Another coaching loss. Sacramento steadily shuttled in fresh players the whole game. We countered with a 6 man rotation.</p>


<p>Worse, three of our starters played near or over 40 minutes, in the first of a back to back. So much for planning to leave anything for tomorro night. And yes, Dyess was way overplayed too, for his age and condition of his knees.</p>


<p>What happened to the promise of Stuckey playing major minutes, win or lose? The announcers proudly, I should say dutifully, announced the 8 man rotation. What a joke to put on us fans.</p>


<p>Rip sat out about a minute or so in the first half before coming back in, and utterly predictably finishing the half. Virtually no rest. The 8 man rotation thing failed to work.</p>


<p>Anyone think Afflalo got minutes. Technically he did. Two minutes can be referred to in the plural. This is a joke.</p>


<p>Hayes continues to do nothing at all out there. But since he is someone who Flip can play instead of Amir, he will not come out of the rotation. His minutes were given to him, and they are gold.</p>


<p>Herrmann hustles, but is way too slow. He simply does not get to plays to affect them.</p>


<p>Maxiell had a bad night at the line, but provided a great burst of energy in the 3rd quarter to get us back into the game. But then the coach sat him most of the 4th quarter, going with a couple of tired 33 year olds instead.</p>


<p>At least Saunders did do a couple of things different. He brought in a guy who should be starting, Maxiell, into the game when it was very apparent we needed Maxiell and his stellar defense. He also played Herrmann and later Hayes some at power forward. If he had not, Dyess would be up around 40 minutes for this game too, and that would be truly obscene on a front end of a back to back. Now, neither of these guys gives us a lick of rebounding or shotblocking as power forwards, so it will never work, but it would be stupider yet to play Dyess even more minutes. So I applaud the coach for at least not being totally ignorant as far as his rotation tonight. Close, but not totally.</p>


<p>Back to the lie that was told us fans. Flip cheerfully announcers he cut Afflalo, a fine young player, out of the rotation. With the absurdly lame excuse that he was going to increase Stuckey's minutes. Afflalo still barely played, but Stuckey was cut to about 10 minutes. Lies. Now, who out there actually believed any of it. I certainly hope that more and more fans will understand that truth and Saunders are strangers. He wants his way, and thats all there is to it. The rest is just excuses. Lame as heck excuses.</p>


<p>Billups and Rip had fine shooting nights. But I sure hope they don't think they will ever win anything of importance on their own.</p>


<p>Foul trouble. Hard to notice it. But we had enough fouls on our bigs in the first half to where they were choosing to let people waltz in unchallenged. This paranoia of Flip's not to ever have to play Amir is truly hurting our defense. And believe me, other teams smell our fear and are crashing inside all they can. Now, Sacramento did not play a particulary smart game. They could have pretty much slaughtered us if they had went inside a bit more even than they did. Don't fool yourselves. With this coach of ours, Sacramento would beat us in a 7 game series.</p>


<p>Tay played aggressively to start the game and then vanished.</p>


<p>Dyess had a good shooting game, got some rebounds. Sure would be nice though if he could cover the inside. He is a good sub, a poor starter.</p>


<p>Oh well, let the inevitable flood of excuses start on Flip's behalf. But it won't help the team any. Fans who want to see the Pistons win this year, and we still can, should start hollering for two things. One, fire Flip. Two, play the youth.</p>