Now that the Pistons have selected Dwane Casey to be their next head coach, they need a GM who can run a better ship than SVG did (or Dumars, in his last 5 years). That got me thinking about trade near-misses Dumars and SVG had in their time here.
2007 - Kobe vetoes trade for Rip, Tay, and picks.
This one would've been a coup for Dumars, but Kobe shot it down. He had demanded a trade and wanted to go to Chicago, but they couldn't make the pieces work. Detroit and LA had the details all worked out, but Jerry Buss talked Kobe down off the ledge and he stuck it out. He would go on to be league MVP the next season and win 2 more titles. Could he have won a 'ship here with Chauncey, Sheed and Dice? Probably.
Grade: Not Dumars' fault, but MAN... 1/2 a facepalm.
2009 - Detroit rejects Ray Allen & Rondo for Rip, Tay & Stuckey.
Ainge reached out through an intermediary and was summarily rejected. Allen's contract was expiring, so it's not as sweet an offer as it looks on the surface. Still, we would've had Rondo through his prime, the horrific 2009 FA moves Dumars made probably wouldn't have happened, and we would've had cap space in the bigger free agency summer of 2010.
Grade: Would've had 4 AS appearances out of Rondo, instead of 0 from Rip/Tay/Stuckey. 4 facepalms.
2014 - Stan turns down multiple offers for Greg Monroe.
Ugh. We don't know what was offered, but anything would've been better than what ended up happening. The Suns were the most aggressive suitor and they had guys like Dragic & Bledsoe that they were trying to get rid of. Even a weak tea offer would've been better than Stan opting to ship out Josh Smith for nothing, stretching his contract until 2020, then losing Monroe for nothing that summer.
Grade: Stan set off a chain of events that continues to screw us to this day. 10 facepalms.
2015 - SVG prefers to draft Stanley Johnson over the 6 picks Boston offered.
This might be the most inexcusable non-move of the bunch. Danny Ainge was desperate to draft Justise Winslow, and started offering up the farm - 6 picks, including potentially 4 first-rounders. Fortunately for Boston (and unfortunately for us), Stan Van Gundy was so enamored with Stanley Johnson that he turned down a deal that included the Jaylen Brown pick and the Terry Rozier pick, among others. Brown & Rozier started for a team that made the ECF, Stanley Johnson comes off the bench for a team that couldn't win 40 games.
Grade: Inexcusable. INFINITE facepalms.
Most of Dumars' gaffes involved bad drafting and bad contracts. He tended to do well in trades, although the Ben Gordon trade wasn't great and turning down the Allen/Rondo trade probably led to some of his worst moves.
Stan made a couple of decent trades early on, but he got progressively worse. Not dealing Monroe at the beginning of the '14-'15 season was just dumb. Nixing Boston's offer for the 8th pick was an all-time boneheaded move.
Look at who we could've had! Kobe in 2008 (not the GM's fault), Ray Allen in '09 and Rondo through his All Star years, whoever on the Suns instead of no Greg Monroe and negative cap space of Josh Smith, and finally Scary Terry Rozier and Jaylen Brown instead of Stanley Johnson. Why didn't these deals happen? Other than the Kobe deal, it was because the GM at the time overvalued what he had and failed to look into the future. Whoever the next GM of the Pistons turns out to be, learn from this.
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