What better way could there be to measure the rise to the top of the 2025-26 Detroit Pistons than to reminisce on one of the many false dawns that befell them for so long?
The Pistons’ 2019 first-round draft pick and long-time recipient of held candles, Sekou Doumbouya, is playing the best basketball of his life. He is finally the 20-point scorer with defensive versatility that it was long hoped he would be.
The only slight downside is that he is doing it all in Japan.
Doumbouya’s Faltered NBA Days
Doumbouya was drafted 15th overall in the 2019 NBA Draft by the Pistons, two spots behind Tyler Herro and two ahead of Nickeil Alexander-Walker. In his rookie season, he played 38 games, starting 19, and averaged 6.4 points and 3.1 boards per game, shooting 39.0% from the field and 28.6% from three. It was a slow start, but the promise was there to those who wanted to look for it. Unfortunately, it also proved to be his NBA peak.
The following year, rather than break out, Doumbouya’s numbers slipped. In 56 games, he averaged just 5.1 points and 2.6 rebounds in 15.5 minutes, shooting 37.9% overall and just 22.6% from deep. Doumbouya had no shot profile of note beyond cutting around off the ball, and the defensive versatility, while intriguing, did not offset the offensive awkwardness enough to make him a replacement-level player. He was not becoming the Luc Richard Mbah A Moute type that was hoped for.
After only two years, the Pistons cut ties, trading Doumbouya along with Jahlil Okafor to the Brooklyn Nets in exchange for DeAndre Jordan’s contract and four second-round picks. The Nets retraded him within a month, with one of the seconds attached, to the Houston Rockets in a salary dump, but Houston immediately waived him, and although a two-way stint with the L.A. Lakers would follow, Doumbouya would play only two games with them, and was out of the league by year three.
Doumbouya’s NBA career was a revolving door, with flashes of potential but never the consistent role or development many hoped for. The NBA stopped calling, and he had to go somewhere else. After a season in the G League, three months back in France and a year in Spain’s ACB, Doumbouya this season moved to Asia, first with Sagesse in Lebanon before landing in Japan to play with the Koshigaya Alphas. And his performances there with the Alphas suggest he has finally found his game.
New Continent, New Beginnings
With Koshigaya, Doumbouya is averaging 20.6 points per game, while pulling down 8.6 rebounds and dishing 2.0 assists a night. The scoring total ranks fourth in the league – 0.1 points behind another first-round bust-out, Jarrett Culver – and the rebounds are good for fifteenth. Doumbouya is shooting 48.5% from the field and 32.3% from three-point range, and has relished being a go-to guy. He even has a game-winning three to show for it.
What is striking is how different his role is now, compared to his NBA days. With the Pistons, Doubmouya was a project; raw, athletic and keen to impress, but limited in impact. Never did he establish a rhythm or leap into a bigger offensive role, or even consistently make his lay-ups. But in Japan, Doumbouya is showing he can be a high-usage forward, trusted with the ball in his hands (admittedly against lesser defenders), putting up real production, stepping into a leadership role, and delivering in big moments.
Even with guaranteed contracts, NBA careers are very fragile. Talent does not always translate to impact, potential does not always become reality, fit matters, and opportunity can be elusive. Doumbouya never made the cut in the NBA because he lacked polish, consistency or the right situation, and there are always more prospects on the production line to take the place of those who cannot stop spluttering. Doumbouya, like many others before him, had to go backwards to go forwards. But, after six years, here he finally is. Doing the things it was hoped for.
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