Pistons coach Monty Williams is right to rip his team: 'That wasn't fight on the floor'

There was speculation that the Washington Wizards were the worst team in the NBA heading into Monday night's matchup with the Detroit Pistons.

After a resounding 126-107 win over the Pistons — a win that brought Detroit's losing skid to 14 — it seems clear that it's actually the Pistons who are hands down the worst team in the league.

At 2-15 that's hard to argue, but the product on the floor Monday night made the facts even more clear. This is a team that has given up less than 20 games into the 2023 this. 

This is despite the fact that the Pistons do have some good young pieces — namely guards Cade Cunningham, Jaden Ivey and rookie forward Ausar Thompson.

After the demoralizing loss, head coach Monty Williams called out his team. It wasn't for losing, but rather, the effort — or lack thereof — that they displayed against the Wizards.

"That wasn't fight on the floor," Williams said in the postgame news conference, per ESPN. "That wasn't Pistons basketball by any stretch of the imagination. That's what this is — we have to have people that honor the organization and the jersey by competing at a high level every night.

"I'm not talking about execution, just competing. That wasn't it, and that's on me."

Williams has only been head coach in Detroit for 17 games, but he's right on one front. Detroit once was a proud organization that boasted some of the best teams in the NBA — specifically in 1989, 1990 and 2004, when the Pistons won championships.

Detroit has always boasted a hard-nosed, never-say-die attitude. From the "Bad Boys" to the "Going to Work" Pistons this has always been an organization that gave its best shot, good bad or ugly.

To be on a 14-game skid is one thing. To lose to the "other" worst team in the league while showing no heart in the process? That's inexcusable and Williams is right, that's not Detroit basketball.

It's on him to change things as the head coach, but his young players are the ones who are going to have to respond attitude-wise.

"It's just a level of growing up on this team, maturity, understanding what game-plan discipline is — all the stuff we talk about all the time," Williams said. "It's enough talking."