AUBURN HILLS – The thickest common thread to the five wins the Pistons strung together before their injury-fueled losing streak struck was resoundingly positive bench play.
One reason the Pistons then lost six straight was the loss of Ish Smith midway through the second of those six straight losses. Smith along with veteran center Zaza Pachulia gave the second unit its personality as much as Stanley Johnson’s end-to-end rushes or Langston Galloway’s 3-point bombs or Bruce Brown’s in-your-face defense.
No coincidence, then, that when the Pistons snapped their losing streak on Saturday by ending Boston’s eight-game winning streak, the bench’s strong play was again at the heart of it. Johnson wound up with the team’s best plus/minus at plus-13 in 12 minutes. The only reserve who finished in the red, at minus-4, was Jon Leuer – and that only because after logging 12 first-half minutes while Andre Drummond endured foul trouble, Drummond stayed out to start the fourth quarter with the bench.
That’s when the Pistons used a 10-1 run over the first three-plus minutes to turn a tenuous seven-point lead into a more comfortable 16-point cushion that allowed them to get away with a spate of turnovers to fuel Boston’s last-ditch rally.
Jose Calderon has taken over for Smith, whom Dwane Casey said on Sunday he expects to miss another dozen or so games, pegging his return somewhere around Jan. 10. Leuer, who’d replaced Johnson at power forward with the second unit while he missed three games with a knee injury, on Saturday stood in for Pachulia – out with the flu – at center.
“You just know exactly what you’re getting from him every night,” Blake Griffin said of Leuer. “He’s going to play good defense, run the floor, finish what he’s supposed to. When guys step up and play like that, we’re a tough team to beat. He was great.”
Leuer didn’t get many chances to play in the season’s first several weeks and when he did he looked pretty much like you’d expect someone getting infrequent playing time after missing nearly a full season between last October’s ankle injury that required season-ending surgery and August’s knee problem that also required surgery.
But in seven December games, Leuer more closely resembles the player who was such a big factor for the Pistons two seasons ago. In 13 minutes a game, Leuer is averaging 6.6 points and 2.9 rebounds while shooting .645.
It’s no coincidence that’s also about the time Leuer started feeling he had both the ankle and knee injuries behind him. He wasn’t cleared for full contact until midway through training camp and would have alternating stretches of good and bad days for several weeks. Gradually, he’d string more good days together and fewer bad ones.
“I would have three or four good days and then a couple of bad days – knee felt bad, ankle felt bad – then I would go a week, feel good, then another bad day or two,” he said. “Probably just over the last three weeks I’ve had stretches where I haven’t had any pain or thinking about my knee or ankle.”
It would be an exaggeration to say Leuer is just happy to be physically capable of playing again, but not by much.
“My mindset is when you’re healthy and get to play this game, it’s a blessing and a great day,” he said. “I’m just grateful for every time I get to step on the court. At the same time, I have goals and things I want to push forward and accomplish, too.”
One of those goals: help the second unit maintain its effectiveness and not force a disruption in its character while Smith or Pachulia or others are out.
“They’re great pieces, no doubt, but I think when guys like me and Jose and Bruce and whoever wasn’t playing, we would come in here and play three on three or four on four and really compete hard,” Leuer said. “That helped us stay in a rhythm so when those opportunities came, we could just step right in and kind of be in the flow of things.”
Getting Luke Kennard and Reggie Bullock back – and now plugged into the starting lineup – also has helped fortify Casey’s bench by returning players like Brown and Galloway to more niche roles. Leuer can be a big part of that for his versatility at both ends – able to guard a variety of frontcourt players and to play with his back to the basket or to step in and fill the role of facilitator as Pachulia has.
“Jon has been playing well,” Casey said. “He got his rhythm. Looks like he’s got his bounce in his legs, his confidence. He’ll be a part of what we do going forward. He just has to stay ready.”