, and maybe this current Pistons team was one of the most thoughtfully put-together teams of the last 25 years. But I'm tired of reading how the Darko pick was defensible. There's no way to predict how an under-20 foreign player from a small country will adapt socially, mentally or physically to riding an NBA bench for a couple of years. It's an enormous risk -- like taking a baby on a cross-country flight. You just don't know. So why take that risk in a loaded draft when you don't need to do so?
Here's the crazy thing: People are still defending the pick. For instance, Mitch Albom wrote on Wednesday, "As for those who say the Pistons blew it with Darko -- they could have drafted Carmelo Anthony or Dwyane Wade instead? Well, factually, that's true. But had that happened, these Pistons wouldn't be these Pistons, because somebody else would be gone. And these Pistons, during Darko's stay, have one championship and one near-championship."
No offense to Mitch, but what the hell does that mean? Who would be gone? Why couldn't they have kept everyone and the No. 2 pick? You're telling me the last three Pistons teams wouldn't have been better off with Carmelo as a sixth man, Wade as a third guard or Bosh as the backup big guy ... especially last year's team, that was forced to play six guys in Game 7 of the NBA Finals? Really? You're making that argument with a straight face? Having a better player would have held the team back?
Another Darko defense, this time from our own Chad Ford, who was Darko's biggest advocate in the summer of 2003 and now admits that "hindsight being 20-20, it's impossible to say the Pistons made the right decision when they chose the 18-year-old 7-footer from Serbia." I'm glad he came to that conclusion. But here's the part that got me:
"Darko sat. And stewed. He lived alone, one of his first mistakes. He got homesick. Started listening to the hecklers. Lost his passion for the game. By midseason of his rookie year, he spent more energy living the life of an NBA player off the court than playing the game that an NBA player is paid to play. When he did get into the game, typically only seconds before everyone went home, he looked out of place. 'Awkward' barely captures how lost the big kid looked. He tried to do too much, with too little time. Then, after a while, he just quit trying. He was awful and he knew it. The shame and embarrassment of it all, for a kid as proud as Darko, was too much to bear."
Precisely! Precisely! This is why you don't pass up blue-chip players in a loaded draft to roll the dice with a talented foreigner who could possibly have adjustment issues playing in a new country on a good team! Why not take a sure thing? Especially when you have an immediate chance to become a title contender? That's what never made sense. Plus, Dumars waited a year too late to trade Darko -- if he was moved for bench help last year, the 2005 Pistons probably would have won the title. If he was moved for bench help this summer, the 2006 Pistons probably would have won 70-plus. Instead, he was moved for cap space and a future first-rounder in 2007. In other words, through 2007, this current Pistons team will have had a four-year window in which it's been (A) exceptionally healthy, and (B) one of the best two or three teams in basketball each year, and somehow, it didn't get any help from the No. 2 selection of the most loaded draft of the decade (which happened at the start of that four-year window). I would say that's a complete disaster.
The bottom line: They could have won four or five straight titles with this current nucleus if Dumars didn't pass up three of the top-eight young assets in the league with that pick. As it stands, they're going to struggle to win two. That's why I believe that, other than Bowie-over-MJ, that was the most damaging draft-day decision of the last 20 years. And anyone who says otherwise is crazy.