Detroit Pistons: Derrick Jones Jr. could be a solid free agent target

The Detroit Pistons will enter free agency with a laundry list of needs. Derrick Jones Jr. might satisfy some of those when free agency begins.

The Detroit Pistons finally have the opportunity to hit the reset button going into the new season. With a new general manager, Troy Weaver, and Andre Drummond jettisoned for salary cap flotsam, a new day is about to begin for the organization.

With his deep ties to the OKC Thunder and Sam Presti going back more than a decade, Weaver might be a proponent of certain tendencies in his quest to rebuild his new team. If that’s the case, there may be no better fit among the bargains of the free agent market than Derrick Jones Jr.

As the Miami Heat are preparing for what they hope will be the coming of Giannis Antetokounmpo in the summer of 2021, there will be some tough choices and cuts to be made. Unfortunately for Jones, he may find himself on the outside looking in as the Heat move on.

Jones suffered more than anybody on their roster as a result of a trade-deadline move that brought Jae Crowder and Andre Iguodala to South Beach. Crowder thrived and started for the Heat on the wing, while Iguodala was a solid bench stopper on the defensive end. In team president Pat Riley’s recent comments to the media, he expressed sympathy for Jones’s situation:

"“I do believe what changed for Derrick was the addition of Andre [Iguodala] and Jae [Crowder] midseason, and now Spo had 11, 12 guys that could play. And I feel bad for Derrick, I really do.”"

The Heat’s logjam on the wing could be to the benefit of the Detroit Pistons. Over the course of the last decade or two, the wing has been a place of utter poverty, almost certainly the lowest-rated in the NBA both in the aggregate and on a year-by-year basis. While Jones isn’t exactly a classic difference-maker, he could provide depth, defense and some athletic juice to a team that has been anything but physically explosive for a long, long time.

Last season Jones averaged 8.5 points, 3.9 rebounds, 1.1 assists and 1.0 blocks in 23.3 minutes per game. He’s a poor 3-point shooter, but the 2020 NBA Slam Dunk contest winner is explosive around the rim and his length and strength make him a potent defender in any scheme.

With the Thunder, Weaver and Presti often prioritized length and athleticism over perimeter shooting in their team-building philosophy, and if that’s a methodology that Weaver brings with him to Detroit, Derrick Jones Jr. could be a tailor-made signing.

Using Jacob Goldstein’s PIPM-based wins-added salary prediction tool, assuming 14.1 percent usage and 1,600 minutes played (22.2 minutes per game over the course of a 72-game season, as 2020-21 is expected to be), Jones would have a 67.7 percent chance of providing positive value on a three-year, $23.2 million contract.

Of course, these are just projections, but it gives an idea of the kind of value a bargain like Jones is likely to provide in a weak free agent class where there isn’t much salary cap space to throw around.

Expect the leaks and rumors coming from the Pistons to be few and far between, but it would be surprising if Derrick Jones Jr. wasn’t on their board to keep an eye on at this point.