Cade is a star that is let down and trapped on a really terrible Detroit team to be frank. The Pistons roster have not looked good in his first two seasons and the third year is looking the same. Dude deserves to be on a way better team.
Has there been an even worse case of a great player let down this bad by their org? I think this is the worst I’ve ever seen
I don’t know. He’s meh defense and low efficiency offense. I’m not sure he would be a 19-6 point guard with better talent around him. I mean offensively he’s a bit like a lot more turnover prone, not near the shot version of Kemba Walker.
He doesn’t strike me like that “great player on a bad team” type of guy… Not Beal his rookie year, Kat his first couple, Devin Booker playing on 20-25 win teams for his first 4 years, even early Trae on bad Atlanta teams.
He’s got that feeling of a guy that is being forced to do more than he should be. Kinda early Michael Carter Williams early on. He did stuff yes. But his role was much better suited as taking a step back with a more talented roster.
Cade’s usage rate is 31%. That’s higher than Wemby, Trae, Lebron, Dame. He’s closer to Jokic than Jaylen Brown. On a decent roster he probably should be in that 18-22% range (Austin Reaves, VanVleet, Marcus Smart, Dinwiddie, Suggs).
Yeah, it probably means instead of 22-7 on 35 minutes a game, he’s more like 12-5 on 28 minutes. But I bet he’d start playing better in that role. And probably not be averaging 4.4 turnovers a game either.
Has the team let him down… Sure. But he’s also dead last in win shares of the 2021 draft class. He’s getting asked to do a lot and he’s not able to.