The Detroit Pistons made the surprising decision to let Tobias Harris walk in the offseason. Despite the fact that Harris was arguably the second-best player on the team during the postseason run, the Pistons thought that replacing him with John Collins at the power forward spot was an upgrade.
All offseason, the Pistons' top brass talked about how excited they were about Collins' shooting and fit with Cade Cunningham. Whether Collins ends up being a better fit than Harris remains to be seen, but the 29-year-old forward isn't off to the best start in the preseason.
Pistons are counting on John Collins, but he has to be better
Collins went 1/5 from the field for two points and two rebounds in 17 minutes of action against the Wizards on Saturday. He didn't add any assists, steals, or blocks, but had two turnovers. The Pistons lost those minutes by five points.
Through two games, Collins is 0/4 from three and hasn't attempted a free throw. He has zero assists and four turnovers.
The 0/4 from downtown is the biggest issue here. In fact, only four attempts are as big a problem as zero made threes. And this was always going to be the issue with Collins and the idea that he was a shooting upgrade.
Yes, Collins has made 40.3% of his three-point attempts over the last two seasons. But he has only taken 3.4 threes per game in that span. Last season, he attempted 4.2 threes per 36 minutes. That is an attempt rate that ranked 166th in the entire league, below the likes of Ron Holland and Caris LeVert.
That volume is simply not high enough to keep opposing defenses honest and provide any more spacing than Tobias Harris did. Spacing is as much about accuracy as it is about volume. There isn't a significant enough difference between Collins and Harris as shooting threats for Pistons fans to get too excited. If anything, in terms of shot creation, Harris is much more reliable than his younger counterpart.
The two preseason games should be further proof of this. Of course, it's only preseason, and Collins will make more shots in the regular season. But if Pistons fans thought that they were getting a proven marksman who will terrify defenses in Collins, these two games should make it clear that this may not be the case.
If Detroit is going to take a big step forward offensively, Collins has to play a large part. He has to be way better than he has been so far, otherwise, there may be some regrets about choosing him over Harris.
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