Here are a few facts about the Detroit Pistons, who have completely lost their mojo:
- They have lost six of their last seven games, including a 119-94 loss to the Milwaukee Bucks on Wednesday and a 113-82 loss to the Chicago Bulls last week.
- In the last three weeks, their only victories have come against the Minnesota Timberwolves, Dallas Mavericks and the Cleveland Cavaliers (with LeBron James and J.R. Smith out of the lineup).
- Since guard Reggie Jackson made his season debut on Dec. 4 -- a moment that was supposed to galvanize the Pistons, not set them back -- they have had the league's worst offense (100.3 points per 100 possessions) and third-worst net rating (-6.4 points per 100 possessions).
- At 15-19, they are tied with the Orlando Magic for 11th place in the Eastern Conference.
It's no surprise, then, that Detroit president and coach Stan Van Gundy is less than thrilled with what's going on. On Thursday, he told reporters that he does not plan to blow up the team, but he knows it should be better and can see the season slipping away.
"I'm focused on getting this group to play better and to try to figure this out; my focus is not on changing everything," Van Gundy said, via The Detroit News' Rod Beard. "I've seen this group win; I know this group can win. I know this group can be good; I know this group should be better than it is. I'm approaching it as a coaching issue. "I've got a team that is underachieving where they should be, from a coaching standpoint. That's how my thought process is right now: How do we get this team playing better, bringing more consistent energy?"
The Eastern Conference is a mess, so the Pistons are only two games back of the sixth-place Atlanta Hawks. Going into the season, though, they had hopes of having home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs. If they keep playing like this, that will seem comical -- just making the postseason looks like a challenge now.
"We're in jeopardy right now -- that's certainly not out of it by any means, but every loss puts you in more jeopardy, especially when you're losing at home like we are," Van Gundy said, via The Detroit News. "There's no question that you have to understand that. You can't run from the fact that all those losses are putting you in jeopardy."
Van Gundy's frustration is understandable, and it's not clear that there's a change he can make to fix this. Last week, Van Gundy tried to shake things up by starting Jon Leuer instead of Tobias Harris. Leuer has been solid and Harris has been excellent as a bench scorer, but this has not ended Detroit's malaise.
As Van Gundy said, this group of players has played much, much better basketball together. The longer that the Pistons struggle, the more they will look like last year's Houston Rockets. It has now been 12 days since their players-only meeting and 10 days since that Bulls blowout, which Van Gundy described as unprofessional, humiliating, embarrassing and disgusting.
If Detroit is going to turn things around, it has to start with Jackson, who was criticized by his teammates for not sharing the ball enough and then criticized by his coach for his lack of aggressiveness when he, as Sports Illustrated's Rob Mahoney put it, staged "an in-game protest." Jackson is at his best when he's attacking the basket, attracting defensive attention and either finishing at the rim or kicking the ball to open teammates. The Pistons need him to do that, but they don't seem to want their entire offense to be built around his pick and rolls, like it was last season.
The key for the rest of this season is finding a balance so Jackson and Detroit's other playmakers can be comfortable. It appears that is much easier said than done.
