The claim was that that Pistons team was "3-4 years" past their best, when they were literally coming off of their best year. It made it out like they had all aged out when most of the starters were still peaking.
That 07 Pistons team no longer had Big Ben, a past his prime Rasheed, and a completely broken down Webber. They were not near as good as the team that won the title.
Sheed was still playing at an All-Star level and was better integrated into the team, Billups/Rip/Prince were all better in 2007 than they were in 2004, and they added Webber who was good enough he would have been the #2 on Bron's squad. There's a reason that team still won 59 games in 2008 and made the ECF for the 6th straight season, which was the season AFTER LeBron had beaten them and 5 more wins than they had in 2004 or 2005.
And LeBron came literally one rebound away from beating Detroit in 2006, when they still had Big Ben and were in their absolute prime winning 64 games.
Compare that to the '91 Pistons, who had an injured Isiah Thomas who would never be the same plus Laimbeer, Vinnie, and Edwards all 33+ and on the verge of retirement. Only won 50 games that year with a shell of a squad, the next year they won just 48 and were dismissed by the Knicks in the first round. Yet Jordan gets credit for beating the "Big Bad Pistons" for the first time in four tries, while Bron's defeat of an objectively better (at the moment) Pistons squad is being dismissed solely because Big Ben had been traded out for Webber.
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DRAYMOND AND PERKINS
