ORLANDO – Summer League is the 180 degree opposite of the NBA All-Star game. About 90 percent of participants are job hunting and playing with the desperation that not knowing where your next paycheck will come from inspires. That doesn’t often generate aesthetically pleasing basketball.
But in that context, the Pistons played a perfect Summer League game in their Saturday opener, an 81-49 smashing of the New York Knicks.
It was perfect in that in the Orlando Pro Summer League standings – one point for winning each quarter, four points for winning a game – the Pistons came out of it with the maximum eight points.
But more relevantly, the players who will or could be on the Pistons 2016-17 roster to a man put into evidence why they belong and how they can help – if not immediately, then into the future.