Cade has better teammates now, it’s time to let them make plays too
Let’s start with the obvious. Cade Cunningham has a turnover problem. The Detroit Pistons point guard began the season averaging 5.6 in his first five games, including 9 against Cleveland, 7 against Boston, and 5 in his last outing against Miami.
It’s not a trend that’s new either. Last season, Cade averaged 5.3 turnovers through his first four games and maintained an average of over four through the end of November before tightening up to finish the season at a more respectable 3.4 per game over 62 appearances.
Through this early portion of the season, Cade is fourth in the league in turnovers per game, trailing only James Harden, Trae Young (although both of those guys average well over 10 assists per game while Cade is hovering around 7.5), and LaMelo Ball. In short, while Cade as a scorer has been peerless, these turnover issues have continued to haunt the team and Cunningham individually.
Full disclosure, I think sometimes the turnover numbers can be a tad overrated, especially when contextualised with usage rate and role, missed fouls, and the like. But high numbers are still high, no matter what spreadsheet you look at.
But what is the root cause of this bug?
No one bears the scars of the last three seasons of futility and ineptitude more than the Oklahoma State product. The face of a new era, marketed as the saviour after being drafted before all others in 2021, Cunningham was immediately parachuted into a leadership role on a team coming off a season so dismal they weren’t even invited to Disney to have fun in the NBA Bubble for a few weeks.
Cunningham was immediately handed the keys to the franchise, allowed to make mistakes and explore his game, and his improvements over his rookie season were a rare bright spot as the team stumbled to 23 wins.
Fast-forward three seasons, and we now have a star point guard averaging nearly 26 points and 7 assists a night. He took his lumps playing on some of the worst NBA teams of all time. The problem is that dysfunction is all he knows.
Last season, Cade ranked ninth in the NBA in usage, at 30.8%, meaning just under 31 of every 100 Pistons possessions ended in a Cunningham shot attempt or turnover. Everyone ahead of Cade on that list has either made an All-Star game (Doncic, Antetokounmpo, Gilgeous-Alexander, Brunson, Edwards, Curry, Fox) or is an alien poised to take over the league (Wembanyama).
Outside of Wembanyama, the difference between Cade’s usage was the individualism with which it was created. For a team that now owns the record for the longest losing streak in NBA history, there wasn’t a lot of sophistication in the way the offense was run. There wasn’t beautiful, crisp ball movement, sharp rolls, and dives, off-ball movement. It was double Cade and see what happens.
What happened? A lot. A lot of bad.
The reason I highlight last season is to point out just how little help Cunningham had when it came to winning basketball games. Now, that’s not to say Cade is blameless in any of this, far from it, but anyone who watched even a modicum of last year’s misery could see the weight of the world on the young man’s shoulders.
Cast your mind back to that losing streak if you haven’t already repressed that memory (I’m sorry). The six games before the breakthrough win was maybe the best stretch of basketball Cade has played in a Pistons uniform. He averaged 31.7 points per game (including two 40+ point explosions against Atlanta and Brooklyn) on 57% from the field, to go along with 7.2 assists per game.
The team won none of those games, and it became a constant theme in the streak for the camera to pan to Cade after yet another awesome statistical game with a big fat L to his name. It wasn’t quite Tungsten Arm O’Doyle areas, but it was comical. Ironically, in that win against the Raptors, he had zero turnovers against 30 points and 12 assists.
The Pistons last year had a cavalcade of veterans all too happy to put their name on the group assignment, results be damned, and let the process sink or swim with whatever Cunningham, along with Jaden Ivey, Jalen Duren and to a lesser extent, Ausar Thompson and Isaiah Stewart, could muster. It felt unfair that the reputations of young and talented players were being saddled by the sheer apathy of the veterans brought to lead them, and a coach who spent half his time on the bench playing Sudoku.
Last year created those bad habits, not just in Cade, but especially in Ivey too. The overdribbling, the barrelling into traffic without a plan, leaving your feet and then looking for a pass. There’s lost years, and then there’s whatever the hell last year was.
That’s why turning the page was so important, bringing in a host of new faces to help bring Cade and Jaden up like a rising tide. It’s important to note that in their short careers, JB Bickerstaff is already the third head coach (well, if you count Monty as a coach) they’ve both had.
You see the flashes of last year when Cade attacks baseline, and rather than kicking it cross court to a wide open Malik Beasley or Tim Hardaway Jr, he has a post war flashback to the corpse of Joe Harris standing on the wing, and takes the bad shot himself, or has the ball knocked away.
Not only is Cade playing with some of the lingering demons from last year, but it’s bled into how teams still defend the Pistons. In theory, the personnel is vastly upgraded from a year ago. Beasley and Hardaway Jr have both been as advertised as shooters, Simone Fontecchio is gradually getting into the flow after a slow first couple of games, and Jaden Ivey looks like he’s making a tremendous leap.
But that doesn’t stop teams from doubling Cade, forcing him to make those pressure decisions, and until he starts slow playing those double teams, recognising where they’re coming from, and passing over the blitz, teams will continue to do it. Teams are still defending the Pistons like it’s December 2023, because while on the outside it may look like a Maserati, under the hood it’s still a Honda, and until you prove that wrong, teams will still believe it.
Passing out of double teams isn’t a concession of weakness or a white flag. In fact, not only is it a sign of respect from your opposition that they think you’re worth extra attention, but passing early can open up cleaner offensive opportunities not only for your teammates, but for yourself as well, off ball reversals, dives and cuts.
Look at the evolution of Jayson Tatum. I haven’t got the numbers in front of me but he’s become one of the most doubled players in the association, and has used that strategy to his advantage to pass early, move off the ball, get it back and attack a scrambling defence.
So while there’s definitely internal improvement required on Cunningham’s end to improve as a ball handler and decision maker, letting go of the anchor of last year’s disaster and trusting his teammates to make plays feels like a first logical step on the road to healing.
I’ve spoken already about the promising early returns on Jaden Ivey in his role this year. Maybe the one player who had it worse last year than Cade, Ivey has thrived so far under coaching that has shone a light on his rare athletic ability rather than confining him to a bit part off-ball role. Not only is Ivey averaging just under 21 points a game with 4 assists, but he’s been efficient from the floor and on fire from three.
Will those numbers keep up? I don’t know, but his process right now feels repeatable and his aggressiveness has been a welcome element to the Pistons offense when it struggles in the halfcourt.
Outside of him though, I’ve enjoyed the work of Beasley and Hardaway Jr off the ball (the latter more so than I thought I would), and they’ve both shown ability to not only hit threes at a high clip and volume (bad Beasley game last time aside), but have also been able to attack closeouts and operate in the midrange.
The big bugbear right now has been the form of Tobias Harris. He was brought in to be a steadying presence and so far has not lived up to it. At this point you have to trust him to work through it, he was never going to be a scoring alpha on this team anyway but the Pistons need more than what they’ve gotten so far.
In theory, there are more failsafes this year to bail out a stagnant Cunningham offensive possession. It’s time for Cade to forget the past, and start trusting his teammates again.
Oh, and a friendlier whistle wouldn’t hurt either (Cade has the same FTA as Jalen Smith).