Andre Drummond Hitting Big Hurdles En Route to Elite Status
The ceiling for Detroit Pistons center Andre Drummond has not dropped, nor has his importance to his franchise's future.
But so far in the new season, the 6'11" building block looks worlds removed from filling such a prominent role. With his stat sheet sagging and frustration mounting, his NBA ascension has taken a puzzling detour.
The stage seemed to be set for Drummond to join the league's elite ranks this season.
He closed the 2013-14 campaign with eye-popping averages in the month of April: 18.4 points and 17.4 rebounds. Then, he followed that furious finish by snagging one of the 12 spots on Team USA's FIBA Basketball World Cup roster.
But the greatest source of optimism came not from Drummond himself, but rather the person the Pistons tabbed to bring him along. Desperate to realize every ounce of his colossal potential, Detroit handed over its coaching and personnel reins to tactical genius Stan Van Gundy.
On paper, it looked like a match made in basketball heaven.
"Pivots of Drummond's profile are nothing new for Van Gundy," Bleacher Report's Josh Martin wrote. "In five seasons with the Magic, Van Gundy helped to mold Dwight Howard into a three-time Defensive Player of the Year while fashioning an offensive system that capitalized on Howard's unique strength and athleticism in the middle."
Drummond still needed plenty of polishing, but he had his own Superman-like set of physical tools. With a 7'6" wingspan and 33.5-inch max vertical, per DraftExpress, his raw ability alone could change the outcome of a game.
It seemed inevitable that Van Gundy would take out his chisel and sculpt Drummond into an interior masterpiece—a distinct possible conclusion that could still happen.
But the opening chapter has been unlike anything one could have imagined. Not only has Drummond failed to progress, he has actually taken a significant step in the wrong direction.
| 2013-14 | 13.5 | 62.3 | 13.2 | 1.4 | 32.3 | 22.6 |
| 2014-15 | 8.6 | 41.7 | 10.9 | 1.8 | 28.3 | 11.4 |
After Drummond's two-point, five-rebound dud during Detroit's 107-103 loss to the Washington Wizards on Wednesday, Van Gundy couldn't explain what is wrong with his center, per Vincent Goodwill of The Detroit News:
Offensively, the Pistons have featured Drummond more than ever. He is on pace to post career highs in both usage percentage (19.2) and field-goal attempts per 36 minutes (11.5).
But the extra involvement has harmed more than it has helped so far. His field-goal percentage is nearly 20 points below his career mark (60.6). He has never before had a higher turnover percentage (14.5) or a lower offensive rating (87).
Some of these setbacks can be attributed to Drummond being forced out of his comfort zone.
Last season, he was essentially a restricted-area specialist. Nearly 90 percent of his 479 made field goals came within three feet of the basket. Over 91 percent of his makes were either dunks (183), layups (177) or tip-ins (78). Dunks alone counted for more than 25 percent of his field-goal attempts.
This time around, he hasn't spent nearly as much time at the rim. Less than 64 percent of his shots have come from within three feet, though that area still accounts for nearly 83 percent of his baskets.
After attempting over four times as many dunks (197) than hook shots (48) last season, he has doubled up his eight dunk attempts with 16 hooks in 2014-15.
The Pistons are finding him in the post, but that part of his game clearly needs more work, as Goodwill observed:
Despite all of the empty trips, Van Gundy has no intentions of looking elsewhere for his team's offense.
"I don't want to run less through him," Van Gundy said Wednesday, per Goodwill. "Going away from him would be a major mistake for a 21-year-old guy."
There is some sound reasoning behind Van Gundy's plan.
After all, Drummond entered this league as a mountain of untapped potential. Two years of catch-and-dunk offense didn't exactly bring him out of that raw state.
He needs more time to develop. It's hard to dominate a game he is still learning so much about.
"Lost within the hype that surrounded Andre Drummond this offseason is the simple fact that he's still 21 years old," wrote NBA.com's Jon Hartzell. "And like most 21 year olds, he's prone to inconsistency and foul trouble."
Besides, the Pistons really have no choice but to live with Drummond's growing pains. Their road back to relevance starts with molding him into a dominant paint presence.
"With Drummond considered to be the team's future, Van Gundy could be trying to develop the third-year center in light of the coming financial commitment to him," wrote Vince Ellis of the Detroit Free Press.
The Pistons should not panic about Drummond's sluggish start, but they need to carefully monitor how these difficulties affect him. If his offensive frustrations leak into other aspects of his game, that is when Detroit could really have something to worry about.
For now, Drummond sounds as if he is processing this challenge the right way.
"It's not an individual game, and everybody has their streaks of shaky moments," he said, per Goodwill. "I'm not getting down on myself. It's an 82-game season."
That being said, he is understandably frustrated with his performance. Even if he won't admit it, his actions have made that clear, per MLive.com's David Mayo:
Although the Pistons cannot afford for Drummond to lose confidence, they can work with frustration. Ideally, that makes him more motivated to keep working and break free of these struggles.
But he needs the right focus to get through this. He has to eliminate the missed rotations and cut down on the bad fouls that limit his involvement. For as much as Van Gundy wants to feature him, Drummound's foul trouble (5.6 fouls per 36 minutes) has restricted how often he can be used.
Avoiding those mistakes won't be easy. Drummond's lack of experience makes it challenging enough, and, as Van Gundy told NBA.com's Keith Langlois, Detroit's new approach has made an uphill climb even steeper for Drummond:
"It’s a process. We’re asking him to do more things. We’re not letting him just do the same thing all the time. That’s hard for a young player. For a young player, it’s a lot easier to, ‘I’m just going to play the pick and roll the same way all the time. Our defensive schemes are the same all the time.’ We didn’t do that. ... I’m not disappointed in him at all. The fouls are a problem and we’ve got to get away from that because it’s making him spend a lot of time on the bench.
"
The good thing about this puzzle is the Pistons should have all the time they need to solve it. They might want to snap their playoff drought as soon as possible, but the most important aspect of this season is Drummond's development.
Despite what the early-season returns might suggest, Detroit could still have an elite two-way force manning the middle. It just might be a while before Drummond makes that type of impact on a nightly basis.
The Pistons aren't worried about his greatness just yet. They're working on building him into a more complete player than he has been and simply hoping to see good results for now.
Patience isn't always easy to apply to a player with this type of potential, but it's a necessity for the franchise. Drummond might be facing some hurdles now, but his race to the top is far from over.
Unless otherwise noted, statistics used courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com and NBA.com.
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