Is that a rhetorical question?

I think an argument can be made for Dixon over Hunter.

I expected a fun game to watch, and I was not disappointed in the slightest. Stuckey started, but had the show stolen by Dixon as far as point guards go. Dixon looked good hitting his first 6 shots, dishing 5 assists too while playing fine D. Sheed started by hitting triples, and then kept working the inside like a fiend. Tay was game MVP with a great double double, 22 points, career high 10 assists. Most of Tay's damage was taking it right to the basket. Rip hit a few shots. Dyess was scoreless, contributed some bounds.

But even with Tay and Sheed on fire tonight, our starters could have lost this game for lack of D. Fortunately though, Flip remembered to play Amir this time, and so we slaughtered the Clips. Amir finally came into the game with 8 minutes to go in the 2nd quarter, and wow, the defense all the sudden, quite mysteriously, held. (Mysterious to Flip only and his supporters. Anyone else can see that Amir is dynamite on D.) The lead began to build. Most of the 3rd quarter was just trading baskets. Then Amir came in at the end, and the lead went up some more. In the end, the team was plus 5 with Amir not in the game, and plus 25 with him in the game. Our defense is that much better when he plays. Sheed had four blocks himself in this one, and it was him and Amir manning the big spots as we started to pull away in the 2nd quarter.

Stuckey scored on a couple of cuts to the basket among his 4 makes. (I missed a portion of the 1st half where he made a couple of shots so I don't know what he did there. I had the game on pause, and then flipped channels - when you do that you come back to live action, missing part of what happened while you had it paused. Oops.)

Hayes made a few shots, one kind of meaninless in garbage time. And they burned him on D a few consecutive times in the first half. My vote for who loses minutes to Dixon is Hayes. Another guy is Hunter, who simply may not be needed down the stretch here after all.

Afflalo hit one shot mid 4th quarter. He did not play in the first half except the last few seconds. Instead, Hayes played a lot and Tay spelled Rip some. Now, I don't mind seeing us doing something different, like playing Tay at shooting guard some, especially since Afflalo did get to play the last 14 minutes of the game. A guy who plays good solid D like that should always be rewarded with more minutes.

No.
Sure. Both of them are very flawed players, but each has different strengths.

I just think it's a huge stretch to call Dixon "solid" based on one impressive game against a lottery team with a horrible backcourt, when you take a glance at his career and see that it's filled with a lot of impressive games and a lot more unimpressive ones. He is what he is - pretty much indistinguishable from every other conscienceless journeyman bench guard in the Association.

And yes, that might make him better than Lindsey Hunter. But "solid" is a lot better than Lindsey Hunter is at this point in his career.

I completely agree. I don't know what more he has to do, or how much more poorly Hayes has to play for this guy to get a freaking chance!

I LOVE his attitude and energy. There's no wonder why he's been a crowd pleaser everywhere he's gone.

As others here have mentioned, this game was looking like a typical Pistons game (maintaining a small-medium lead) until Amir Johnson came in and we went on a 10-0 run. The pattern is making itself clear. He plays good D, which results in easy O for us when we get blocks, steals, etc. This is why we are seeing so many of these gaudy runs when he is in the game.

Observatios:

• Dyess only attempted 1 shot. I noticed that he passed up a completely open jumper from his sweet spot in the 2nd half and then threw it away on a pass. Not sure what the problem was. Maybe b/c Sheed was rolling, he didn't look to score, then wanted to let the young guys get shots later? His D looked a little shaky tonight too. Maybe he has a cold or something.
• Tay got to show off a bit without Chauncey.
• Sheed was having one of his best games of the year, until he got completely bored and took that horrible lefty shot over the backboard. That was about it for him.
• I'm really not basing this on the results, but Dixon's form looks pretty good. Nice compact release without too many moving parts, nice arc, and good rotation. He also seemed surprisingly like a 1, which does not fit his rep as a 1/2.
• Herrmann with the razzle dazzle. In only 4:40, he took 4 shots, got fouled, grabbed 3 rebounds, and dished out 2 assists?!?! That is at least 9 touches in a very short period of time. That baseline pass was one of the year's passing lighlights for Det.

Statistical Anamolies:

• We made 20 more FG's than they did (44-24). I'm not sure I've ever seen that big of a disparity.
• They attempted 34 FT's to our 12. That is also one of the biggest spreads. However, these are correlated, since when we foul them on a shot it gives them free throws and doesn't count as a shot attempts.
• Cory Magette got more free throws than our entire squad.
• In the 2nd and 4th quarters, the Clippers scored 27 total points. Nice job ZOO CREW! 18 total points if you ignore free throws.

__________________
"Will was rolling, wasn't he? I roll with the guy that's hot." MC

Nice game for "Pistons home/away crowd" as once again it appeared that there were more us with Pistons jerseys/garb there than those with Clipper gear. Of course you heard the "DEEEtriot Basketball chants"", the SHEEED everytime he got the rock,>> even "ball don't lie" was yelled out when Sheed had a bogus foul called on him. There were plenty of oohs and aahs and hollers on JMAX's dunks and attempted dunks, and of course the big cheers when Fabio dazzled the crowd in the end. The Pistons fans without Detroit gear came out of their shell and were there cheering in the second half when it appeared the game was over for the Clippers, as the boys in blue led from start to finish.....

The Clips really miss EB and Livingston....no wonder Sam abandoned them.... Kaman played in his first game in a week after getting an epidural, (no he is not pregnant), but this was supposed to eliminate the back pain.) He started out good but faded after playing the whole first quarter. Cuttino Mobley was a no show and seem to have a stomach cramps midway thru the game. poor Maggete...he got his points but most of them came at the FT line (he has averaged on 10 points at the line the last 11 games). Dunleavy came out of the lockerroom with a scared look on his face and the end of the game he walked off with the same face.

Now back to the Pistons..Tay took over for the missing CB, shouting directions and scoring on jumpers, short pops and runners. He lead the team in points and assists with 22-10, and it appeared that he had something to prove to his relatives friends sprinkled throughout the crowdd. AJ returned to the line-up and provided his relatives and high school friends with a couple of blocks and steller defense as wll as leading the team with rebounds.

Sheed was the catalyst in the beginning scoring 13 points in the first 7.5 mins but only 4 after that. I actually told my wife at halftime that despite Sheeds first half scoring heroics, he would not top 20 and I was right. Those 4 blocks were enouht to frustrate Kaman & Co though.

The bench was impressive tonight. After starting off slow in the 2nd qtr, they finally came around and had the Clipper faithful wondering who they were and yours truly had to provide resume information.

Although Stuckey was OK in his first start, Dixon was a pleasant surprise off the bench leading the zoo crew in scoring and assists. The zoo crew scored 41 points as Dunleavy threw out the white flag with about 5 mins left in the contest>>er actually this was no contest. It was just an excuse for Team Piston to enjoy some sunshine and R & R California and then end it with a nice entertaining scrimmage for the all of the former Detroiters who migrated out here over the last 25 years.

I sat about 4 rows back of the Clippers bench in the corner by the tunnel so I was not able to see what was going on at the Pistons bench down the way, but I can tell you that coach-in-training Lindsey Hunter walked out on the floor with the rest of the coaches on every time out and provided his opinion. If Dixon can play that way vs the C's next week, we might be able to shut down Hunter for good.

Meaningless stats> Pistons scored 52 points in the paint, more than 20+ above their average. They got 28 assists, which translates to 38 games in a row that a game topping 24 assists have resulted into a W ( and no Chauncy>>who needs him any) Pistons are a league best 25-1 when scoring 100+ points.

Time to get some rest now, got to get up and drive to Vegas in the morning. I will check my photos and if any are decent I will upload when I return Tuesday....

Wow, thanks La Dre, wonderful first hand courtside journal, thank you.

Wow, Thanks LaDre.........Nice Avatar........

I suppose Lindsey's defensive strengths could give him the edge in the end. If Dixon is indeed just another conscienceless journeyman bench guard in the Association Lindsey wins hands down. No contest.

I think Dixon may have a touch more upside than that.

games like this show the importance of one of our most un appreciated players... prince is so important to this team with how he just fills in where ever he's needed, 10 assists last night think it was 8 in the first half when the game was still a game.

And AJ is again a gamer, can only go from the online stats to make this judgement but again he seems to be playing better then max, and really is to the point he should be the first big off the bench.

If they keep focus and remember how they have gotten to this point the future looks good.