Blake Griffin has confidence in team heading into the offseason

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The Detroit Pistons have had a very disappointing season, to put it lightly, but Blake Griffin has confidence heading into the offseason.

Griffin feels that the Pistons just didn’t have enough time to put it all together after he was traded from the L.A. Clippers on January 29th. He does feel that Detroit will have an opportunity next season to make a run in the NBA’s Eastern Conference.

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From The Detroit News:

  • Blake on his trade:

“(Getting to the playoffs) was the goal and that was our push,” Griffin said. “When you take away two guys from this team who played significant minutes and add a new guy and Reggie (Jackson) being hurt, I don’t know that things are going to come together within a month.”

  • Blake on next season:

“Having Reggie and Andre and a full group healthy and ready to go, I like our squad,” Griffin said. “We have a pretty high ceiling and we can make a run in the East.”

It is good that Griffin has confidence because Detroit will have to build around him for years to come. Blake is a piece of the organization that is not going anywhere. He is under contract until the 2020-2021 season and will be making over 30 million the remaining years. With his injury history and being on the verge of hitting 30 years old, that’s a hard piece to sell, if Detroit ever felt the need to try. The Pistons will have to make it work.

With the lack of a first-round draft pick in the 2018 NBA Draft and not much cap space, Detroit will have to get creative if they want to add anything significant to the roster this offseason to build around Griffin. The first step toward that task may need to be placed on someone other than Executive Stan Van Gundy.

Van Gundy hasn’t had the best track record. If one player like Reggie Jackson can get hurt and it completely destroys the season, you have to look at the team you’ve constructed. Being in cap purgatory, having a history of bad draft picks, and bad signings up and down the roster isn’t a recipe for success. When this offseason rolls around and Van Gundy has to meet with owner Tom Gores, maybe Gores’ will see that it is time to move in another direction in the front office.

If the Pistons are healthy and have Griffin, Drummond, and Jackson on the floor consistently for a full season, can they be a contender in the East? Probably. Will this actually happen, is what every Pistons fan should be asking themselves. If you go ahead and base it off the last few seasons in Detroit, all the injuries, and the way this organization is run, it probably won’t.