The Diamondbacks’ last win is more recent than the Pistons’ and other fun facts
Dec 29, 2023, 9:26 AM
(Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)
It was Saturday, Oct. 28 when the Arizona Diamondbacks won their last game, a victory against the Texas Rangers in Game 2 of the World Series.
It came hours after the Detroit Pistons under former Phoenix Suns head coach Monty Williams won 118-102 against the Chicago Bulls in their third game of the season.
Neither team has won a game since.
Arizona lost three straight to fall short of the franchise’s second title and entered the offseason. Detroit has played 28 games in 62 days spanning Oct. 28 to Friday, losing all of them and tying an NBA record for losses in a row. The Pistons blew a 21-point lead to lose in overtime to the Boston Celtics on Thursday to continue the unfortunate skid.
They have a Saturday date with the Toronto Raptors to end it before 2023 wraps.
In sports terms, the Pistons’ losing streak is historic. It’s also, like, really wild to compare to other streaks in sports that have occurred within that time period.
Here’s a peek at what else has transpired in the sports world since Oct. 28:
The Suns’ run of injuries to Booker, Beal and Durant
Devin Booker returned briefly from an ankle injury on Nov. 2, took another 13 days off with a calf issue, returned to lead Phoenix on a seven-game winning streak and has watched Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal suffer varying degrees of ankle injuries themselves.
Speaking of Beal, he played three games from Nov. 8-12 before shutting himself down for a month with a lingering back issue. He returned Dec. 12 to play two games alongside Booker — but not Durant — before spending five minutes with the All-Star trio on Dec. 15. Then came his ankle sprain shut him down.
Beal is questionable to play Friday. If he returns or Detroit continues to falter, it means he’s dealt with two injuries and had three brief stints of action spanning the Pistons’ losing streak.
Coyotes have many streaks spanning Pistons’ very long losing skid
The Coyotes are 18-14-2 heading into a Friday visit to the Anaheim Ducks. They have gone 15-10-2 since the Pistons last won, and since Nov. 18 have been streaky in a more peak-and-valley sort of way.
They have four mini-streaks compared to Detroit’s one very, very long one.
Arizona lost three straight (Nov. 18-22), won five in a row (Nov. 25-Dec.4), lost four straight (Dec. 7-Dec. 12) and then rolled off four consecutively (Dec. 14-21). All those streaks were consecutive, making it a streak of four streaks in a smaller amount of time than Detroit’s one streak.
Wildcats went on a tear to end 2023
The Pistons’ last win came hours before Arizona’s football team defeated then-No. 11 Oregon State on Oct. 28, the second win of what ended up to be a seven-game streak to close the year at 10-3 with an Alamo Bowl victory against Oklahoma on Thursday night.
Pistons’ woes spanned most of Ja Morant’s suspension
Before this season, the NBA suspended Memphis Grizzlies star Ja Morant for conduct detrimental to the league for showing a firearm on his social media accounts for the second time.
Memphis was three games — all losses — into that suspension when Detroit won its last game.
The Grizzlies went 6-19 without Morant, which included three separate losing streaks of six games, four games and five games. Memphis won four in a row upon Morant’s return last week before losing Thursday with the guard sitting out due to illness.
Let’s measure the Pistons’ woes in NFL quarterback turnover
We in Arizona already knew Joshua Dobbs had some fun things to him, but a 1-7 record as the Cardinals’ starting quarterback and Kyler Murray’s proximity to a return ended with the backup quarterback heading to the Minnesota Vikings at the Oct. 31 trade deadline, right after the Pistons last won.
He captivated the nation quickly by leading the Vikings to two wins from there and even went viral for accepting Minnesota’s affinity for Creed. Though he eventually was benched for fellow fun backup Nick Mullens, other backup quarterbacks have flooded the newsfeeds since.
Cleveland lost Deshaun Watson and Dorian Thompson-Robinson to season-ending injuries, so Joe Flacco has come off the couch to put up historic numbers, leading the Browns with a string of four huge December wins in five starts.
The Giants’ Tommy DeVito shared the spotlight with his very Italian agent, going 3-5 since his debut on Oct. 29. He’s since been benched for Tyrod Taylor.
In Las Vegas, head coach Josh McDaniels was fired on Nov. 1 and replaced by former ASU assistant and Arizona player Antonio Pierce, who has at least reinvigorated the Raiders by flipping starter Jimmy Garoppolo for rookie backup Aidan O’Connell — among other things.
Rookie Will Levis took over as starter in Tennessee on Oct. 29, the Falcons and Patriots have flipped starters for performance reasons, the Jets have done Jets things at QB, and Drew Lock won the Seahawks a game with a late drive in place of injured Geno Smith.
Aaron Rodgers has recovered from an Achilles tear enough to rejoin the Jets’ roster and not play, and Russell Wilson has been benched in Denver.
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are still in every headline
Yep, they are still dating — even had their families together for Christmas, apparently.
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