insider Special: Dumars Real Pistons' MVP


By Chad Ford
ESPN Insider


"Where there is no vision, the people perish. " -- Proverbs 29:18

NBA commissioner David Stern handed Chauncey Billups the Finals MVP trophy Tuesday night after the Pistons finished beating the pulp out of the Lakers for their first NBA title in more than a decade. But let's not kid ourselves. Billups might have scored the most points. Richard Hamilton might have been the most consistent. Rasheed Wallace was the catalyst that made them believe. Ben Wallace was the heart of the team. Larry Brown brought it all together.

But Pistons president Joe Dumars was the real MVP on Tuesday night.

I've read or listened to every theory raised to explain how and why we were wrong about this year's Pistons.

The East is stronger than we thought. The West is weaker than we thought. The Lakers were distracted and not playing at full strength. The Pistons are the one and only team in the East that matched up well with the Lakers. Defense, not offense, wins championships.

In an effort to console ourselves, we'll claim the Pistons are a fluke, that they don't stack up to the great NBA champions of the past. Michael's Bulls were better. Larry's Celtics and Duncan's Spurs were, too. In fact, my guess is many of you want to put Shaq and Kobe's Lakers -- minus the version that showed up the past two seasons -- above this year's Pistons.

Don't believe it.

The Pistons are one of the great teams in recent NBA history. And Dumars, the Pistons' head man, is the guy who deserves the credit. He's a visionary who has given GMs an alternative blueprint for building a champion.

For the past two decades, almost every NBA GM has followed the same model for building a contender: Acquire a superstar in the draft. Add another one in free agency. Bring in support players all around them. Then ride the superstars' backs to victory.


Joe Dumars' vision and conviction have put the Pistons back atop the NBA.
The Lakers have perfected the art. Jerry West paid a fortune to acquire Shaquille O'Neal, the best player on the planet at the time. He wheeled and dealed to get Kobe Bryant in the draft. Mitch Kupchak used the lure of an easy championship to bring more star power -- Gary Payton and Karl Malone -- on board. Before L.A., the Bulls, Spurs and Rockets followed the same model. You have to go back to the late 1980s, when Dumars was breaking hearts and collecting rings on the court, to find a great team that won it all without a single, dominant star.

Dumars' Pistons deliberately have taken the road less traveled. There are no superstars. No max contracts. No major egos. The Pistons are a group of misfits -- NBA castoffs working on their third or fourth chances in the NBA.

They are everyman, not superman. They wear blue collars -- much like their fans. Their basketball abilities may not fill up SportsCenter highlights. But their hearts are the stuff of legend.

Look at Detroit's starting five:

Chauncey Billups, a Finals MVP before he was an all-star (Dumars was the last guy to achieve that honor), Billups was traded by the Celtics halfway into his rookie season. He spent time in Toronto, Denver and Minnesota before finally finding a team that emphasized his strengths without dwelling on his weaknesses.

Rip Hamilton was dumped by the Wizards in favor of Jerry Stackhouse after Michael Jordan, of all people, felt that Hamilton didn't have what it took to lead the Wizards to the playoffs.

Ben Wallace was traded by the Wizards and Magic before becoming the best defensive player in the league for the Pistons.

Rasheed Wallace had been cast off by the Blazers for a napkin and some paper clips in February. He was traded again a few days later for five players for whom the Pistons had no use. No one else would touch him. Some claimed Wallace would destroy the Pistons' chemistry. Instead, he became the sparkplug for their championship run.

Tayshaun Prince nearly fell out of the first round despite having a stellar college career at Kentucky. Even Detroit fans called for the team to dump him in favor of Carmelo Anthony last summer.

And don't forget Darko, the guy who was supposed to cost the Pistons a championship this year. When Darko didn't play and Carmelo was dominating for the Nuggets, critics came out of the woodwork to bash Dumars. Even when the Pistons were playing in the Eastern Conference Finals, the haters still said it was too bad the Pistons hadn't drafted Carmelo or they would have had a shot at winning it all. Now Darko is the youngest player in the history of the NBA to wear a championship ring. He might have had nothing to do with this year's championship run, but he'll play a big part in the Pistons' continued dominance over the next few years.

In almost every way this team resembles the man who built it. In his playing days, Dumars -- not the more famous Isiah Thomas or Bill Laimbeer -- was the glue that silently held the Bad Boys together. Now Dumars has assembled 12 of the stickiest players in the NBA. He has created a team in his own image. Silently, almost without being noticed, they just ran roughshod over a team with four Hall of Famers.

“ I know patience can be a dirty word in this business. But at the very time people are writing that our window is closing, I'm telling you it's just now starting to open. ”
— Joe Dumars in December

It wasn't by accident. Dumars always has had a vision, and it was uncompromising.

In late December I interviewed Dumars during a turbulent stretch. The Pistons had lost four straight, and it had been eight games since they scored 90 points. The questions were everywhere. Why did they fire Rick Carlisle? Why did they trade Cliff Robinson? Why didn't they take Carmelo over Darko?

Dumars was resolute.

"We had gone as far as we were going to go with that team," Dumars said then. "We had to make a change before it was too late. I knew there was a good chance that by changing the makeup of this team we probably had to take a step back. That, to me, is a small price to pay for a championship.

"I'm not going to sacrifice tomorrow so I can have last year's record. My job is balancing today and tomorrow with the same moves. ... I believe they have the talent to help turn us into a legitimate contender down the road.

"I know patience can be a dirty word in this business. But at the very time people are writing that our window is closing, I'm telling you it's just now starting to open. They gave me that award [Executive of the Year] last year because we surprised a lot of people and turned around a pretty bad team quickly. But I've done more this summer than I did last year. It's just going to take a little longer to see the results. But when they come, we won't be happy just to be in the Eastern Conference Finals."

Six months later, the Pistons are the NBA Champions. Dumars looks prophetic.

"I am happy we won, but I did believe in what I was doing," Dumars said Tuesday night. "It is easy for me to say that if I had to do it all over again, I would do the same thing over again. But I have never backed off a move I made or had second thoughts. I think coming in here and winning it all speaks more for me than anything I can tell you."

"I understand it is part of the job to be second-guessed and have stones thrown your way," Dumars added. "We caught all of the stones and put them away."

Dumars saw it before anyone else could. No other explanation will do.

Thanks for the article, and I would remind some of the fans that Ernie Grunfeld had a similar vision with spree and camby. And if we had Phil Jackson, instead of sucking up to a quitter, we could've had at least 1 championship. Instead Knicks gets second guessed and sold down the east river.

I wonder how Zeke feels about Joe getting this championship