CadeCunningham

Preseason question: Does everything for Cade have to be so hard-earned? It’s amazing to watch Cunningham, in the basketball equivalent of a straitjacket, make daring escape after daring escape. He doesn’t have the space that other stars enjoy or the secondary options they rely on. That doesn’t stop him from carving up defensive coverages from the inside out and grinding his way into positions of advantage that he and the Pistons can repeatedly exploit. Making tough plays is the clear purview of stars. Yet the very best—the MVP class—all have their avenues to easy offense. Cunningham is still expanding his, while captaining a team that can use every straightforward scoring opportunity it can get. Maybe there are more opportunities to push aggressively in transition or to court contact rather than settle for the pull-up. At the highest levels of competition, that low-hanging fruit is a matter of survival. The Pistons have a responsibility to put a more balanced lineup around their lead playmaker, but it’s on Cade to turn every incremental advantage into a tangible payoff.