AUBURN HILLS – Stan Van Gundy saw what Reggie Jackson saw and came to admit what Jackson could not. The plays he made routinely last season simply didn’t get made this season, his legs unable to get him from Point A to Point B before the door slammed closed.
When Van Gundy made the call to pull Jackson from the lineup, even Jackson could finally come clean to himself.
“Just felt a little different. There were plays I know I made in ’15 and ’16 and gaps that I could hit and had the confidence to get there at all times,” he said after Tuesday’s loss at the buzzer to Miami gravely wounded his team’s playoff chances. “And this season, at times felt good and I could get there, other times felt like I was a shell of myself.”
Jackson’s plight has hung over the Pistons’ season since late in the first week of training camp when the diagnosis of left knee tendinosis – chronic tendinitis – was rendered. Jackson chose the option that required the longest recovery – platelet-rich plasma treatment – but also promised the most lasting results.
The Pistons survived his absence as well as they could have hoped, going 11-10 in the face of a challenging schedule, and expected to take off from there upon his early-December return. Jackson had flashed enough in those early days of camp – and in the September voluntary workouts and scrimmages before then – to inspire the “why not us?” mantra the Pistons carried into the season.
“He was absolutely dominant,” Van Gundy said. “He had a great summer.”
The expectation was that Jackson, after challenging for an All-Star berth last season, would take that next step this time around even in an Eastern Conference loaded with stars at that position. In large part, that fueled the organization-wide optimism. Jackson was the lynchpin of the offense. His pick-and-roll acumen drove everything. In synergy with Andre Drummond’s rim-running threat, it would create all the space the Pistons needed for the 3-point shooting around them.
In year three of Van Gundy’s system, the Pistons felt a top-10 defense would result and push them into the upper half of Eastern Conference playoff seeding. The defense, by and large, has been as expected. Even with the month-long swoon begun in mid-December – largely aberrant, the product of opponent’s shooting 45 percent from the 3-point line over a 15-game stretch – and the recent struggles as a response to overwhelming offensive frustration, the Pistons sit 11th in defensive rating.
But they’re 25th in offense and the underlying numbers speak to Jackson’s (a) absence and (b) diminished play in the 52 games he’s played. The Pistons rank 29th in free-throw attempts (Jackson’s went from 4.3 per game to 2.8, indicative of his far less frequent forays to the rim), 29th in 3-point shooting and 26th in 3-point attempts, the 3-point numbers in large measure a reflection of defenses being emboldened to stick with perimeter shooters rather than crowd the paint.
Jackson gave glimpses of his old self just often enough to make everyone, himself included, believe a full return was imminent. There was the occasional explosive drive or the infrequent dominant quarter. Even earlier this month, Jackson posted a 14-point fourth quarter as the Pistons came back to beat the Bulls behind his 26 points and, four days later, he put up 12 points and four assists in the fourth quarter of a big win over Cleveland in which he scored 21.
As the Pistons have gone 1-8 since beating the Knicks by 20 points two days after that win over Cleveland, Jackson’s brilliant bursts have been rare.
“I could see the gap and felt like I couldn’t get there at times, couldn’t explode there, couldn’t get there as quick,” Jackson said. “It was like guys are popping out of nowhere when they get back in front of the ball and get in front of me. Didn’t feel like I was quite the same.”
Van Gundy, based on feedback from Pistons doctors and training staff, expressed full confidence that with a normal off-season of conditioning, Jackson will recapture his explosiveness. Jackson, for his part, expects there to be a silver lining to this season’s travails.
“It’s tough, but I also think it’s going to be good in the long run, force me to have to play a little different, force me to have to expand my game,” he said. “I haven’t been great this season by the way that I measure myself, but without pain there wouldn’t be joy. I truly believe there’s light at the end of the tunnel and I see it with everything I’ve gone through so far. This season will all be worth it and will make everything that much more joyful.”