Game Review: McDyess deserves better

Who’s your favorite Piston?

Richard Hamilton? Rasheed Wallace? Tayshaun Prince? Rodney Stuckey? Jason Maxiell? Are you still hanging onto Allen Iverson? What about Walter Herrmann?

Detroit fans have so many different favorites these days. But they all seem to have the same No. 2.

Antonio McDyess.

McDyess is the consummate professional. He’s quiet, but he usually gets the job done. Last night, he did a little more than that.

McDyess scored 21 points and grabbed 22 rebounds. It was the Pistons’ first 20-20 game since Bison Dele had 26 and 20 in 1997.

Still, the Pistons lost to the Knicks, 116-111 in overtime. In all too typical fashion, McDyess’s teammates let him down.

• Richard Hamilton had eight turnovers and fouled Larry Hughes on a 3-pointer with 10 seconds left in regulation.
• The Pistons bench scored just 12 points — compared to 49 by the Knicks, including 30 from Nate Robinson.
• In his first start of the season, Jason Maxiell had just three points and two rebounds.

It was the fifth 20-20 game of McDyess’s career. The other four came in an 11-month span with the Nuggets. During that time, he also won a gold medal with the 2000 U.S. Olympic team.

McDyess was a supreme athlete and a rising player. In 1996, then-Denver coach Bernie Bickerstaff glowed about his star rookie to The (Colorado Springs, Colo.) Gazette.

“The guy has got talent,” Bickerstaff said. “You don’t see many guys who can jump with that kind of quickness and that kind of explosiveness. Those things just jump out at you. . . . He’s a keeper.”

But McDyess’s career derailed. He played just 94 games from the 2001-02 season through 2003-2004 as he dealt with an assortment of knee injuries.

In his first game back with the Knicks in 2003, he got teary eyed during and had to leave the court during the national anthem, according to The (Hackensack, N.J.) Record. As he tried to come back, he suffered through an inconsistent season, which included a trade to Phoenix.

Then he signed with the Pistons in 2004, and he became a solid contributor. His hops are gone, but he’s smarter. He has an excellent mid-range jumper, and he positions himself well for rebounds. That intelligent play endeared him.

But when he decided to come back to to the Piston when the Nuggets waived him after the Billup-Iverson trade, well, that took the respect everyone had for him to a new  level. He wanted to be in Detroit. These days, not many do.

The Pistons win over Orlando on Monday made McDyess a Piston. Of course, he was a Piston before, but that game meant he had played more games with Detroit than the Nuggets.

His impact is being seen this year more than any of his other years with the Pistons. The rebounded tone he set immediately improved them.

In the Pistons’ 19 games with him, they were 5-14 in the board war. With him, they’re 21-20-3.

McDyess is just 50th in the league in rebounds — hardly elite. But every player above him has played more minutes because McDyess had to sit out while waiting to sign with Detroit after Denver waived him.

McDyess originally joined the Pistons after they won the 2004 NBA Championship. McDyess has never won an title, and he took less money to join Detroit.

But the next year, the Pistons, no longer as hungry for a ring, blew a nine-point second-half lead to the Spurs in Game 7 of the NBA Finals. McDyess cried in the locker room. Then he went home to Houston and stayed in house for two weeks.

Last night’s loss won’t cost McDyess the ring he signed, and re-signed, with the Pistons to get. But it certainly doesn’t help.

McDyess has given so much to the Pistons, but what have they given him?

Game Review: Detroit 87, Atlanta 83

I wouldn’t read too much into this game. Detroit played OK. Atlanta played OK. The Hawks were slightly better.

That’s the nature of the NBA and its 82-game seasons. Not every game is going to have a grand meaning.

No Piston had a great game, and none had a bad game.

What’s important is not keeping this up. To get the fourth seed, Detroit can’t settle for the status quo. Atlanta is on pace to nab the fourth seed with 46 wins.

To get 46 wins, the Pistons will have to finish the season 15-6. Their best 21-game stretch of the season is 13-8.

So getting the fourth seed is a tough task, but it’s certainly not impossible. Detroit is playing its best basketball of the season. The winning percentage needed to get to 46 wins is fewer (.714) is lower than the Pistons’ winning percentage last year (.719)

But with tonight’s win, the Hawks have swept the Pistons in three games and will hold the tie-breaker. So, if the Hawks hold pace, the Pistons will need 47 wins.

As much as this game doesn’t reveal too much about the Pistons, it could be important at the end of the season. That’s why Detroit can’t afford too many more non-descript games.

Why the Hawks didn’t win, 96-95.

Both teams had about the expected offensive ratings. But the pace was much slower than expected. That’s why scoring was down.

Atlanta’s offensive efficiency was slightly higher than expected, and the Pistons’ was slightly lower. That’s why the margin was a bit wider than expected.

Notes

Will Bynum made 2-of-3 shots, scored six points, had three assists, a steal and no turnovers in 11 minutes. He has scored 35 points in the last four games — his best four-game scoring stretch of the season. If Allen Iverson comes back, and the Pistons decide they’re better without him, Bynum is proving to be a capable backup point guard.

Rodney Stuckey (four) and Richard Hamilton (three) had too many turnovers for a starting backcourt. Seven isn’t a ridiculous total, but it played a part in the Hawks’ close win.

With excellent rebounding in the fourth quarter, the Pistons won the battle on the glass, 45-43. Their rebounding played a large part in sticking around once the Hawks built a 78-70 lead with six minutes left.

McDyess has scored just 10 points combined in the last two games.

Josh Smith had four blocks, but teams should go right at him. Most of his blocks came when a Detroit player got around him and he was trying to catch him from behind.

A friend of mine saw Iverson at Motor City Casino on Tuesday night during the Nuggets game. How much does it mean that he’s not with the team when he could be?