9th December - New Orleans Pelicans VS Detroit Pistons - 6-17
Last game we got annihilated by the Dallas Mavericks in the single worst loss this franchise has ever suffered under the Pelicans name. It was a 46 point murder. I missed it live, but watched it back when I woke up and frankly, I'm surprised it wasn't slightly worse than 46, given how it looked at times. Not only was it a franchise worst loss; it was also a franchise tying 8th consecutive loss. That's right, at 8 losses we are now tied for the worst losing streak in franchise history, under the Pelicans name.
But that's behind us. That was against Dallas. They're a good team. Tonight we play the Pistons. They're 9-14. Better than us, sure, but still comfortably sub-.500. After the Thunder losses, that doesn't seem to mean much, but it does mean that we should be slightly less overmatched. Here's the injury report:Pelicans injury report - 12.9 vs. DET:
— Pelicans PR (@PelicansPR) December 8, 2019
QUESTIONABLE
Derrick Favors – Personal Reasons
OUT
Darius Miller – Right Achilles Surgery
Zion Williamson – Right Knee Scope
Interesting to note that Favors is listed there as ''questionable'', rather than out. Does that mean he plays tonight? No idea. But worth keeping in mind.
Whether Favors plays or not tonight is a big what-if. If he does play, and he logs heavy minutes (30 minutes or more) then this won't be an issue, but if Favors doesn't play, then we have to worry about Andre Drummond, the de facto franchise player of the Pistons. He's a rebounding machine, we all know it, and we're a team that's not the strongest on the boards. He's also a big body: listed at somewhere around 290lbs, Drummond has 70lbs on Hayes easily. Okafor, even when he's at his best, is not exactly a voracious rebounder either; essentially what I'm saying is that if Favors doesn't play, we could be getting 30 boards pulled down on us tonight. Drummond is averaging 17 rebounds a night.
What else do we need to consider against Detroit? Well, Reggie Jackson is out and Markieff Morris is day to day, so that eases up the burden somewhat. They do still have threats though.
1) The Pistons shoot 39.6% from three, and are the most accurate team in the NBA from long range. Neither Blake nor Drummond are monster 3pt shooters (though Blake is certainly solid), so that tells you something important: their roleplayers are marksmen. Among players who take at least 1 3PA per game, they have three guys who shoot over 45% from deep, and another three who shoot at least 40%. Our perimeter defense needs to be active and intense tonight, or we could get holes shot in us quickly.
2) They are top ten in assists per game; they move the ball pretty well. They are, however, somewhat turnover prone, especially given their slow pace (16.3 per game) so it's important that the team defense is on high alert tonight (which is troubling because our team D is pretty awful overall)
3) Pistons don't foul. They only give up a FTR of .183 to opposing offenses, which is very low. Combine that with our inability to get real foul calls anyway, we can't rely on the refs here. This has to be a game where guys impose themselves early.
4) Pistons are the 10th best offense in the NBA, so they're a little better than us, and they're the 17th best defense so, again a bit better than us. That's worrying. The upside is that they're the 6th slowest team in the NBA; we do not need to run so fast that our own defense falls apart, but even just 'solid' pace is more than they're used to. If we can ramp them up a little, it might skew their results for the night.
That's about all I've got going on in my head for this one, at least that's write-able
Hopefully getting slaughtered like we did last game has at least wounded some pride, and will lead to some fight-back tonight. Somehow I find that a little hard to believe, but even if we fail to respond to the circumstances, at least we'll break a record! It'll be the record for ''longest losing streak'', which sucks, but it's a record nonetheless.
#WBD
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Originally Posted by msusousaphone
