Detroit Pistons

Lore & Background

The Pistons were founded as the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons in 1937, sponsored by Fred Zollner of the Zollner Corporation, a foundry that manufactured pistons. They won NBL championships in 1944 and 1945, and also won the World Professional Basketball Tournament in 1944, 1945 and 1946. In 1948, the team became the Fort Wayne Pistons and jumped to the BAA. In 1949, Fred Zollner brokered the formation of the NBA from the BAA and the NBL at his kitchen table.

There are suggestions that Pistons players conspired with gamblers to shave points and throw games during the 1953–54 and 1954–55 seasons, including accusations that the team may have intentionally lost the 1955 NBA Finals to the Syracuse Nationals. In 1957, the franchise moved to Detroit. The Pistons played at Olympia Stadium for their first four seasons, then moved to Cobo Arena beginning in the 1961–62 season. In 1974, Zollner sold the team to glass magnate Bill Davidson.

In 1978, Davidson moved the team to the Silverdome in Pontiac. The franchise's fortunes turned in 1981 when they drafted Isiah Thomas. Key acquisitions included Vinnie Johnson (1981), Bill Laimbeer (1982), and the hiring of head coach Chuck Daly (1983). In the 1985 draft, they selected Joe Dumars.

Before the 1986–87 season, they acquired John Salley, Dennis Rodman, and Adrian Dantley, adopting a physical, defense-oriented style that earned them the nickname "Bad Boys." The Pistons won NBA championships in 1989, 1990, and 2004.

Did You Know?

• George Yardley became the first NBA player to score 2,000 points in a season, doing so in the Pistons' first season in Detroit.
• The Pistons' 1979–80 team lost its last 14 games, which combined with the first 7 losses of the next season created a then-NBA record 21-game losing streak.
• The team's "Bad Boys" nickname came from their physical, defense-oriented style of play in the late 1980s.