Cavs: FS Cleveland’s tweet shows it’s clear what Andre Drummond brings

Andre Drummond has made his presence felt for the Cleveland Cavaliers so far.

The Cleveland Cavaliers, given that they were not an Orlando-area bubble team last season following the NBA’s novel coronavirus-induced hiatus, did not have much of a sample size from Andre Drummond.

Drummond was acquired near the 2020 trade deadline via deal with the Detroit Pistons, and last season, we only saw him in action in eight games for Cleveland. Drummond was somewhat banged up initially, and then the hiatus/ultimately the end of last season occurred.

Drummond, after he picked up his $28.7 million player option for this season, has been back with Cleveland, though. And he’s off to a pretty solid start for the Wine and Gold.

He’s had 18.0 points, a whopping 14.8 rebounds, 3.6 assists, and an impressive 2.4 steals and 2.4 blocks per contest. It’s been five games, of course, but Drummond has made an impact in the paint and as a rotator defensively, to go with being a big-time glass cleaner.

In that realm, a recent Fox Sports Cleveland tweet demonstrated how Dre has begun the 2020-21 campaign in pretty rarified air as far as team history is concerned.

That Fox Sports Cleveland tweet shows it’s clear what Dre brings for the Cavs.

This tweet essentially shows that we know what Drummond brings on a game-to-game basis, in that he’ll get interior looks, via post-ups/rolls, and be an elite rebounder. The dude has led the NBA in rebounding four of the past five seasons, and he was a walking double-double for Detroit seemingly.

As Cavs.com’s Jimmy Longo pointed out back in September, coming into this season, Drummond had had 407 double-doubles since the 2012-13 season, his rookie year, which led the NBA by 83 games over his “next-closest competitors” in Nikola Vucevic and Russell Westbrook.

Now have some of his offensive rebounds come due to him missing some short push shots/interior looks? You bet that’s the case at times, as it has been in 2020-21 some, but I do credit Drummond for making his presence felt, drawing his share of fouls to generate free throw trips, and helping the Cavs throughout games in that way.

Granted, the occasional perimeter shots Drummond takes, along with him trying to over-playmake and seemingly be in over his skis and put on dribbling displays are not ideal. The Cavaliers need Drummond, who has also had 3.4 turnovers per game, to frankly, be self-aware this season.

All things considered, however, Drummond has objectively, made an impact when he’s been out there for the Cavaliers so far this season, as that Fox Sports Cleveland tweet indicated.

It’s clear what he provides for Cleveland, and him being mentioned alongside Kevin Love, Brad Daugherty and Mark Price regarding Cavs historical significance shouldn’t be discounted, even if it’s for a five-game sample.

In addition, though, Drummond’s presence on the interior on defense, especially, has aided guys like Darius Garland, Collin Sexton, Larry Nance Jr. and others. I give Dre his props for that, and his screening has helped open up some plays in settled offense for perimeter pieces.

All of that being said, Drummond still does make some head-scratching decisions at times, and it’s difficult to just look past those, and that’s partly why one would imagine Drummond could seemingly be an expiring trade piece for Cleveland, feasibly near the 2021 deadline.

And Evan Dammarell of Fear The Sword and Forbes hit on that sort of thing in a season preview for him coming into the season, too, for what it’s worth. To take it a step further, Dammarell stated he’s extremely confident that Drummond won’t end up sticking through the deadline with Cleveland.

That’s a very reasonable take, one would think, anyway, but maybe there’s a possibility that if Drummond can stay engaged and/or help Cleveland on both ends if he’s more self-aware looking onward, perhaps he could re-sign via long-term deal this upcoming offseason. Again, I wouldn’t bet on that, though.

Moreover, it is apparent, as that Fox Sports Cleveland tweet showed, that we do know, by and large, that Drummond is basically a walking double-double for the Cavs, and I’m not going to completely discount that.

But we’ll see how things shake out with Dre, particularly with Kevin Love currently sidelined for a chunk of games to come for three-plus-four weeks or so with a calf strain/reaggravation of that.