2020-2021 ROSTER TALK: Archived

[SleepingHero]

The last three years his defensive on/off have been all negative: -3.3, -11.1, -2.4. 

We should not be using single metrics to define a player in any capacity, because doing so means we're zeroing in on a specific part of a picture and we could be missing a bunch of detail. Yes Drummond's on/off numbers aren't great, but on/off is a stat rooted on team performance inherently. Drummond's teams the last 3 years have been bereft of talent, that makes it hard to win anything. Case in point, the main reason why Drummond has a negative net rating is because of his teams poor offensive rating while he's on the court. Which is my main issue when it comes to Drummond, not his defensive impact, but rather how he uses himself on offense that limits teams. 

But other defensive metrics paint Drummond as a neutral at worst, to one of the best paint protectors in the league. Opponents are shooting 40.7% on Drummond at the rim, and 47% overall. That is actually at the same level as Rudy Gobert so far this season (40.1/47.2). Further, Drummond has lead the league twice in defensive win shares (18/19), was top 5 in 2016, 2017, and has been top 10 the last 2 years. To keep it going, Andre Drummond has lead the league in defensive rating twice, and has had an individual DRTG below 100  4 times (matched only by Gobert and Dwight Howard for active C's). His career DRTG is exactly 100, which among centers in the NBA is only bested by Dwight Howard, and is matched only by Rudy Gobert.

Drummond has also had a positive DBPM (which relies solely on how much better the team performs while he's on the court) in every season since 2015. 
Drummond also been top 15 in the league in Block% (which is how many FGA are blocked by the player while he's on the court), for the last 4 years. 

Now, after all of that, does that mean I think Andre Drummond is a top 5 defender and/or a better defender than Rudy Gobert? No. Absolutely not. I think Drummond doesn't move very well in space, despite being athletic enough to keep up on the perimeter (lookup Drummond guarding Lebron to see what I'm saying). I think his BBIQ is what really holds him back, because he's normally not in the best position, and if he was he would probably be a premier defender.

What I AM saying though is that looking at a player through a reductionist lens, boiling him down to a single stat and writing him off, is a bit poppycock. Drummond is not a defensive sieve. Far from it. He does have other issues with him though. Like his general maturity, the fact he's resigned to not be a lob threat, and that his motor isn't always there on the defensive end until near the end of the possession when it comes to rebounding.   

I wouldn't mind Drummond here, but not at a 30+ mil price tag, and not if it requires multiple picks or even a first.