As the Detroit Pistons seek to bounce back into contention, it’s important to remember how Blake Griffin should be valued as a part of that rebuild.
In more ways than one, the 2018-19 season feels like an eternity ago. The world looked completely different, literally, and the Detroit Pistons were being carried to the NBA playoffs thanks to an astonishing performance from Blake Griffin that nobody ever saw coming.
With admittedly fading athleticism, Griffin relied upon a barrage of 3-point shooting the likes of which had only been seen once before in the history of the Pistons organization. That’s right, the once-all-world dunker had the second-most prolific 3-point shooting season in team history with 189 makes, hitting just two 3-pointers fewer than Allan Houston.
Of course, it wasn’t all 3s for Griffin as the carrier of the heaviest offensive load. 26.4 percent of his possessions were post-ups, and he was efficient, scoring .923 points per possession (PPP). 18.7 percent of his possessions were as the pick and roll ball-handler, and he was very efficient, scoring .994 PPP, which placed him in the 87th percentile.
The Pistons were even better when Blake Griffin was able to take a step back and let the Reggie Jackson/Andre Drummond pick and roll really cook, but they wouldn’t have been able to be nearly as effective without Griffin being an existential threat to defenses both on the ball and off it.
As we know now, the constant wear and tear on Griffin’s knees grew to be too much, and he missed games late in the season and the first two games of the NBA playoffs (if we can call it that) against the Milwaukee Bucks. He wasn’t himself in 2019-20 and was shut down for the season just after Christmas.
Both Griffin and the organization say he’s back to 100 percent, and hopefully, that’s the case, but naturally the Pistons will need to be prepared for the worst-case scenario that does not provide for him to be at full strength. Whatever the case may be, however, the Pistons must not treat him like a salary dump.
Blake Griffin is not a salary dump for the Detroit Pistons
When dumping salary in the NBA, you need a reason to get another team to take on your bad money. Generally speaking, that comes in the form of incentives like your own valuable draft picks or young players. As the Pistons are in the beginning stages of their own rebuild, those draft picks and youngsters have far more value to them than any kind of salary flexibility that they could gain from trading Blake Griffin’s contract.
Mind you, it remains a huge contract with two years and $75.5 million remaining on it, but the Pistons have done a good job of letting the clock run out on other bad contracts signed during the Stan Van Gundy years, and the added flexibility doesn’t necessarily provide much utility.
There are a few acceptable outcomes for the Blake Griffin saga in Detroit. The first is that having almost (or more than) a year off to recover does wonders for him and he has another 2018-19-level season in him. That can lead to either a surprise playoff run thanks to his rejuvenation, or rehabilitated trade value that could be moved as a positive asset at the trade deadline to a contender.
The other path is that Griffin does not return to his former greatness and he either struggles through the season or gets shut down at some point once again. If that’s the case, the Detroit Pistons will need to eat that contract for the remainder of its duration.
There isn’t a desperate sense of urgency to move Griffin, and the Pistons should not try to accelerate it unnecessarily. As we heard reports of teams like the New York Knicks being eager to use their cap space to take on bad contracts, remember that this doesn’t describe the situation the Pistons are in.
As things stand now, Blake Griffin’s contract does qualify as bad salary, but their situation does not require or advise a salary dump in any way.