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2015-16 Pistons Profile: Kentavious Caldwell-Pope

KENTAVIOUS CALDWELL-POPE

AGE: 23

NBA EXPERIENCE: 3 seasons

BECAME A PISTON: The Pistons drafted Kentavious Caldwell-Pope with the No. 8 pick in the 2013 NBA draft after his sophomore season at Georgia.

CAREER MILESTONES: Caldwell-Pope, a McDonald’s All-American, was one of the highest-ranked recruits to attend Georgia in years. As a sophomore, he was named SEC Player of the Year despite playing for a team that finished with a 9-9 conference record. He neither began nor ended his rookie season as a starter, but started 41 games that season. He’s started every game in which he’s appeared, 158, in two seasons under Stan Van Gundy and has seen his scoring average increase each of the past two years.

CAREER ARC: Caldwell-Pope established himself as a rookie foremost for playing hard. Under Stan Van Gundy, he’s translated that into becoming recognized as one of the game’s top perimeter defenders. Unless doing so created severe matchup issues for Reggie Jackson, Van Gundy usually assigned Caldwell-Pope to cover the opposition’s top backcourt scoring threat, quite often point guards like Steph Curry, Damian Lillard, Russell Westbrook, Kyrie Irving and Isaiah Thomas. With added strength and continued strides as a ballhandler, Caldwell-Pope has plenty of room for continued improvement. One major component of his growth will be to improve his consistency as a shooter and scorer.

SEASON HIGHLIGHTS: Caldwell-Pope scored a career-high 31 in a Dec. 16 win over Boston in which he hit 3 of 4 from the 3-point arc and 8 of 8 from the free-throw line, showing off his improved handle to make plays off the dribble and get to the line. Maybe an even more impressive game, though, came four days earlier when the Pistons blasted Indiana by 22 points with Caldwell-Pope scoring 18 points, passing for eight assists, grabbing seven rebounds and recording four steals. When the Pistons grabbed perhaps their most important win of the season at Cleveland on Feb. 22 to snap a five-game losing streak and launch them to a 17-9 finish and their first playoff berth since 2009, Caldwell-Pope hit 8 of 10 shots and scored 19 points. As a defender, perhaps his two games against Russell Westbrook stand out. In the first game, Westbrook fouled out after scoring 14 points on 5 of 14 shooting with 11 turnovers; in the second, Westbrook shot 8 of 28.

2016-17 ROLE: Caldwell-Pope finished fourth in the NBA – behind All-Stars James Harden, Kyle Lowry and Jimmy Butler – in minutes per game, about the best measure possible of Stan Van Gundy’s estimation of his value to the Pistons. He’s entrenched as the starting shooting guard. If he can improve incrementally across the board on offense – with the consistency of his 3-point shot, his ability to make plays off the dribble and his threat coming off screens – Caldwell-Pope can challenge to become one of the best at his position in the NBA.

CONTRACT STATUS: Caldwell-Pope’s fourth-year option on his rookie contract was picked up by the Pistons before the deadline to do so prior to the start of the 2015-16 season. He’s eligible to sign an extension this summer, but might choose to wait until next summer when he could become a restricted free agent.