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Is it eerie to anyone else that both Darryl Dawkins and Moses Malone pass right before Andre Drummond's breakout season?

if any players in the history of the NBA summarize Andre Drummond's game, it's those two. No disrespect, I hope they made it to heaven but to me that's a very eerie coincidence.

Let us hope we have cause to consider whether it's eerie. There are some similarities in terms of physique and game. AD's rebounding does put you in mind of Moses, although MM wasn't generally as athletic as AD. DD was quite the gifted athlete, but was never the rebounding force that AD has been even to date. Very sad to lose those two so close together.

20 points is a stretch for a guy still working on his basic post moves. We've also added shooting, so, despite the loss of Monroe, I'm not sure how much his touches will really go up. His improvement this year needs to be in the post and defensively. I'd be very happy with 17/14 with a FG% back over 55, and perhaps some improvement from the line. It's very likely RJ leads us in scoring as the only guy at or above 18 ppg.

It's sad, but not eerie, to lose those two big fellas recently. Both were nice people, apparently, too.

Andre had to absorb their essence to become stronger. Thus is the circle of life.

15 and 14 is where I see Dre this season if healthy..

He'll never hit 20 a game unless his FT% improves. I shouldn't say never..

Oh, I dunno. He averaged 14 last season and should have more room and opportunities with the type of team we have now. With some improvement, it's possible.

14 rebounds? Sure. He could do that. 20 points? Nah. You have to be pretty consistent to AVERAGE 20 ppg. Even if he makes a giant leap forward, most teams will just double centers if they are threats to drop 20+. That's the whole point of surrounding him with a bunch of shooters.

Han Solo wrote:He'll never hit 20 a game unless his FT% improves. I shouldn't say never..

Hopefully the shooting coach can help him achieve a semi-respectable free throw percentage.

I can see Dre averaging 15 and 14, which is far realistic than 20 ppg IMO.

But people really underrate Moses though, the guy had a good short range face up game and a decent turnaround post jumper. Along with that with his unrelenting hustle on the boards and down low, it's no wonder he averaged at least 25 and 14 for like 8 seasons. That's insane.

DBC10 wrote:I can see Dre averaging 15 and 14, which is far realistic than 20 ppg IMO.

But people really underrate Moses though, the guy had a good short range face up game and a decent turnaround post jumper. Along with that with his unrelenting hustle on the boards and down low, it's no wonder he averaged at least 25 and 14 for like 8 seasons. That's insane.

Sure was, he was a very effective scorer, as well as a rebounder. I'm not sure who was underrating Moses, as I was the only one who remarked on him, and that was to observe that he wasn't as gifted as AD in terms of raw athletic talent. Known for having small hands, without great hops or speed, he still made a very impressive HOF career for himself. Moses was one of the greats. I am not asserting that MM was not as good as AD, who has a long way to go to be as effective a player as MM.

I predict Dre to average 17-18 ppg this season.

“I saw a stat the other day about Andre. His per-36 (production extrapolated to 36 minutes) with me on the floor was like 22 (points) and 18 (rebounds). We talked about that. " - Anthony Tolliver

http://www.nba.com/pistons/features/tolliver-gets-rare-2nd-year-same-team-and-hes-high-pistons-outlook


So this year with a stretch big on the floor (Ilyasova/Tolliver/Morris) for 40+ minutes a night... Dre can't get to 20?

I think he could average 18 & 18 easy. Getting to 20 would just be up to Hopla getting him to make a couple extra freethrows.

Even during his best month of last season the most ppg he averaged was 16. Take that in for a second.

In order to become a consistent 20ppg guy for the entire season he's going to need to make a huge jump in his post game and will need to address his FT issue...at the very least he needs to be above 50% this year. People always talk about how his raw numbers will increase without any diminishing returns if his minutes go up, but it's really not that simple. He needs to have better conditioning to be able to play 36+ mins and still produce the way he does at 30 mpg.

I'd say 15-17ppg is a lot more realistic, and if he did in fact average 17ppg for the season that would be a pretty solid jump in his scoring.

hoophabit wrote:

DBC10 wrote:I can see Dre averaging 15 and 14, which is far realistic than 20 ppg IMO.

But people really underrate Moses though, the guy had a good short range face up game and a decent turnaround post jumper. Along with that with his unrelenting hustle on the boards and down low, it's no wonder he averaged at least 25 and 14 for like 8 seasons. That's insane.

Sure was, he was a very effective scorer, as well as a rebounder. I'm not sure who was underrating Moses, as I was the only one who remarked on him, and that was to observe that he wasn't as gifted as AD in terms of raw athletic talent. Known for having small hands, without great hops or speed, he still made a very impressive HOF career for himself. Moses was one of the greats. I am not asserting that MM was not as good as AD, who has a long way to go to be as effective a player as MM.

I'm talking in general. Most people underrate Moses as an all time great, because his only fault was winning only one ring when he's always been consistently great throughout his long career.

If you tell people to list their top 5 big men of all time, Moses will never be in majority of people's top 5 lists, which I think is underrated IMO. They'll say the usual, Kareem, Hakeem, Shaq, Russell, and Wilt.

MrBigShot wrote:Even during his best month of last season the most ppg he averaged was 16. Take that in for a second.

In order to become a consistent 20ppg guy for the entire season he's going to need to make a huge jump in his post game and will need to address his FT issue...at the very least he needs to be above 50% this year. People always talk about how his raw numbers will increase without any diminishing returns if his minutes go up, but it's really not that simple. He needs to have better conditioning to be able to play 36+ mins and still produce the way he does at 30 mpg.

I'd say 15-17ppg is a lot more realistic, and if he did in fact average 17ppg for the season that would be a pretty solid jump in his scoring.

All of this would be true if we didn't have a massive sample set as in the overwhelming majority of the game he does play more then his average his numbers skyrocket.

He's already at 14ppg (13.8) @ 30.5mpg. If Andre Drummond averages 36+mpg his numbers could be absolutely crazy. Just a baseline would be 16/16. With that said, I honestly think his rebounding numbers would be even higher.

I can easily see Andre averaging 20/20 given the minutes because he's already done it.

(His per 40 is 18/18)

Andre is a different type of bigman. A rare bred who truly understands rebounds, and angles. Who knows what he is truly capable of. All I know is that this is the year when we truly can gage him as a player.

1. Steady coach/great coach

2. Solid system built around him

3. Proper teammates to take advantage of his skills/system

This is Andres year. All speculation until this year is just that, speculation.