A warning to you Pistons fans who are already jonesing for a little Bad Boys skinny from the Vegas Summer League: plopping down a tenspot for the league’s Courtside LIVE downloads won’t scratch your itch. No indeed.

This dross, to be frank, makes the surveillance video above your favorite liquor store counter look like “Citizen Kane.”

Footage jerks, starts, blurs, buffers, hiccups and mostly shows crowd shots or guys standing during shootaround. Game footage is obscured by a foreground watermark, and sometimes the shooter scores from outside the frame. Good luck trying to figure out who did what, especially without useful screen titles or narration.

In other words, it’s like “Blair Witch Project” if the witch was holding the camera. On the positive side, most of it is in blissful silence, except for the occasional gurgle of crowd noise or a bouncing ball. But — and this is a JLo-sized one — on some clips there is an awful honking, whining background audio track that sounds like the Georgia Satellites channeling a bandsaw. So we’re not talking prime multimedia here, which is odd given that the Vegas Summer League is sponsored by Toshiba.

But I digress. Don’t waste your dough, is what I’m saying.

This is just proof, once again, of something we used to say at Langley before I was pensioned off with my 30 and a golden colostomy bag: there’s no substitute for HUMINT (human intel) in the field. Fortunately, we’ve got assets on the ground in Vegas.

Starting with the Pistons’ first game against Washington on Saturday, we will be giving you the straight dope while answering all vital questions (How did Amir look? Who’s better, Acker or Blalock? Did Cheick Samb really give an opposing center a paper cut?)

In the meantime, keep checking in. We’ll file additional game results at the VSL as they happen.

For all of us who couldn’t make it to Vegas, there’s good news: the online game recaps appear to be much better this year. Here are a few quick hits on the four games during Day 1:

Sacramento 90, Minnesota 83
A good debut for Randy Foye, with 23 points in a losing effort. Kevin Martin led the victors with 20, and Louis Amundsen chipped in 16. Ron Artest was a no-show, but the Kings expect to see him in Las Vegas for future games.

Houston 88, Portland 82
John Lucas tallied 22 and Houston got 20 each from Pat Carroll and Marquette sharpshooter Steve Novak (6-8 from 3 point land). Martell Webster was high man in defeat with 29 points. Brandon Roy had 12 points and 8 assists.

Denver 113, Dallas 85
The Mavs came up snake eyes in this one, trailing by as much as 30. MSU product Maurice Ager scored 17 in defeat, while Casey Jacobsen led the Nugz with 20.

Toronto 93, Washington 85
Number-one pick Andrea Bargnani looked good for the Raps, scoring 20 including 16 in the first half.

Other action
Former Piston Mike James was busy in the stands according to ESPN’s Marc Stein, “conducting face-to-face negotiations with the three teams chasing him: Houston, Dallas and Minnesota. After a meeting with Rockets officials, James could be seen in a far corner of the gym, engaged in an animated discussion with Mavericks owner (and fellow Pittsburgh native) Mark Cuban.”

If only Mike wasn’t so shy, eh? We’ll be back soon with more coverage of a distinctly Pistons flavor.