The Detroit Pistons suffered a major injury blow, as it was announced that they will miss the services of Jaden Ivey for at least four weeks due to arthroscopic knee surgery. The 23-year-old guard only played 30 regular season games last term due to injuries, having averaged 17.6 points, 4.1 rebounds, and 4.0 assists on 46.0 percent shooting from the field.
In a recent interview with Detroit Pistons beat writer Omari Sankofa II, Cade Cunningham shared his honest thoughts on Ivey’s latest setback.
“It sucks. I hate to see that. He’s been dealing with stuff for a while,” Cunningham said about Ivey. “His spirits never dropped. He just ducks his head and works. I mean, that’s who he is. Doesn’t get ahead of himself. I know he’ll be fine.”
“He’s gonna come back better than ever. He’s just got to get all that stuff cleaned up. In the meantime, him not being available takes away from us a lot. He brings a lot of ability, so we’ve got to all lock in and take another step as far as finding out what it takes for us to fill in that gap,” he added.
Detroit Pistons News: JB Bickerstaff is confident they have enough to fill in for Jaden Ivey
Head coach JB Bickerstaff expressed his optimism that the Detroit Pistons can play without Jaden Ivey, especially after they made the offseason moves to acquire Duncan Robinson and Caris LeVert.
“We want to make sure that he’s healthy, make sure he’s 100% and confident in it too,” Bickerstaff said about Ivey. “When you go through this and haven’t played since Jan. 1, making sure that you’re confident when you come back and play is just as important as the physical piece of it, too.”
“If healthy, we have the guys that can fill those spots,” he continued. “Playing with A.T. (Ausar Thompson) with the ball in his hands more, Caris has the ability to do that, we’ve been extremely pleased with Marcus Sasser and how he’s been able to help us. We’ve got guys that we feel confident in, all the way to Daniss (Jenkins).”
