The Detroit Pistons got a shot in the arm on Monday evening when they went out and acquired Blake Griffin from the Los Angeles Clippers. It was a move that came out of left field, and one that the Pistons hope will help them go from the nine seed to a spot in the postseason.
One day later and we finally learned the team’s thinking, courtesy of head coach and president of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy. During a media session, Van Gundy broke down how getting Griffin was hardly a move with just this season in mind.
“Our thinking was this, the hardest thing to do in this league is to get a proven star,” Van Gundy said. “It’s just very hard to do, it’s hard to do in free agency, it’s hard to do in trades, you get very few opportunities to do it. The guy’s a five-star All-Star, been an All-NBA guy, put him in the top-15 guys in the league. He’s only 28 years old, we know the injury history, that’s the risk on it, but that risk was worth it because of the talent we’re bringing back.”
Van Gundy isn’t necessarily wrong, because Griffin does bring the team a level of star power that it hasn’t had in a really long time. He also seems to be at peace with the fact that there’s a good chance that Griffin’s checkered injury history catches up to the team at some point, which, obviously, no one wants to see.
But above all, the Pistons know the path to a title is through stars. Who knows if they’ll ever win a ring with this team as the general framework, but the team believes Griffin helps them move closer towards reaching that goal. In Detroit, where landing a star in free agency is always an uphill battle, trading for one with four years left on his deal was likely their best chance to lock up a star talent for the long-term.
