If Giannis Antetokounmpo gets dealt to the Miami Heat, the headlines write themselves. Giannis and Bam Adebayo. A new East superteam. The end of an era in Milwaukee.
There’s a smaller piece of the latest Marc Stein report that could end up meaning a lot for the Detroit Pistons. Stein says Detroit could step in as a third team in a Giannis-to-Miami deal and walk away with Tyler Herro. It looks like the Pistons would just be helping someone else’s trade go through, but they could really be using it to speed up their own plan.
Detroit keeps getting linked to scorers
It almost doesn’t matter whether Herro is the exact player who ends up in Detroit, because the Pistons keep getting tied to scorers in general. Herro, Coby White, Isaiah Joe and Zach LaVine are all very different players with different contracts, but they would each fix the same thing Detroit struggled with all of last season, which was putting points on the board.
The Pistons made a real jump this year by reaching the Eastern Conference semifinals and showing that Cade Cunningham can lead a winning team. The harder job is turning a good young team into a real contender, and that usually starts with finding the star some scoring help.
How Tyler Herro would fit next to Cade Cunningham
Herro comes with some real concerns that have followed him for a while, since he can get targeted on defense and his contract is large enough that any team trading for him has to plan on paying him again later.
On the court, though, he fits cleanly, because he is one of the best high-volume shooters in the league, he can create his own shot, and he can run a pick-and-roll. He would step in as one of Detroit’s most dangerous perimeter scorers right away.
That kind of shooting would open up the floor for Cunningham, give Jaden Ivey cleaner driving lanes, and create more room for Jalen Duren to roll to the rim. The offense comes together in a hurry with a shooter like that in the mix.
Coby White and Zach LaVine fit the same pattern
The Herro report lines up with everything else Detroit has been doing this offseason, and the interest in White, Isaiah Joe and LaVine starts to look like one plan rather than a bunch of separate rumors.
Detroit isn’t chasing one specific player so much as a type of player, meaning shooters and creators who can score 20 on any given night. Whether it turns out to be Herro, White or someone else, the goal stays the same, which is getting Cunningham more offensive help.
The risk in speeding up the Pistons’ timeline
Moving the timeline up always comes with a cost. Young teams can trade away their flexibility too quickly, and Detroit still has one of the better young cores in the league, with Ausar Thompson developing and Duren locked into the long-term picture.
Adding Herro would help now, but it would also create money problems and roster questions later, so the front office has to weigh winning sooner against keeping its options open.
Detroit is starting to act like a contender
The Giannis angle will get most of the attention, which makes sense given he’s one of the best players alive and any trade involving him becomes the biggest story in the sport. For Detroit, the part worth watching has almost nothing to do with Giannis and everything to do with the company the Pistons are keeping.
A year ago, Detroit was still trying to prove it belonged in the playoffs. Now the team is getting linked to proven veterans who can help it win immediately, which is how a team behaves when it thinks the rebuild is nearly finished.
Nobody knows yet whether Herro lands in Detroit, or whether Giannis ever reaches Miami, but the Pistons clearly believe Cade Cunningham is ready for more help and they look willing to make a big move to get it.
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