Hiring Dwane Casey is a much-needed win for the Detroit Pistons

For the first time since trading for All-Star Blake Griffin, the Detroit Pistons made a splash by landing Dwane Casey, the best available head coach on the market.

When the Detroit Pistons wrapped up the 2017-18 regular season with a blowout win over the Chicago Bulls, it seemed safe enough to predict that it would be their last victory for a while.

Going into the offseason, there didn’t appear to be any opportunities for the Pistons to make a splash on the NBA radar.

Detroit has nine players under contract for next season, plus a $2.5 million team option for Reggie Bullock, a very team-friendly salary for a starter. The Pistons rank near the bottom of the league in available salary cap space, however, which means no one should expect them to make a realistic run at elite free agents such as LeBron James, Chris Paul or Paul George.

The Pistons’ only 2018 draft pick is at the 42nd spot. Plenty of teams can get a diamond in the rough in the second round, but even in this loaded draft class, there won’t be any headline-grabbing star rookies still on the board that late.

After going 39-43 last season and missing the playoffs for the eighth time in nine years, it seemed the Pistons were headed for more of the status quo next season.

But then on May 7, the franchise parted ways with head coach and president of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy. On Monday, the Pistons filled the coaching vacancy by agreeing to a five-year contract with Dwane Casey.

Detroit’s offseason splash had been made. For the first time since Jan. 29, when the team traded for All-Star power forward Blake Griffin, the Pistons made some noise with the mainstream sports media.

Landing the most-coveted NBA coaching candidate on the market, who was widely considered the best coach available, represents a much-needed win for a Detroit franchise whose future looks brighter today than it did one month ago.

Casey’s resume is certainly impressive.

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As a player, he won a national championship with the University of Kentucky in 1978 and began his coaching career as an assistant with the Wildcats under Hall-of-Famer Joe B. Hall the following year.

Casey coached in Japan for a few years before making his NBA debut as an assistant with the Seattle SuperSonics in 1994. He got his first head coaching job with the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2005, which he held for two years. He won an NBA title with the Dallas Mavericks as an assistant in 2011, and later that year landed the Toronto Raptors’ head coaching job.

Over the course of seven seasons, Casey led the Raptors to the most successful run in franchise history, including five straight playoff appearances and a franchise-record 59 wins this past season.

But the Raptors, like a lot of teams in the Eastern Conference over the last 15 years, had a LeBron James problem. Toronto suffered three straight playoff exits at the hands of LeBron’s Cleveland Cavaliers, the last two being four-game sweeps. It had turned the Raptors into something of a joke around the league (remember “LeBronto”?). A culture change was needed, and Casey was essentially made into the scapegoat, fired almost immediately after the Cavs bounced the No. 1-seeded Raptors from this year’s conference semifinals.

So like with most coaching hires, there was a reason why Casey was available in the first place that doesn’t exactly reflect positively on the coach.

Overall though, Casey is well-regarded as a good coach. Surely the Pistons’ fanbase would trade their team’s results over the last five years for what Casey was able to do with the Raptors.

One popular criticism of Casey’s actual coaching scheme is that he relies too much on his guards.

In Toronto, the All-Star backcourt of DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry carried a heavy scoring load; in the 2018 NBA Playoffs, the duo scored 37 percent of the Raptors’ total points and took 38 percent of the field goal attempts.

Jordan Kligman, who covers the Raptors for Hashtag Basketball, tweeted this in reaction to the Pistons hiring Casey:

In Casey’s defense though, who was he supposed to be running plays for? Jonas Valanciunas and his clunky post game? Serge Ibaka, who in recent years seems to think he’s Reggie Miller? It’s not like Casey’s Raptors had Chris Bosh in the frontcourt.

Sometimes, fans and media don’t give coaches enough credit.

Dwane Casey has been coaching high-level basketball since 1979. He has coached everyone from Sam Bowie (the college version) to Shawn Kemp to Kevin Garnett to Dirk Nowitzki. I think he has some acumen and knows a little bit about how to use a talented big man and get him the ball. I doubt Casey is going to see Griffin and Drummond on his roster and decide Reggie Jackson should be the captain of the ship.

For what it’s worth, Casey has already revealed he has big plans for Griffin. Here’s what he had to say to ESPN‘s Stephen A. Smith via Adrian Wojnarowski:

"“We’re going to empower him to expand his game, a lot like DeMar DeRozan in Toronto,” he said. “Expand his game out to the 3-point line, have some point-forward responsibilities with the basketball out on the floor bringing it down. Because he’s more than just a back-down, post-up player.”"

With a core trio of Griffin, Drummond and Jackson, the Pistons have a talented foundation that has potential to be good. They now have a head coach who inherited an even bleaker situation in Toronto and turned that team into a legit conference-title contender.

Casey is also well-liked and respected around the league. Most media members who cover the Raptors that I’ve heard from enjoyed working with him. Players like him. Other coaches like him. Casey recently won the National Basketball Coaches Association’s version of the Coach of the Year award for 2017-18 — over Boston’s Brad Stevens, who will probably win the media-voted “official” version handed out by the NBA — and I think that had a lot to do with how popular Casey is among his colleagues.

Next: Ranking the 5 favorites to win the 2019 NBA Finals

Casey is a winner, and the Pistons scored their first win of 2018-19 by bringing him into the fold.