Congratulations

Seriously, to Cleveland, the better team in the Eastern Conference finals by far. Even the games the Pistons won I thought they got lucky. LeBron was fantastic and the other guys good enough. Daniel Gibson, again, wow.

Among many things, I wish the Pistons hadn't melted down so far in the 4th quarter so that I could bring up in good faith the fact that the Cavs shot 46 free throws, without getting fouled down the stretch. But even more equitable calls wouldn't have made a difference last night.

So, for me, the question is what becomes of this Pistons team. Even before the series, the future wasn't on their side and now that's even more true. Cleveland will only be better next year and the same with Chicago. The sad thing is that, even as good of a GM as Joe D. is, there won't be any easy fixes. Talk of Z-Bo, I don't know...

Taking a page out of one of the Detroit papers, I'll submit these final grades to the Pistons players for their last series.

Chauncey Billups: D-

He played his worst playoff basketball as a Piston. When he was scoring, he was not getting others involved. Abysmal turnover to assist ratio, no clutch play, weak leadership. Before the series, I couldn't imagine being ambivalent about his return to Detroit, now I'm wondering whether he'll be worth the money. He's still an above average point guard in the L, but he took a big hit in this series.

Richard Hamilton: B+

The only player who had a peak performance in a game in the series. The shot wasn't there every night, but he came to play in the final game, unlike any of his teammates and singlehandedly kept them in a couple of games. He also had some decent moments on defense.

Tayshaun Prince: F

What the hell happened to Tay? He regressed further than I would have thought possible. You all know he's been my favorite player over this run because he does a little bit of everything. Well, in this series, he did a lot of nothing. He failed to slow LBJ down much at all, so no trademark defense and his offense--holy suckitude. I still love ya, Tay, but man, you were terrible in this series.

Rasheed Wallace: D+

It's important not to forget how good he was in the first two games that the Pistons won in Detroit. However, he had a couple of essential no-shows in Cleveland. And then, while he played with fire, his blowup on Saturday night was embarrassing. You could almost feel this run ending with that tantrum. No apologies for Sheed this time, you blew it.

Chris Webber: D+

He gave it what he had, he just doesn't have enough anymore. He bounced back from a terrible game 4 to play all right in the last two, but he was slow, terrible on d, and devoid of power. I feel bad for him, ultimately. I hope he retires--he could probably find work next year, but it would be beneath him and he would cause trouble for it. I'm surprisingly dispassionate about this.

The Bench: D

Aside from McDyess and one great game from Maxiell, they were very bad.

Coach: F

It's not fair to pin it all on Flip, far from it. But he's such an uninspiring guy on the bench. I swear, whenever they showed him on the screen, my confidence waned. And his substitution patterns--what the fuck? Starting the 4th quarter with your season on the line and you go with a backcourt of Lindsay Hunter and Flip Murray? What? Then Cleveland goes on a mini-run, you call a timeout and then send them back out there?!! And the run continues and your season is over. I can't really blame Lindsay and Flip Murray, as Saunders hadn't given them enough burn in the series to get any kind of rhythm. Either ride your horses all the way or commit to getting your bench guys in, but switching up at that point and then not pulling them when it was clear it wasn't working?

The players have been bears from day one for Flip and he seems like a nice guy with a decent mind for the game. But I can't see him winning in a big way. Bring in Bill Laimbeer and be done with it.

So it's obviously frustrating, but I should acknowledge that this team rose quicker and went further than I imagined they would five years ago. There was that transcendent championship that I will always cherish and many other great moments. They've been good enough to want them to be better than they are, or at least as good as they thought they were. Alas, they weren't, and now it seems, as quickly as it arrived, the era of Piston championship aspirations is over.