Detroit Pistons Owner Tom Gores Deserves Credit For Quick Turnaround
The Detroit Pistons owner has proven he's willing to do whatever it takes to make the Pistons relevant again.
Two offseasons ago, Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores put his money where his mouth was by handing out a historic head coaching contract to Monty Williams to become the Pistons’ new head coach. A six-year, 78.4 million dollar contract at the time was the richest contract in NBA history for a head coach.
At the time, the numerous other potential coaching options, including Kevin Ollie, were not appealing to Pistons fans or Gores. The Pistons owner paid top dollar for a former Coach of the Year and NBA finalist. Many at the time praised Gores' decision and willingness to spend money, which many owners refuse to do.
Fast forward a year later, though, and the Williams experiment went worse than any other coaching experience in Pistons history. Detroit won 14 games, a franchise-worst, and lost a NBA record 28 games in a row. Second year prospect Jaden Ivey was never utilized correctly and often in the doghouse for Williams in favor of Killian Hayes, a player who is no longer in the NBA.
To make matters worse, to my knowledge, Williams had worn out his welcome throughout the organization before the season had even ended.
The once praised move had blown up to a historic degree in Gores and the Pistons face.
In an offseason that would lead to much change, Gores fired then-General Manager Troy Weaver and started a search for a new head of the front office. This was the first of Gores' moves that deserve credit and signaled change in Detroit.
In December of 2024, Vincent Goodwill of Yahoo Sports reported “there’s a lot of voices with influence in the building”, that building being the Pistons franchise. Goodwill said, “Having a lot of cooks has almost always been the case with this franchise, and plenty others, to be sure, but the Pistons could stand to benefit from a top-down mentality that filters through the rest of the decision-makers.”
Many with connections within the franchise speculated and understood that the Pistons had too many actors in their front office making decisions. This can often lead to a lack of one vision and everyone being on the same page, which was an issue in Detroit.
A Goodwill source confirmed this in another report stating, “There’s four factions in that building,”
Gores heard this criticism and made changes with his next hire.
If you look up “Trajan Langdon” on Google, you will see that it does not say “General Manager” next to his name. It says “President of Basketball Operations”. This means Langdon is the sole decision maker, and every decision concerning this basketball team is his responsibility.
There is no questioning who made [X] decision, who has more power within the front office, who's vision this team is being built to match, etc. The Pistons now have one chef, leader, and vision, and it all comes down to Trajan Langdon. This type of change leads to changing a franchise’s culture, something Gores spoke to this week.
“We’re really developing the rhythm both on the court, and then in the front office, we’ve really got good culture, and it starts with being unselfish and having a foundation that we can play with or work with.” -Tom Gores
In the last few years, there has been some controversy in the front office, both basketball-related and non-basketball-related. Gores attempted to change that culture, which seems to have paid off.
Then comes the hiring of J.B. Bickerstaff.
Or really, the firing of Monty Williams.
It had been reported multiple times that whoever Gores hired to replace Weaver and his front office would be given the decision to keep or fire Williams.
After those reports, on June 15th, Marc Stein reported that it was “likely” that the Pistons would keep Williams for a second season. The Pistons hired Langdon later in the offseason. With so much to do in such little time left, the assumption could be that Langdon decided that another coaching search and the rest of the responsibilities this late into the offseason would be too much.
If things didn’t work out, Langdon could always fire Williams mid-season or the following season, where the front office would be in place and he’d have plenty of time for free agency, the NBA Draft, and a coaching search.
Four days after this report, the Pistons fired Monty Williams.
Langdon was on board with getting rid of Williams and finding his coach. To my knowledge, Tom Gores made this decision. Gores saw how badly this previous season went, Williams’ lack of connection with the roster, and how many throughout the organization felt about the former Suns coach.
Gores stepped in to make much-needed changes to restart this franchise and rebuild its culture completely.
However, making this decision would be publicly admitting a mistake. Everyone knows Gores had a heavy influence on hiring Williams. Admitting your mistake publicly *one season* later takes an incredible amount of humility to do. Not many people in this business can put their large ego aside to do that.
Move past the humility. This was an insanely expensive decision to make! Gores will pay Monty Williams 65 million dollars the next five years to NOT coach his basketball team, while also paying Bickerstaff to be the current coach.
In a league where owners trade away stars and destroy championship-contending teams because they’re so cheap and don’t want to spend the money, Gores has proven over and over again that he is willing to spend money, in this case, burn over 65 million dollars, if it is what’s best for the Detroit Pistons.
Fast-forward to March 7th, 2024. Langdon signed one of the best value-free agents in recent memory, Malik Beasley, who is in the running for Sixth Man of the Year. Head coach Bickerstaff is second in odds to win Coach of the Year. The Pistons are sixth in the Eastern Conference, fighting for home-court advantage in the playoffs.
The Gores era has not been the greatest in Pistons history. Since he became owner, the team has yet to win a playoff game. That looks like it will be changing this year.
Gores has made mistakes as an owner.
But, he has proven to be an owner willing to admit his mistakes and try to correct them. He has proven willing to spend as much money as it takes to make the Detroit Pistons a great team again, even if it means paying historic amounts to people to leave the organization.
The Pistons are finally good again.
Tom Gores’ fingerprints are all over the reasons why.