One man's honest opinion about sports in the Motor City, and beyond.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

A Swede Daye for the Pistons

The Pistons embarrassed the Bobcats in a 98-73 romp Wednesday night at the Palace of Auburn Hills, and improved to 4-4 on the season. Charlie Villanueva led the way with 30 points and played solid defense. I believe the Pistons' largest lead was 312 until head coach John Kuester sent in the Pistons Spare Tires dance team for an 8-minute stretch in the 4th quarter.

I would really love to tell you (my audience of 3.5 people, 1 dog and an albino titmouse named Mahornathon) that the Pistons are a deep team. That Jonas “The Swedish Piranha” Jerebko and Austin “For real, are you sure that’s not Tayshaun Prince?” Daye looked solid against Charlotte tonight. That Jerebko – a 6-10 Swede, mind you – seems to be pretty athletic (he threw down a nice ‘oop’ early in the 1st.) Yes, I would love to tell you that, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Remember, this was the Charlotte Bobcats (3-5), and I’m still trying to figure out why the Pistons scheduled an NBA D-League team.

All jokes aside, the Pistons did look good – especially considering they are still short a Rip and a Prince (the Bobcats were missing Raja Bell and Nancy Lieberman.) If both Rip and Prince come back healthy the Pistons bench doesn’t look too bad. The top four off the bench would be Gordon, Bynum, Jerebko and Daye… Really, the second unit could be a lot worse.

The first half

The Pistons played solid defense, and once again Ben Wallace led the way. He had 4 rebounds, 3 steals and 3 blocks in the first half, and helped the Pistons hold the Bobcats to a mere 41 points. On the offensive side Gordon scored an effortless 16 points and Charlie V chipped in 12. The Pistons went into halftime leading by 12.

Third quarter, game over

Detroit came out firing in the 3rd quarter and hit at least 69 shots in a row. Charlie V dropped 18 in the third by himself. Everyone was hitting shots. Even Darko… seriously, he flew in just to stick it Larry Brown (Bobcat's head coach). The Pistons outscored the Bobcats 29 to 12 in the 3rd and went into the 4th up by 28 points.

Solid game for Stuckey

Rodney Stuckey played a good game tonight. He limited his bad shots, and dished out 7 assists. He finished 6 of 10 from the field with 16 points and grabbed 5 boards. He’s actually rebounding very well this year. On paper this was a Billups-esque game. My Dad is skeptical of Stuckey, but that mostly stems from the devastating loss suffered when Joe Dumars accidentally traded Billups to Denver (it was an accident, right Joe?) Ok, it also stems from the fact that Stuckey has been taking way too many bad shots and not getting many assists (both very valid beefs). But, at least for one night, he looked good. I hope Kuester has him watch the tape of this game over and over again.

An a personal side

Stuckey, for my sake, please step it up this year. I’m not sure how many of my Dad’s “Billups was a closer, he’d get to the line In the 4th and the game would be over… who’s going to do that now is what I want to know” rants I can take. (Dad, if you read this, I agree with you, but Billups is gone. And you know what? He seems happy, and I think he’d like you to be happy too… Actually, check that, at least you aren’t talking about Allan Houston anymore.)

Holy Effing Bynum

Bynum had two incredible dunks in this game. The first, in the second quarter, was UH-Mazing… I would describe it, but this is the internet, so just watch it…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7rL7ONw6a4

Coming Up

The Pistons play the Wizards (2-6), in Washington, on Saturday night. Tip off at 7:00pm.

~Matt Penridge

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