Same old Pistons?

[Tahoe]

Too early to tell

Looks the same to me

No, we are playing different ball

[Wilfredo Ledezma]

Too early to say, wait til' Stuckey gets back...and IF amir johnson ever gets a chance to touch the damn floor after warm-ups

[Hermy]

Yup, the type of team that should make the Conf. finals. We should all be proud and not bitch like women.

[DE]

I don't know if Same Ole Pistons is fair but I would like to see them drop the getting killed in the paint and on the boards shit from last year and last night.

[DrRay11]

I want to see Amir and Stuckey play before I decide. One of the two can happen now if the coach would give him 10 or less mins per game...

[metr0man]

Looking forward to seeing Stuckey, but so far, it is the same old Pistons...

that's not all bad of course since we are very lucky to have a perennially good team - the starters could win 50 games in their sleep. As long as you ignore the fact we have (had?) the team to win multiple titles.

What I really want from this team are the things that Flip can't seem to provide:

-A strong rebounding team
-An inside-out offense
-that poise under pressure
-Great defense

to be fair there are things we DO WELL. We limit turnovers and do have balanced scoring, we are pretty good under pressure not as good as the pistons of old, and we have good jump shooters, our defense is good in small spurts, and on any given night can have mismatches to exploit with our personnel. The limiting turnovers thing is a nice stat, but I could gladly give up some turnovers to get better rebounding. its like last night... we were within 2, then within 3, then within 1, then up 1, then down 2, and somehow, i knew we were going to lose. I expected it - that's not something I remember happening during the 03-05 Pistons.

It just feels like we're the perenial hurdle. the hump that someone else has to cross. At this point, it could be Chicago or Boston beating us in the CF if the pattern holds - i hope it doesn't.

[Tahoe]

Feels like the same old Pistons to me, but its early.

We get down and STILL expect to be able to flip a switch and come back and win it. I still think that game in last years playoffs in Chicago(?) where we were down a bunch and came back to win, hurt us. We still think we can do that anytime we want.

I see a big difference in urgency in the second half and we play better. Ripis the only player that seems to hustle ALL the time. He isn't the perfect player but lack of hustle isn't it. The others seem to lollygag around for a while till it gets close to games end.

This was mostly last nights game, but feel THAT is the Pistons we'll see come playoff time.

[Atticus771]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say this year's team is different. Why?

1. It starts with Rasheed. Honestly, if Rasheed keeps playing the way he has been, how can we NOT be better this year? I defy anyone to say that Rasheed has been anything but superb.

2. We have a more-active, contributing bench. Yes, I know we didn't see much of it against Chicago, and I'm not sure why. But even last night Maxiell played well, Nazr did some good things, and Jarvis was okay. Once Stuckey returns and Amir gets fully healthy, our bench will be turning some heads.

3. Flip Saunders is growing to be more-assertive with this team. Granted, he does need to emphasize things other than good shots and low turnovers, like rebounding and protecting the paint, but I believe the players are listening to him more this year. In the offseason, the players told him they wanted him to be more vocal and hard-nosed, and I think we'll see more of that as the year goes on.

4. Focus. This team is way more focused than it has been the last few years, and I think we all can see that. They know the window will only be open a few more years most likely, and they don't want their legacy to be "the team who won a championship but should have won three."

[Big Swami]

4. Focus. This team is way more focused than it has been the last few years, and I think we all can see that. They know the window will only be open a few more years most likely, and they don't want their legacy to be "the team who won a championship but should have won three."

I think we can all agree that without a little bit of discipline, that focus is easily disrupted by all kinds of lame garbage.

[Tahoe]

We're soft in the middle. We're gonna have the same result this year.