Stan Van Gundy to Pistons, Greg Monroe likely out

You know you missed this facial expression!

Everyone's favorite Ron Jeremy look-a-like, mock turtleneck wearing NBA coach is back. This time, he's not only a coach, but he's also in charge of basketball operations.

Stan Van Gundy agreed to a 5 year, $35 million contract with the Detroit Pistons, and will join Gregg Popovich and Doc Rivers as the only NBA head coaches to also have full control over player personnel.

According to Sean Deveney of Sporting News, Van Gundy's arrival in Detroit will most likely lead to Greg Monroe's departure:


Now, with Van Gundy in place on an eyebrow-raising contract—five years, $35 million—there is near certainty among league executives that Monroe has played his last game for Detroit.

The fact that Van Gundy opted for the Pistons over the other team in pursuit of him—the Warriors—offers some insight, one league general manager told Sporting News.

“There are two things that made that job better for Stan,” the GM said. “One is the fact that he gets to make personnel decisions, that is a big deal of course. But the other is Andre Drummond. If you want to build your team around a young player, Drummond is the guy.

"You’re not going to build around both him and Monroe, they had too much trouble making that work. You pick Drummond and move on from Monroe.”

Ideally, Van Gundy’s offense will be constructed like the one he had in Orlando, which was innovative at the time—he wants to spread the floor with shooters and create space for a power big man down low. It will be Drummond in Detroit, just as it had been Dwight Howard with the Magic.


Greg Monroe will be a restricted free agent, and according to Deveney, will attract the most interest from the Lakers and Bobcats (and perhaps the Pelicans, as Monroe is from New Orleans).

Is there any chance Monroe could end up in Boston? Celtics Life writer Mike Dyer believes it to be unlikely due to cost, plus he doesn't really fit the bill of the rim protector that Danny Ainge is looking for. From his article about potential Celtics centers for next season:

Greg Monroe will be a restricted free agent, but it's going to be really hard for the Celtics to clear the necessary cap space for him, plus, he doesn't really fit the description of "rim protector". He's a great offensive player, but not the guy you want patrolling the middle. After that there's a whole bunch of meh: Chris Kaman, Greg Oden, Birdman Andersen, Greg Stiemsma, Jermaine O'Neal (lol), Andrew Bynum (double lol). A bunch of players with major injury concerns much better served as back-ups, and definitely not the type of guys you'd expect the Celtics to target (possible exception in Oden, but he has yet to crack the 200 total minutes played mark this season with Miami. Still monster question marks surrounding him). 

 Jared Sullinger's father recently said that the Celtics have promised to get a true center, so if they are unlucky at the draft, we might see some drastic moves by Danny if they want to live up to these alleged promises. The free agent pool for talented centers isn't very deep, so while Monroe to Boston might seem unlikely at the moment, anything is possible this off-season.