Detroit Pistons: Confident Andre Drummond Ready To Dominate

Detroit Pistons’ center Andre Drummond is brimming with confidence, and as a result he’s going to be more dominant than ever.

When Stephen Curry knocks down a deep triple and breaks out a shimmy to celebrate, it feels unsurprising. Guards with an abundance of charisma and personality have been a staple of the NBA for years, the smaller men on the court playing the role of showmen has come to be the norm.

On the other hand, for some strange reason or the other that’s likely deeply ingrained in the NBA consciousness by now, when a big man plays with a similar swagger and confidence, it’s impossible not to immediately sit up and take notice.

When it comes to Andre Drummond, the Detroit Pistons‘ star man has long been drawing attention for the quality of his play. Over the past 12 months there’s been a shift in the way he carries himself on the floor, though, and it suggests that an even better, bolder version of Drummond could still be only in its formative stages.

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As the Pistons took on the Bucks at the Palace of Auburn Hills on Sunday evening, Drummond had helped his team to assert themselves early.

Milwaukee has over $42 million tied up in a center rotation of Greg Monroe, John Henson and Miles Plumlee this season, and yet individually or collectively, they were never going to be a match for the $22 million Drummond.

With the game in the early stages of the second quarter, the Pistons had already started to open a respectable lead, when a Bucks turnover gave the Pistons a chance to get out and run in transition with their two bigs.

Jon Leuer bounded towards the rim with the ball in his hands, before dropping off a pass for Drummond to finish in style as they arrived in the paint. The explosive finish for a man of his size would have been impressive in its own right, but Drummond topped it off with what’s become his trademark shimmy.

To be breaking out the shimmy in the second quarter of an October game against Milwaukee says a lot about how good the former UConn Husky must feel about not just himself, but the situation he’s now in.

Having only recently turned 23, the Pistons are Drummond’s team. He no longer has to share the frontcourt with the likes of Josh Smith or Greg Monroe, instead he has shooters like Marcus Morris and Leuer who’ve been put in place to get the best out of him. Even someone like Reggie Jackson, undoubtedly the Pistons’ second biggest star, spends a significant portion of his time on court operating pick-and-roll sets to get Drummond easy scoring opportunities.

The shimmy first made an appearance at the Palace in the December/January portion of last season, when Drummond started to push himself towards the forefront of the All-Star race.

After a season that saw him make his first All-Star appearance, make his first playoff appearance, finish the year as the league’s rebounding leader and be named to an end of season All-NBA Third Team; it only seems natural to expect more of the shimmy in 2016-17 too.

Averaging over 16 points and 16 rebounds through the Detroit Pistons’ first three games, the New York native has set his stall out early in terms of what he can do in his fifth full year in the NBA. Looking stronger than ever with an almost perfect combination of athleticism and muscle for the center spot, Drummond is quickly bordering on territory where he could become unstoppable.

Considering he has no game away from the basket on offense and is a career 38 percent free throw shooter, that only acts as a testament to how formidable the rest of his game has become.

Speaking after Sunday’s Pistons win, Drummond accredited his impressive start to the season to the hard work he’s put in paying off.

"“I worked hard this summer on all aspects of my game. The work is just showing. I put a lot of work in and it’s coming to light right now.”"

It’s one thing having his work in the gym pay off in terms of an upgraded skill set, but it feels as if there could be more to Drummond’s current play than that. He has been one of the league’s best centers for a couple of seasons now, but it might have taken Drummond more time to believe that than it did for onlookers around the league.

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Whether or not confidence ever was an issue, it’s clear that Drummond knows he’s good now and that should terrify the other 29 teams in the NBA.