Detroit means business
No Jalen Duren, no Isaiah Stewart. Rowdy rah-rah halftime speech from Knicks head coach Mike Brown, Stephen Fry at the Knicks game, didn't faze the Pistons, did not faze them, crunched the Knicks, crunched them on Thursday, 126-111.
Detroit entered the All-Star break with the NBA's best record, nobody talked about them but the coaches of every team in the East and a few from the West. The Knicks had all week to prepare for Thursday's initial post-break performance, talk themselves from the back to frontpage, stunk. Knicks made to stink by a superior opponent.
There is no chance this game snuck up on the Knicks, these two teams are kinda familiar. And the Knicks won't hear anything but this stat until the teams meet again in the playoffs: Detroit's busted New York three outta three games this year, Piston advantages of 31, 38 and now 15 points in the lone loss in New York. Podcast hosts don't have to look those differences up, they can memorize "31," "38" and "15." It is only recalling Ricky Davis, Viktor Khryapa, and (obviously) Andris Biedriņš' uniform numbers.
Unforgettable number, Andris.
If they meet in the playoffs. The Knicks are 1.5 games behind Boston for the No. 2 seed, seven games behind top-seeded Detroit, tied with No. 4-seeded Cleveland. New York is no guarantee to top Boston in the second round, nor No. 6 Philly in the first round, nor No. 5 Toronto. No cinch to top, should New York secure a No. 2 seed, the quickest club to emerge from the percolating Eastern Play-In.
This column isn't about my Walt Frazier impression, though. This column isn't about New York, every other column is about New York but not this one. This is about the Pistons, the team we shoulda been focusing on the entire time. Steve Rubell was born in Detroit, you know.
No he wasn't, Crown Heights, but so many other tastemakers we associate with tall buildings and arty lofts – Patti Smith, Madge, Hoffa, Iggy – came from Michigan, why couldn't Steve? If the Pistons can top the Knicks by 28 points per game a year after New York beat Detroit in the playoffs, why aren't we all in love with the 2025-26 Detroit Pistons? Why isn't this everyone's second-favorite team? Do they not mean business? I think they mean business.
