Another day and another Pistons free agent signing. The Detroit Pistons have signed veteran Point Guard D.J. Augustin to a 2 year $6 millon dollar deal on Sunday. Augustin had a pretty big year with Chicago after being signed to replace Derrick Rose once he went down and filled in nicely averaging 14 PPG and 5 AST per game. Augustin seemed like a perfect fit in Coach Thibodeau’s system shooting 41% from the field and shot 41% from beyond the arc, and for the 6 year veteran who certainly has had his ups and downs in his NBA career he certainly needed this big year otherwise he may be fighting for a job with a team in the summer league or training camp. Instead Stan Van Gundy has given him a shot, and he should be a good back up to Point Guard Brandon Jennings.
The other signing that they’ve made tonight was with veteran Small Forward Caron Butler who played with The Milwaukee Bucks and Oklahoma City last season. Butler certainly is on the downside of his career, but he can add some much needed scoring and veteran leadership to this team. Butler was supposed to be that veteran leader for The Bucks last year and that failed due to failure within the organization and not Butler. Butler was then traded to OKC, but never really found a role on the team. Butler can still help The Pistons, but with this move I see a sign and trade sending Greg Monroe out of town and moving Josh Smith to the Power Forward position. Butler’s deal is 2 years $9 million according to Marc Stein of ESPN.
With these pair of moves it’s certainly good that Detroit is making moves, but there’s no real pattern to the signings. I’m not sure what system Van Gundy is doing with the signing of Aaron Gray and Butler since they do have Caldwell Pope who is shining in the summer league and Aaron Gray isn’t a very good back up to Drummond he’s a foul waiting to happen and doesn’t do anything special offensively. The two good signings I can say Detroit made is Jodie Meeks and Augustin who will help one of the leagues worst outside shooting teams last season.
