I watched much of the Detroit Pistons versus Miami Heat series and I did not like what I saw from the Pistons. The Pistons had a mismatch in two very key areas, one of the biggest being at power forward with Rasheed Wallace. Just as no one on the Pistons could guard Shaq, no one on the Heat could guard Wallace but the difference in the series was that the Heat took advantage of their mismatch and the Pistons did not. Posting up Wallace could have done two things for the pistons. It could have put Shaq in foul trouble if the Heat choose to put Shaq on Wallace at some point in the game. It would have also freed up cutters and shooters giving the Pistons more easy looks. Instead of posting up Wallace the Pistons consistently went to Tayshun Prince, a good but young player that should never get more touches than Wallace. They also choose to have Wallace shooting three pointers the whole series. Another mistake the Pistons made that cost them the series was not posting up Billups more. Billups spent sometime in the post, and when he did he was very effective, getting Jason Williams in foul trouble in almost every game. This makes me wonder about Flip Saunders coaching ability. It is good to have a game plan but sometimes you have to know when it is not working and do something different. The Pistons decision to stick with their game plan sent them home a bit too early. |
