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Pistons Notes: Griffin, Ellenson, Jackson, Smith

April 5th, 2018 at 3:29pm CST by Luke Adams

The Pistons’ faint playoff hopes were officially snuffed out on Wednesday night, when Detroit’s loss to Philadelphia eliminated the club from postseason contention. While the Pistons don’t have a ton to play for in the season’s final four games, injured star Blake Griffin continues to push for a return from his ankle injury and Stan Van Gundy hasn’t ruled out that possibility, as Keith Langlois of Pistons.com details. Still, Detroit’s head coach doesn’t sound desperate to get Griffin back on the court.

“I don’t know if that’s going to come or not,” Van Gundy said. “We’ve only got six days left. Four games in six days. Whether we see him again, I have no idea. But it’s certainly no better than 50-50.”

With Griffin still on the shelf for now, expect to see plenty of Henry Ellenson down the stretch for the Pistons, writes Langlois.

Here’s more out of Detroit:

  • How different might the Pistons’ season have looked if Reggie Jackson had been able to stay healthy? As Ansar Khan of MLive.com notes, Detroit had a 25-16 record in games Jackson played, which is a stat Van Gundy could point to when he meets with owner Tom Gores after the regular season ends.
  • Although the Pistons are officially out of the playoffs, there are still some important developments to watch down the stretch, says Rod Beard of The Detroit News. As Beard observes, Ellenson, Luke Kennard, and Stanley Johnson should get a significant chunk of minutes in the club’s final four games — and the Pistons could get to .500 without compromising their lottery position by winning their remaining games.
  • Ish Smith has seen action with 10 different teams in eight NBA seasons, but he has finally found a home with the Pistons, Beard writes in another piece for The Detroit News. Smith has one more year left on his contract with Detroit after this season.
  • With the 2017/18 season now in the books for the Grand Rapids Drive, expect two-way players Kay Felder and Reggie Hearn to be with the Pistons the rest of the way, tweets Beard.
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Pistons Notes: Trade Talks, S. Johnson, Griffin

February 5th, 2018 at 3:02pm CST by Luke Adams

The Pistons have already completed a deal that will likely go down as the biggest in-season trade of the 2017/18 season, acquiring Blake Griffin last week from the Clippers. Still, that doesn’t mean Detroit is ready to sit out this week’s deadline.

“[GM Jeff Bower] is always working,” president of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy said today, per Rod Beard of The Detroit News (Twitter link). “I don’t know that we will do anything or we won’t. I couldn’t put a percentage on the possibilities, but Jeff is still working.”

With Griffin and Andre Drummond – the latest Eastern Conference player of the week – leading the frontcourt, Van Gundy was asked about the possibility of adding a third star to that duo and creating a “Big Three” for the Pistons. In Van Gundy’s view though, the club already has a solid third option on the roster.

“To me, the third piece is Reggie [Jackson],” Van Gundy said, per Beard (Twitter link). “That’s pretty good. That’s a pretty good three. We’ve got it in place. We just don’t have it on the court right now.”

Here’s more on the Pistons:

  • With the possibility of another trade looming, Ansar Khan of MLive.com runs through the entire Pistons’ roster, examining each player’s value and odds of being dealt.
  • Stanley Johnson‘s name has surfaced repeatedly in trade rumors this season, and according to Vince Ellis of The Detroit Free Press (Twitter link), the Knicks are one team that has been monitoring the third-year forward. Ellis adds that he’d be “stunned” to see Johnson moved, however.
  • The acquisition of Griffin has re-energized the Pistons and their fan base, Beard writes for The Detroit News. Within the same piece, Beard notes that two-way players Kay Felder or Reggie Hearn could be in line for a call-up from the G League if Detroit’s need for backcourt help persists.
  • Earlier today, we passed along the latest on the Pistons’ reported interest in Rodney Hood.
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Pistons Sign Reggie Hearn To Two-Way Deal, Waive Luis Montero

January 15th, 2018 at 2:43pm CST by Arthur Hill

JANUARY 15, 2:43pm: The Pistons have made their deal with Hearn official, confirming in a press release that they’ve waived Montero. The team also announced Felder’s signing.

JANUARY 14, 1:26pm: The Pistons will waive Montero and sign both Hearn and Felder to two-way contracts, tweets Rod Beard of The Detroit News. Their pro-rated deals will give them each 22 days in the NBA.

12:50pm: The Pistons are close to finalizing a two-way contract with G League guard Reggie Hearn, tweets Marc Stein of The New York Times.

Hearn, who was in training camp with the Kings, has been playing for the Reno Bighorns and is averaging 14.7 points in 14 games.

The Pistons currently have Luis Montero filling one two-way spot and were reported yesterday to to be close to a deal with Kay Felder for the other one, so either the Felder deal fell through or some other roster move is in the works. Detroit converted Dwight Buycks‘ two-way deal to a regular contract on Friday.

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USA Basketball Announces Roster For First World Cup Qualifiers

November 14th, 2017 at 11:00am CST by Luke Adams

USA Basketball has announced its 12-man roster for the first round of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 Americas Qualifiers, bringing back four members of the squad that won gold earlier this year in FIBA’s AmeriCup tournament.

Here’s Team USA’s full 12-man roster:

The squad, which will be coached once again by Jeff Van Gundy, is comprised almost entirely of G League players, since most of the qualifying tournaments take place during the NBA season, preventing NBA players from participating. Team USA’s goal is for Van Gundy’s squad of G Leaguers to qualify for the 2019 World Cup, which will take place in August and September, when NBA players will be free to participate.

The new-look USA Basketball program is off to a good start, having gone 5-0 this summer to win a gold medal at the AmeriCup tournament. Drew, Hearn, Munford, and Warney were all part of that team.

This time around, Team USA will face Puerto Rico on November 23 and then Mexico on November 26. After those contests, the first round of World Cup qualifiers will resume in February before concluding in July. The top three teams in each first-round group will advance to the second round, which begins in September 2018 and concludes in February 2019, so the qualifying process will take some time to play out.

Meanwhile, the G League teams temporarily losing players to Team USA will be permitted one free move per lost player from the available player pool, tweets Adam Johnson of 2 Ways & 10 Days.

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Kings Waive Three Players

October 15th, 2017 at 8:55am CST by Luke Adams

The Kings got down to the regular season roster limit on Saturday by parting with three players, according to RealGM’s official NBA transactions log. Sacramento waived camp invitees Matt Jones, David Stockton, and Reggie Hearn.

Jones, a 6’5″ guard out of Duke, received an Exhibit 10 contract when he signed with the Kings, so he’s a good bet to land in the G League with the Reno Bighorns as an affiliate player, earning him a modest bonus.

Stockton and Hearn, meanwhile, have been mainstays at Reno in recent years, so it makes sense that they’d return to the Bighorns for the coming season. Details of the contracts they signed with Sacramento earlier this week aren’t known, but there’s a good chance they include Exhibit 10 clauses as well, to ensure both players get a little extra bonus money for heading back to the G League.

With the three cuts, the Kings are now ready for the regular season, with 15 players on NBA contracts and two on two-way deals.

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Kings Sign Reggie Hearn, David Stockton

October 10th, 2017 at 4:18pm CST by ChrisCrouse

The Kings have signed Reggie Hearn and David Stockton, according to a team press release.

Hearn played for Sacramento’s G League affiliate, the Reno Bighorns, over the past three seasons. During the 2016/17 campaign, he averaged 13.5 points while shooting 44.2% from downtown.

Stockton played for the Bighorns during three separate stints since 2014. He supplemented his G-League experiences with contracts in Croatia and New Zealand.

The Kings’ roster now stands at 20 players. Sacramento is likely to waive both players before the season begins and the duo is expected to suit up for the Bighorns as a result.

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USA Basketball Announces AmeriCup Roster

August 22nd, 2017 at 8:33am CST by Luke Adams

After taking 17 players to training camp, USA Basketball has narrowed that group down to 12 players for its official AmeriCup roster, the program announced in a press release. The players representing Team USA in next week’s AmeriCup tournament will be as follows:

The five players who missed the cut for the final roster were Rod Benson, Will Davis II, Ra’Shad James, Darius Morris, and Derek Willis.

“All 17 guys that came to camp in Houston had a strong case that they could have made that they should have been selected, but unfortunately, we could only take 12,” said U.S. coach Jeff Van Gundy. “It was very, very difficult getting down to that number, but we feel very happy with the guys that we have selected. We feel we have positional versatility, we have a good balance between size and quickness, so it will be interesting for us to go to Uruguay and see what we can do.”

As we detailed in an earlier story, FIBA has changed its format for qualifying for marquee events like the World Cup and the Olympics, and many of the qualifier tournaments will now take place during the NBA season. For those events, Team USA intends to primarily use players who have been spending time overseas and in the G League, with the bigger-name players taking over for the main events in 2019 and 2020.

Team USA doesn’t need to win the AmeriCup to qualify for the next World Cup and Olympics, but it’s a tournament the U.S. must participate in to eventually play in more crucial events. Van Gundy’s squad will participate in preliminary round games in Uruguay starting next Monday. If Team USA wins its group – which also includes Panama, the Dominican Republic, and host Uruguay – it would advance to the semifinals in Argentina in early September.

The program won’t face real pressure to win until November, when Team USA need a top-three finish in a pool that includes Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Cuba in order to start advancing to later qualifiers. For more in-depth details on how those qualifiers work, be sure to check out FIBA’s breakdowns for the 2019 World Cup and the 2020 Olympics.

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17 Players Vying For Spots On USA’s AmeriCup Roster

August 17th, 2017 at 9:02am CST by Luke Adams

USA Basketball has begun the process of selecting its roster for the AmeriCup 2017, the first of a series of qualifying tournaments under FIBA’s new format. As Brian Mahoney of The Associated Press details, Team USA doesn’t need to win the AmeriCup to qualify for the next World Cup and Olympics, but it’s a tournament the U.S. must participate in to eventually play in more crucial events.

Because upcoming qualifiers will take place during the NBA season, Team USA is putting together a roster primarily made up of G League players and veterans who have been playing overseas, as we previously learned. With training camp set to begin on Thursday, 17 hopefuls are suiting up for Team USA, with the program poised to eventually pare that group down to a 12-man roster.

Here are Team USA’s training camp participants, via USA Basketball:

Although there are no high-profile names in this group, several players have some NBA experience. Hilliard is currently a free agent, but appeared in 77 games over the last two seasons for the Pistons. Drew, Munford, and Plumlee have all played in at least a dozen NBA games.

Marshall, Morris, and Reggie Williams are perhaps the most notable names on the list, having played regular rotation roles for various NBA teams in recent years. Marshall was a lottery pick in the 2012 draft, while Williams has appeared in more than 200 NBA games since 2010.

None of the players on Team USA’s training camp roster are currently under contract with an NBA club, but Willis – the only player of the group who has yet to play professional ball – has reportedly agreed to a training camp deal with the Pistons.

The club will be coached by Jeff Van Gundy, an international rookie himself, and will eventually participate in preliminary round games in Uruguay later this month. If Team USA wins its group – which also includes Panama, the Dominican Republic, and host Uruguay – it would advance to the semifinals in Argentina in early September.

As Mahoney outlines in his report, Team USA won’t face real pressure to win until November, when the club need a top-three finish in a pool that includes Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Cuba in order to start advancing to later qualifiers. For more in-depth details on how those qualifiers work, be sure to check out FIBA’s breakdowns for the 2019 World Cup and the 2020 Olympics.

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