NBA: 7 teams with questionable futures heading into the offseason

Detroit Pistons

In my eyes, the Detroit Pistons‘ fate was sealed when the former coach and president of basketball ops, Stan Van Gundy, in a desperate attempt to save his job decided to trade for Blake Griffin. That trade bought themselves a one-way ticket into settling for being the Bucks’ punching bag this year and for plain and simple mediocrity the following years.

In an era where spacing and switching is practically everything, Andre Drummond‘s situation with the team is quite sticky. There is no questioning his elite rebounding and inside scoring abilities, but paying a guy who doesn’t space the floor and has below average defensive abilities over $80 million the next three years isn’t really an ideal situation to be in.

So, with the league’s 7th highest payroll and a slightly above average squad who profile as low seed contenders, where do the Pistons go from here? A trade involving either Andre Drummond or Blake Griffin would be ideal but finding a trade partner who’s willing to take on their massive respective deals is a tough ask.

The only silver lining here is that after the 2019-20 season, their payroll will shrink to a measly $67 million, meaning that if they can endure another year being average at best, they could perhaps swing an all-or-nothing trade to bring in a third piece to pair with Drummond and Griffin. However, the most realistic option would be to simply blow it up and initiate the tank, as I’d doubt both big men would be around in the Motor City by the 2020 offseason.