{"id":821677,"date":"2026-08-27T08:45:24","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T08:45:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/821677\/"},"modified":"2026-08-27T08:45:24","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T08:45:24","slug":"central-notes-pistons-oubre-b-smith-cavaliers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/821677\/","title":{"rendered":"Central Notes: Pistons, Oubre, B. Smith, Cavaliers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Pistons weren\u2019t willing to pay the price it would have taken to acquire a star player like Kevin Durant<\/a> or Kawhi Leonard<\/a> this offseason, but that doesn\u2019t mean it was quiet offseason for the team, writes Omari Sankofa II of The Detroit Free Press<\/a> (subscription required).<\/p>\n

Examining summer additions like John Collins<\/a>, Isaiah Joe<\/a>, and Ebuka Okorie<\/a>, Sankofa considers whether Detroit did enough to continue to thrive in what should be an increasingly competitive Eastern Conference or whether the front office played it too safe.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, it\u2019s probably unreasonable for the Pistons to repeat last season\u2019s 60-22 regular season record, but Coty M. Davis of The Detroit News<\/a> (subscription required) identifies three factors that will determine whether the team will win 50-plus games in 2026\/27.<\/p>\n

In addition to highlighting Ausar Thompson<\/a>\u2018s offensive development and maintaining last season\u2019s defensive intensity, Davis suggests it will be important for Detroit to knock down more three-point shots after ranking 28th in the NBA in that category last season. Adding Collins, Joe, and a full season of Kevin Huerter<\/a> should help the Pistons improve in that department.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s more from around the Central Division:<\/p>\n

Will the Pacers be better off with Kelly Oubre or Bennedict Mathurin<\/a> going forward? In the wake of news<\/a> that Mathurin is signing with New Orleans, Dustin Dopirak of The Indianapolis Star<\/a> considers that question and ultimately concludes that Oubre will give the team more positional versatility and better defense while holding his own offensively.
\nSpeaking to Dopirak<\/a> (subscription required) at the Pacers\u2018 charity softball game on Monday, second-round pick Braden Smith<\/a>, who will begin his career on a two-way contract with Indiana, said he\u2019s determined to \u201cbe better\u201d after a shaky Summer League showing last month. \u201cI think I\u2019m my hardest critic about it. I think being able to digest it, understand it, see what went wrong, see what went well, what I can learn,\u201d said Smith, who shot just 26.5% from the field in five outings in Las Vegas. \u201cThose type of things. I had a lot of good feedback from just the guys, the coaching staff. I think I\u2019ve come a long way so far. For me it\u2019s just applying it and doing it with those guys at practice and learning from there.\u201d
\nThe Cavaliers lost a handful of role players this offseason, including Dennis Schr\u00f6der<\/a>, Dean Wade<\/a>, and Keon Ellis<\/a>, but Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com<\/a> believes Max Strus<\/a> will be the one that\u2019s the toughest to replace. While Sam Merrill<\/a> is a \u201cstylistic lookalike\u201d on the court, Strus\u2019 toughness, leadership, and competitiveness made him a popular locker-room figure in Cleveland, Fedor observes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pistons weren\u2019t willing to pay the price it would have taken to acquire a star player like…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":699645,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3773],"tags":[7,363,2456,296,188,3860,3147,872,6,297],"class_list":["post-821677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-detroit-pistons","tag-basketball","tag-bennedict-mathurin","tag-braden-smith","tag-detroit","tag-detroit-pistons","tag-detroitpistons","tag-kelly-oubre","tag-max-strus","tag-nba","tag-pistons"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117166599241334647","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=821677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/699645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=821677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=821677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=821677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}