Pistons will have to pay big to land a top hoops executive

The Detroit Pistons are a mess, and it's going to take more than a new president of basketball operations to turn them around.

That said, the Pistons absolutely need a fresh new perspective at the top of the food chain. Owner Tom Gores is about as absentee as you'll find in professional sports, and the person he empowered, general manager Troy Weaver, has presided over a horrible stretch during his tenure.

The Pistons seem to have gotten worse each and every season under Weaver's watch. He's built a team with no cohesion and no purpose. Outside of former No. 1 overall pick Cade Cunningham — who was a no-brainer — there's arguably not one player on Weaver's roster who would start on a halfway decent playoff team.

This thing needs to be torn down to the ground and a real basketball mind needs to be brought in to rebuild the rebuild. One of the executives reportedly on Detroit's radar is Minnesota Timberwolves President Tim Connelly, who has done a tremendous job building around former No. 1 overall pick Anthony Edwards to create a contender in the Western Conference.

According to James Edwards III of The Athletic, there is one way the Pistons could bring an executive like Connelly to Detroit.

"Whether or not Connelly returns to the Timberwolves, league sources say he is likely to opt out of the final year of his contract. It seems likely that Connelly will return to Minnesota, but if Pistons owner Tom Gores is willing to offer something like $15 million annually, that could be enough to pry him away," Edwards wrote.

If that's the price of getting a big-time basketball mind, so be it. Gores has proven willing to open up his pocketbook, and in Connelly, the Pistons would be getting the architect of both the Denver Nuggets and the Timberwolves.

He'd be worth the price of admission.