UPDATE: The Pistons officially announced that Joe Dumars is no longer President of Basketball Operations.
As expected, Joe Dumars will soon end his reign as GM of the Detroit Pistons. Dumars has agreed to stick with the organization – the only one he’s ever known in the NBA – as an executive adviser. Per the Detroit News and Detroit Free Press:
The Pistons’ 116-107 loss to the Toronto Raptors concluded their home schedule Sunday and essentially sent the Pistons into an offseason of unchartered territory, on the hunt for a new leader, a new face of the organization. An announcement could come as soon as Monday.
Pistons owner Tom Gores and his Platinum Equity executives will proceed on a search for a new president of basketball operations, while George David and Ken Cantanella will continue in their roles as assistant general manager and director of basketball operations, respectively.
The two will run things in tandem until a new leader is hired, preparing for this coming June’s draft by way of interviews and workouts with college players, doing season-ending exit interviews with current players, and preparing for July’s free-agency period.
The two will report to Platinum Equity executives Phil Norment and Bob Wentworth until the position is filled. Norment and Wentworth are around the team daily, and have been since Gores took over in April 2011.
As for Dumars, he’ll be free to pursue other opportunities with other teams, essentially ending his near 30-year tenure with the organization that drafted him in 1985.
Dumars, who has run the organization for 14 seasons, has agreed to remain as an executive adviser outside the basketball operations domain, said a person with firsthand knowledge of the situation.
“That’s not my job,” Andre Drummond said. “That’s not my job to pick and choose who the coach is or who is going to be the GM — nothing like that. My job is to show up every day, play basketball and not worry about what happens in the front office.”
