The Detroit Pistons have already shaken up their depth chart this summer, and they’ll enter next season with a brand new starting power forward with Tobias Harris headed to the Western Conference
Last season, the Detroit Pistons took a massive step forward when they went from 44 regular season wins and a first round playoff exit to a 60-win campaign that earned the squad the top seed in the East along with a trip to the conference’s semifinals. But despite that tangible improvement, the Pistons still looked like an incomplete team that struggled to score from the perimeter once the Cleveland Cavaliers packed the paint in round two.
Before reaching the postseason, the Pistons graded out as a mediocre three-point shooting squad, and that deficiency reared its ugly head at the worst time for Detroit since All-Star center Jalen Duren production cratered at the same time. Cade Cunningham still served as the engine and driving force for the Pistons at the end of the year, but the All-NBA point guard needed some reliable help around him to score in the playoffs.
With that untimely failure hanging in the air, Pistons President of Basketball Operations Trajan Langdon set out to rework the team’s roster so that they’d be more prepared to compete with the Eastern Conference’s elite in the future. Now, doing so inarguably required for Langdon to make a few difficult decisions in the offseason with the handling of Tobias Harris’ free agency among them.
During Langdon’s end of season press conference, the Pistons exec stated that he was interested in keeping Harris, a 35-year old veteran who was well-liked within the Detroit locker room, in the Motor City for another go-around.
“We appreciate everything he’s brought, and yeah, we hope that we can bring someone back,” Langdon said in May. “He’s somebody that we want to keep in a Pistons uniform.”
But earlier this week, Harris inked a two-year deal with the San Antonio Spurs after the Western Conference squad made it all the way to the NBA Finals, and one of his primary reasons for doing so was that the Spurs aligned with his championship aspirations.
“The urgency to win a championship,” Harris said of his decision. “It felt like both our goals aligned.”
Though that comment could be perceived as a subtle dig at the Detroit organization, it is more likely that Harris was simply speaking positively about his new team after the Pistons reportedly offered the 15-year pro a two-year contract with only one year guaranteed.
In the end, Harris agreed to a two-year deal with the Spurs for $31 million, which brought his career earnings to over $330 million in total. And without Harris on the roster moving forward, the Pistons quickly pivoted by bringing in John Collins to play power forward to help give Detroit an above-the-rim presence with added long-range reliability (over 40% from three-point range last season) that Harris simply didn’t offer.
Before these transactions went through, the Pistons also executed a trade for former Oklahoma City Thunder guard Isaiah Joe, who’s another marksman from beyond the arc with a three-point connection rate above 40% as well. These moves signaled the Pistons’ intention to get younger while adding another dimension to the team given how proficient Collins and Joe are from distance.
Since the Pistons dominated the paint last season, Detroit was already well-equipped to attack near the basket, but the squad lacked teeth from outside the line. Harris’ specialty came from the mid-range, but the Pistons sought to transition the team’s makeup towards a more balanced approach with dangerous scorers both inside and outside the arc.
The NBA can be a cutthroat business, and the Pistons had to accept that reality. No matter how well liked Harris was in Motown, the team needed to improve on the perimeter, and it was easier for Detroit to accomplish that with a new opening at the four. So, the Pistons will look quite a bit different when the 2026-27 regular season kicks off considering Harris started every single game that he was healthy for over the last two seasons, but that is the nature of the league nowadays.
Detroit entered the offseason with intentions to course-correct their struggles from downtown, and parting ways with Harris helped the Pistons accomplish just that.
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