Why Detroit sports talk radio blows: Reason #474

WXYT has spend the past half hour talking Pistons. Mid-day hosts Scott Anderson and Doug Karsh are talking Pistons half assed, with only one host (Karsh) making sense, but at least they're talking Pistons.

What got me going was the clueless Anderson crucifying the Pistons for their admittedly ugly, but ultimately inconsequential, loss to the Knicks Sunday night. Even worse, most callers are agreeing with his know-nothing ass. The discussion is turning into the lame, beat to death, "Pistons have no heart" argument.

Couple of things...

First off, I HATE the "Have no heart" argument. I DESPISE IT! It's totally subjective, not based on any facts, especially when coming from fans who only see the team from a distance on TV. How do you measure heart? How can a team that beats the Celtics on the road, the first team to have done so this season, have no heart? It's totally nonsensical claim, arbitrarily measuring the unmeasurable.

The Pistons did beat the San Antonio Spurs on Thursday night, which was a very nice win after tough losses against 2 of the NBA's best, Boston and Dallas. I think that showed they have plenty of "heart", whatever that entails...

Here's a fact. The Pistons played 4 road games in 5 days, one of those nut busting NBA schedule quirks that every team has to survive. I saw a fair amount of the game, and the Pistons had the look of a team that was dead tired from playing a barnstorming like schedule this past week. Every team has a few of these awful losses against a team they would normally kick their asses up and down the court.

Flip Saunders saw what was happening against New York, and emptied the bench. That was the smart thing to do, limit the starters minutes in a meaningless game that was long lost.

Losses like last night's happen in the NBA, where a team plays well below their capabilities, and the opposition steps up. Even a bad team like the Knicks is capable of beating anyone in the NBA on any given night. In other words, shit happens, you burn the tape, and you move on. That's it...

More importantly, it's the middle of fucking January! If this were April, then I might, I repeat, MIGHT, be concerned. As for the Knicks debacle? We'll have forgotten all about the loss in a week.

So I'll cut the Pistons plenty of slack over a silly loss that is only 1 game in 82. I think a team that is playing well over .700 ball has earned it, despite what IQ challenged sports talk radio hosts would have you believe.