Pistons to acquire Brandon Jennings
Multiple outlets reporting sign-and-trade with the Bucks for Jennings, with his contract being 3 yrs $24 million. No word on what the Pistons are giving up. I'm not a fan of this move.EDIT: sending Knight, Middleton, and Kratsov. link:http://sports.yahoo.com/news/nba--pistons-to-acquire-brandon-jennings-in-sign-and-trade-deal-211830240.html
As of now Jennings has been a very talented player who has the potential to have a huge game. With a new team one can hope he becomes a top 5 pg who can score 20 a game and pitch in an adequete amount of assists. He potentialy is a guy who can make a few all-star games and be a perenial top 10 pg.
Brandon Jennings is an inefficient chucker and he's not much of a facilitator either. He's got a career 17.0 points per game on 15.5 shots per game. That's beyond awful. Someone else mentioned his 51% TS% last year (career TS% is < 50%), which is laughably bad.
Just when you think the Pistons are going in the right direction by drafting guys like Drummond and Monroe they turn around and acquire Josh Smith and Brandon Jennings.
But I will say he builds a winner through FA/ trades rather than the draft. When we won in 04 only 1 starter was a draft pick(Tayshaun). The only key contributors that came off the oak, that were our picks, were Lindsey and Okur. The argument can be made that Mike James and Corliss gave more off the pine. The later acquisitions of Mcdyess and C-Webb were good moves.
Bottom line if Joe D could draft better he would be fine.
Darko over Melo/Wade/Bosh at #2 overall. Joe D isn't alone in this one.
I am Nuggets fan, actually. When I saw the terms of this deal, I thought the Pistons got a steal-- of course, I like Jennings alot, so that might color my impression. Also, Brandon Knight is a guy who has never once done anything to distinguish himself from "average gaurd-type substance". In fact, I realized today that the picture that my mind has associated with Brandon Knight was actually Patrick Beverly, for whatever reason.
In other words, I can actually say wouldn't have believed Brandon Knight telling me he was Brandon Knight before tonight. Brandon Jennings could be a top 10 PG (doubful, especially in this golden age of point gaurd play, but he has that type of potential)-- Knight will be lucky to be a top 10 combo bench guy.
18.7 PPG, 7.7 APG, 3.0 RPG
1.0 SPG, 2.8 TOPG
44%/85.6%/37.8%
Brandon Jennings (3 Years, $24 Million)
17.5 PPG, 6.5 APG, 3.1 RPG
1.6 SPG, 2.5 TOPG
39.9%/81.9%/37.5%.
Not much difference in production. $12 million less per year and for 2 less years. Also, Jennings hasn't played with the quality of teammates, nor coaches that Williams has been afforded.
I'm all for being a homer, but c'mon bro, slow your road on that one.
Jennings definitely seems like an upgrade in talent over Knight and the Pistons really didn't give up anyone that was a sure thing to be in their rotation next season. Also, 3 yr/$24 million seems reasonable.
I do share concerns that he doesn't seem to be a great shooter who compounds that by shooting a lot, but look at thost Bucks team, outside of him and Monta Ellis, who else would you want to shoot the ball? The last two seasons with Monta Ellis, the Bucks' 3rd leading scorer were J.J. Redick and Drew Gooden. The two seasons before that, without Ellis, the other primary option was John Salmons.
One can only hope that with a better supporting cast, he won't need to shoot as much and he'll continue to increase his assist rate (which has gone up every season). Also, as far as shooting, he did have a good year from 3 last season (.375) which is something that this team needs.
Overall, the roster definitely seems like it has more talent and it'll be interesting to see how it all fits together.
Looking at Jennings' Milwaukee numbers and after watching him play and all the critiques against him, he's a good player, solid point guard with a lot of potential to score and set up teammates. He's a more than willing passer who seems to enjoy setting up teammates. I'm not sure why he's labeled as selfish. Too many tattoo's maybe. Detroit's current roster is vastly different and, in my opinion, more talented than Milwaukee's team last year. With that being said, Jennings will have a different role w/ the Pistons. He'll still be the PG, but there won't be so much pressure on him to score. Cheeks plus growth and maturity will slow Jennings down a bit, remove a few of those poor shots, long twos and learning to play solid, team defense and he could easily turn into a very, very good player.
Most of his weaknesses are fixable (is that a word?). I need to see him improve on his off hand as he's a lefty who doesn't finish very well w/ his right hand. Jennings is still a project, but he's a much more polished, experienced project than Knight and he's better than any other PG that was available. This move improves the Pistons a lot and frees up some roster spots and some of the logjam in the frontcourt. Good job, Joe. Just my opinion.
This is off topic and should be marked as such.
Included in the trade are
Brandon Knight - Kentucky
Khris Middleton - Texas A&M
Viacheslav Kravtsov - foreign
This does not have any play on UofM sports in any such way.
BTW, the Pistons presumably didn't draft Trey Burke (I believe he suited up a time or two for UofM) because they already had their PG "of the future" in tow. So this post is in direct correlation to that draft night debacle that set this blog ablaze. Boom. Lawyered!
Yes the post should have been marked OT, but it is clearly labeled about what it's about and if you aren't a Pistons/NBA fan, you have plenty of warning not to click on it. I'm fine with pointing out poorly labeled threads, but don't be a dick for no reason.
The Pistons won three championships when they were owned by Bill Davidson, a UM alumnus.
The Pistons have not yet made the playoffs since Tom Gores-a Sparty-bought the team.
Michigan=valiant victors
Sparty=NOOOOO
Gordon and Villanueva got 90M+ deals one offseason
Smith, Jennings, Billups and Datome got 86M+ deals this offseason
Joe D did a good job this offseason IMHO...hopefully this Roster gels and the Pistons end up a 4-6 seed and win a playoff series.