Flip Murray has decided to play for the Pistons next season for $1,890,000 bucks and it’s a smart move for him.  The Pistons although probably just wish that Murray would have walked based on the way he played last season.  He played in 69 games (18 starts) and he averaged 21.4 minutes, 6.7 points, 1.6 rebounds and 2.7 assists.  He also didn’t shoot to well last season as he only hit 40.4% from the floor, 28.9% from three point range and 72.5% from the free throw line.

Murray has always been a offensive minded bench player but his career numbers took a hit because of his play last season.  Murray has now played in 290 games (69 starts) and he’s averaged 22.6 minutes, 9.3 points, 2.0 rebounds and 2.3 assists per game.  Murray has hit 40.9% of his shots from the floor, 27.5% from three point range and 71.7% from the free throw line.

Antonio McDyess has opted out of his contract and he will become an unrestricted free agent on July 1st.  The Pistons would probably like to bring McDyess back but good, big men are expensive and McDyess surely qualifies as one of those.  He can’t play big minutes any more because of past surgeries but he’s really a good backup player.  McDyess played in all 82 games (3 starts) last season for the Pistons and he averaged 21.1 minutes, 8.1 points, 6.0 rebounds and 0.9 assists per game.  He shot 52.6% from the floor but that’s a little misleading as most of his shots were dunks or putbacks.  He only shot 69.1% from the free throw line.

McDyess’ career numbers continue to fade as his playing time has been cut due to the past injuries in his career.  He has now played in 725 games (471 starts) and he’s averaged 28.8 minutes, 13.9 points, 7.6 rebounds, 1.3 assists and 1.2 blocked shots per game.  He has hit 49.7% of his shots from the floor in his career, only 12.7% of his three pointers and 67.2% of his free throws.

Chauncey Billups has opted out of the final season of his contract with the Pistons and he will become a unrestricted free agent on July 1st.  Billups is saying all of the right things in the media about wanting to come back to the Pistons, but Ben Wallace was saying the exact same things and he bolted Detroit.  The Pistons must retain Billups as he’s the guy that makes the whole Pistons offense go and if they lose him it will hurt them badly.  Billups played in 70 games last season and he averaged 36.2 minutes, 17.0 points, 3.4 rebounds, 7.2 assists and 1.2 steals.  He also shot fairly well from everywhere on the court as he has hit 42.7% of his shots from the floor, 34.5% from three point range and 88.3% from the free throw line.

Billups career numbers just keep improving as his minutes have gone up due to his maturation as a basketball player.  Billups has played in 680 games (586 starts) in his career and he has averaged 31.7 minutes, 14.5 points, 3.0 rebounds, 5.3 assists and 1.0 steals per game.  His shooting has always been pretty decent as he’s hit 41.2% of his shots from the floor, 38.4% from three point range and 88.2% from the free throw line.

The Pistons have traded Carlos Delfino to the Raptors for a 2nd round pick in 2009 and a 2nd round pick in 2011.  It doesn’t seem as if the Pistons got fair value for Delfino, but he never really seemed to fit into the Pistons style of physical basketball.  Delfino played in all 82 games (1 start) this season for the Pistons and he averaged 16.7 minutes, 5.2 points, 3.2 rebounds and 1.1 assists per game.  He shot the ball a little better than he did his first two seasons with the Pistons.  He hit 41.5% from the floor, 33.3% from three point range and 78.7% from the free throw line.  In 3 years with the Pistons, Delfino played in 180 games (6 starts) and he averaged 14.2 minutes, 4.4 points, 2.4 rebounds and 0.9 assists per game.  He shot 40.2% from the floor, 32.2% from three point range and 70.4% from the free throw line.

The Pistons played awful last night and they deserved to lose…..and that they did.  The Pistons were dominated 31-16 in the 4th quarter by the Cavs and that ended their season!  The Pistons only shot 35.9% from the floor and they were outrebounded 53-33 last night.  Richard Hamilton was the only starting player that played well for the Pistons with 29 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 steals.  Chris Webber had a decent game with 13 points and 6 rebounds.  Rasheed Wallace had a bad game before getting tossed late in the 4th quarter.  He only shot 5 of 14 from the floor and wound up with 11 points, 2 rebounds, 2 assists, 3 steals and 2 blocked shots.  Chauncey Billups had an awful game as he finished up with 9 points, 1 assist and 2 steals.  Billups was also abused by Cavs’ rookie Daniel Gibson who scored 31 points including 19 in the 4th quarter!  Tayshaun Prince had another awful game as he was only 1 for 10 from the floor with 5 points, 6 rebounds, 6 assists and 2 steals.  The Pistons folded up like a tent in this series losing 4 straight games after winning the first two games of this series.

http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=270602005