Dear Coach Curry,

Small ball must die. Now. Well technically this should have occurred weeks ago, but us fans would be happy just to see some semblance of activity in your cranial matter so now shall suffice.

What on earth is it doing for us that is good? Outrebounded, outhustled, outworked. Five in a row. Five! That’s the most consecutive losses in five years for our beloved Pistons. Five is not a good number right now, my friend.

We’ve tried to be patient. We’ve made every excuse in the book. “Well, Rip and Sheed were injured so maybe they just needed to get back in shape.” That didn’t do it. Amir might not be the second coming of Jesus but he’s certainly active on the boards and has a discernible effect on the game whenever he’s on the floor. Yes he fouls too much and yes he isn’t Rodman in his prime but he isn’t going to learn by sitting courtside. Why in the heck is Maxiell riding the pine when we can’t control the glass? The sheer idiocy (again, we know you’re the professional and all… but sooner or later things just don’t add up) of the moves – or lack thereof – is mindboggling!

This whole Rip / A.I. telenovela (due credit to DBB commenters here – great title, guys) is worse than the fact that 90210 is back on television. If you’re the player’s coach that they respect that holds everyone accountable and makes the right moves… well, MAKE THE RIGHT MOVES! It’s one thing to play around with lineups when you add a new player mid-season (hey, we understand no training camp affects the whole shebang) but it’s another to consistently keep throwing out five (see? i wasn’t kidding – five’s a bad number right now!) guys who don’t fit together. Whoah, sorry about all the parenthesis there. You can’t even manage a lineup so I don’t mean to do anything else to confuse you right now.

Factiousness aside, we’re only acting like this because we care. We truly care about this team and know we’ve been spoiled with so many consecutive trips to the ECF. But we also hold people accountable (novel idea, eh?) for our team and want to see results. So please Coach Curry, please start acting like, you know, a coach. We’ve already gotten rid of Matt Millen once around these parts and don’t need a second coming.

Signed,

Pistons Fans Everywhere

(Addendum – everything in the comments below)