Will the Pistons finish above .500 for the season?

66 It's pretty high for Tony Allen!!

Can Monroe become an all-star this year?

Dwight it's in the west, well, Bynum it's in the east but let's not forget that bynum recieved a lot of votes just for playing in the Lakers. I think Monroe can beat him up.

Who other centers are in the east better than Monroe? Being objective, Hibbert? Brook Lopez? Okafor? Al Horford?

I really don't think Bynum is that good.

I can dig where Tony Allen is coming from.
I feel snubbed personally for not being on this list.
Granted, I never played beyond high school but the snub still "motivates" me.

Hibbert - Yes.
Bynum - Yes
Lopez - No
Okafor - Nope
Horford - ...pretty good comparison.

Another 10 players! No Monroe yet, guys.

51- Kyle Lowry
52- Nene Hilario
53- Paul Millsap
54- Danilo Gallinari
55- John Wall
56- David West
57- Marcin Gortat
58- Andrea Bargnani
59- David Lee
60- Brook Lopez

It's shocking me seeing that this "104 experts" have Monroe THAT high.. I mean, I loved Monroe and I want him to be a Pistons for Life... But I didn't think that those experts could see him being better than Millsap, John Wall (who was 1st pick in the same draft where Monroe ended up 7th), David Lee, a guy who averaged 20 points and 9.6 rebounds...

Will Monroe be higher than Cousins in this rank?

He's probably be very close to Cousins.

You're talking about a guy who is on the cusp of making the all-star and Olympic teams and he's a big man... which is more sought after.

I'd guess that he'll come in at around #30-35

It'd be funny if Monroe was named #98 and SJ just missed him on the list.

Just stat wise Monroe has had some somewhat monster-like seasons. I am somewhat surprised at how high he might show (maybe I'm more surprised that the Pistons have anyone this high), but like TaS said it really isn't that surprising.

Monroe was 23rd in the league in efficiency last year (a stat that ranks Lebron, Love, and Durant as its top 3), 9th in rebounds, and 6th in FG%... and he had the 4th most assists of any center.

He's unspectacular, but good at many things. So, he's sneaky good.

He was 9th in the L in rebounding? Sneaky good indeed because I am again surprised but really shouldn't be because he averaged 9+ per game, no?

Who were the top 3 centers in assist per game? This one feels a little disappointing for some reason like calling someone the good looking co-joined twin.

Or, if Monroe simply didn't make it into the top 500.

Monroe was actually 4th amongst centers in total rebounds last year (which factors in the fact that he played every game and stayed out of foul trouble). He was 2nd in offensive rebounds with only 3 less than Noah. He was 8th in defensive, just above Noah and just behind Chandler and Duncan.

In passing, Marc Gasol was #1 and Joakim Noah was #2. Offsetting this stat for Monroe is the fact that he had the 2nd most turnovers of any center, behind Dwight Howard (who surely had way more touches and was pouting most of the year).

Nevertheless, he's basically in the Chandler/ Noah/ Duncan/ Gasol level and he's a step below Howard and Bynum overall.

We've been clamoring for Joe to get a young big for several years and by golly, he's done it!

Now on the to-do list:
- pass first PG (I saw a youtube clip where Knight was working on his handle and mentioned wanting to make others better)
- penetrating SG who doesn't settle for J's: check, check, and check
- wafer thin SF with a great highlight reel from 2003-2004: check
- short necked PF who can stretch the defense with his greatly improved .300 FT line extended jumper: check

We basically have the Mona Lisa on the canvas in front of us.

Joe's 2004 version..................................................Joe's 2012 version


If you back up and squint, you can tell how close we are to greatness once again.

The blueprint for a championship. Well done.

Monroe #49

:(

He was above Noah in defensive boards because he played more games also, correct? I will be surprised if that is per game because I do not think of him as a defensive rebounder.

Marc Gasol might be a pretty good comparison for Monroe if he were still playing C. I am not excited about the move to the 4.

49 ain't bad. A year ago I would have laughed you off the internet if you told me the Pistons had a Top 50 guy that wasn't a bad contract or malcontent list. Baby steps.

Not necessarily. Keep in mind that the Bulls were a great defensive team and forced their opponents to shoot an abnormally low FG% while the Pistons allowed a higher than average FG%.

So, Noah had many more opportunities per x minutes to reel them in.

To cancel out that skew, we need to look at defensive rebounding %, defined as "an estimate of the percentage of available rebounds that the player grabbed while he was on the floor."

Defensive rebounds:
Monroe: 23.6%
Noah: 21.8%

Sneaky good!


However, for a real comparison, Dwight Howard sat at 33.1%. So, yeah, there's that whole other stratosphere.

As Johnny Carson would say very interesting. Thanks for the explanation, it does not fit my preconception.

Monroe seems like he would be a better defensive rebounder than offensive rebounder to me because he seems laid back and non athletic. I would have imagined him to get great position on the defensive boards to get his fair share, but be hopeless on the other end where it takes more free form athleticism. And on a higher level, I wouldn't have thought that he'd be great at either.

Now that I've seen him for a while, I've come to the conclusion that it's his relentlessness and toughness combined with his disinterest in the 3-point line that makes him a good offensive rebounder. He's just always there and he has good hands, so anything that he is in position to grab, he usually does. He's more of a Laimbeer/ Duncan than a Rodman.

If Drum turns out to be anywhere close to what we are hoping, we have our twin towers with our shot blocker/ finisher complementing our big fundamental/ passer.

Before we had bigs, I couldn't get that excited about watching the development of the team. Seemed like a dead end. But now, I have the feeling that we're seeing the foundation getting laid properly. The 1, 4, and 5 are the hardest positions to fill and we have a keeper + 2 solid prospects already locked up. SG and SF are a dime a dozen. Stuckey looks better than average to me at this point, so I'm interested in seeing if he can break the mold and give us a new type of combo guard. But if he doesn't work out, it's a minor issue to fix if we start looking Championship bound. I'm less optimistic about Prince, but again, easy position to fill with a veteran ring seeker at the right time. Looks like our model with the solid bigs won't include a Kobe/Lebron, which is fine by me.

TaShawn, don't forget about our Russian dude either.