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The Andre Drummond Thread

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If you guys are this bitter about Drummond I can't even imagine Portland fans after missing on Durant..
 
If you guys are this bitter about Drummond I can't even imagine Portland fans after missing on Durant..

Those situations are nothing alike. Greg Oden was the consensus #1 pick that year. Every GM would have taken him. He just turned out to be horribly injury prone. Portland did nothing wrong.

Chris Grant was wrong to pass on Drummond. Hopefully Dion continues to improve and becomes the player he's capable of and Grant will just be less wrong. I say that as someone that is still in Grant's corner (albeit getting nervous being there).
 
I still don't see how Dion's skill set and upside was considered better than Drummond's by our FO.
 
I still don't see how Dion's skill set and upside was considered better than Drummond's by our FO.

Without knowing their specific thinking it's tough to say. They may not have thought Dion's upside was better, just more likely to be realized. There were significant concerns about Drummond's ability to be a professional and put it altogether. They were wrong. It sucks. I liked Drummond a lot and hoped he would be the pick, but I understood the concerns given the information that was available at the time. Just because you hit on 14 and bust doesn't mean you made the wrong decision.
 
Without knowing their specific thinking it's tough to say. They may not have thought Dion's upside was better, just more likely to be realized. There were significant concerns about Drummond's ability to be a professional and put it altogether. They were wrong. It sucks. I liked Drummond a lot and hoped he would be the pick, but I understood the concerns given the information that was available at the time. Just because you hit on 14 and bust doesn't mean you made the wrong decision.



There're were just as many if not more concerns for Dion though.

Especially since they're harping on having good character guys and good human beings. Skill wise they were just as many concerns for Dion.
 
Without knowing their specific thinking it's tough to say. They may not have thought Dion's upside was better, just more likely to be realized. There were significant concerns about Drummond's ability to be a professional and put it altogether. They were wrong. It sucks. I liked Drummond a lot and hoped he would be the pick, but I understood the concerns given the information that was available at the time. Just because you hit on 14 and bust doesn't mean you made the wrong decision.

Maybe staying put on 17 is a better analogy.
 
There're were just as many if not more concerns for Dion though.

Especially since they're harping on having good character guys and good human beings. Skill wise they were just as many concerns for Dion.

Grant had ins with Syracuse (don't remember if it was with Boeheim specifically or someone else), so we can assume that he made sure to interrogate plenty into any concerns about Dion's attitude. So while we (the average fans) may have had concerns about Dion's personality/attitude, I believe Grant knew a lot more than we did at that time.

Grant likely didn't have as much inside connection with UConn/Drummond, and yes Drummond had MANY people worried about his attitude and lack of care for the game. It was obvious in high school that he was freakish when it came to height, length and athleticism - but he had enormous red flags about his attitude during and after his freshman year at UConn. He went from what seemed to be a sure-fire #1 pick (or possibly #2) before his freshman year began, to a possible top 5 pick who may slip on draft night (and he did indeed slip).

I'm one of those guys who wanted Drummond (if Beal/MKG were gone), but I understood why we didn't take him at that time. I basically had no idea what to expect once Beal/MKG were off the board. Of the available guys I wanted Drummond (but was also very nervous about him), was lukewarm on Barnes (would've considered him an unexciting yet acceptable pick), didn't want T. Robinson (since we just drafted Thompson, and I wasn't sold that T. Rob would be better than TT or even as good). When we picked Waiters I was shocked, but after that wore off I was equally a mix of excited (about his potential) and nervous (more so about his size than his attitude).
 
I'm a big Dion fan and I'm glad we picked him, but I can certainly see why so many people wish we went with Drummond, the guy's a monster.

But I don't see this as a bad decision by Grant, there were so many questions about Drummond's attitude, work-ethic and basktball IQ before the draft, he was too high of a risk at #4, we couldn't afford to miss with this pick and we still got a very good player in Dion...if you look at the history of #4 picks, it's a big mixture of all-stars, solid starters, role players and total busts, Dion already grades out pretty good, even without looking at potential future improvement.

And for the record, there are way more Drummond supporters in this thread then there were before and after draft day...FWIW. It's OK to wish we had him, but it doesn't make sense to blame Grant.
 
Taking Dion out of the equation, I just didn't see the value in drafting a scoring combo guard at 4 over a center. The old adage that you don't trade big for small still holds true in this case.

FA every year has reasonably priced scoring guards, it doesn't have a man-child like Drummond. You have to take centers/SF's/PG's inside the top 5 because they are the hardest spots to get production out of.

Selecting a combo guard in the top 5 felt like taking a running back in the top 5 value wise. They are plentiful, and easy to come by.

We had to spend $12 million a year on a center with no knees, that is how hard they are to come by as far as quality goes.

Drummond was worth the risk because of the difficulty associated with filling that position. Not to mention that he was a combination of youth, size/bulk and athleticism the likes of which we haven't really seen.

My biggest beef with Grant is that he doesn't get much value out of his picks, because PF's and combo guards are the 2 most plentiful commodities in the league. When you're drafting in the top 5 it has to be for guys/spots you can't readily address in free agency or the trade market very easily.

Drummond has become a symbol of the larger problem with Chris Grant. He doesn't look at the big picture in that respect.
 
With a talent strapped cavs team we had before the 2012 draft we should be swinging for he fences with that 4th pick. No one from the remaining players presented the type of game changing potential than Drummond at that time.
 
It's not like we can retroactively go back and choose Drummond and it's not like Dion's some total bum, either.
 
Taking Dion out of the equation, I just didn't see the value in drafting a scoring combo guard at 4 over a center. The old adage that you don't trade big for small still holds true in this case.

FA every year has reasonably priced scoring guards, it doesn't have a man-child like Drummond. You have to take centers/SF's/PG's inside the top 5 because they are the hardest spots to get production out of.

Selecting a combo guard in the top 5 felt like taking a running back in the top 5 value wise. They are plentiful, and easy to come by.

We had to spend $12 million a year on a center with no knees, that is how hard they are to come by as far as quality goes.

Drummond was worth the risk because of the difficulty associated with filling that position. Not to mention that he was a combination of youth, size/bulk and athleticism the likes of which we haven't really seen.

My biggest beef with Grant is that he doesn't get much value out of his picks, because PF's and combo guards are the 2 most plentiful commodities in the league. When you're drafting in the top 5 it has to be for guys/spots you can't readily address in free agency or the trade market very easily.

Drummond has become a symbol of the larger problem with Chris Grant. He doesn't look at the big picture in that respect.

One of the better arguments against taking Dion I've seen. Makes a lot of sense. Also explains why you don't "like" Dion. It's not that you hate the guy it's just that you feel he can be easily replaced in his role as a spark plug off the bench.

Where I disagree with you is that I feel he's a starting two guard capable of much more than simply being a spark plug. Bringing off the bench like we're doing now is taking the easy way out imo. Start him and Kyrie so we can have two elite creators right out the gate to put as much pressure on the defense as possible. We don't need to separate their time on the court like we're doing now. This is for another thread though.

Honestly, if I read your post prior to the 2012 draft I'd be 100% behind this thinking. Makes perfect sense to me. Why take something that's easy to find (even if he is a good player) when we could have something that's rare with more upside. Doesn't make much sense.

Thanks Birdy
 
Those situations are nothing alike. Greg Oden was the consensus #1 pick that year. Every GM would have taken him. He just turned out to be horribly injury prone. Portland did nothing wrong.

Chris Grant was wrong to pass on Drummond. Hopefully Dion continues to improve and becomes the player he's capable of and Grant will just be less wrong. I say that as someone that is still in Grant's corner (albeit getting nervous being there).

Yeah I see your point. I was just saying it's gotta be a shitty thing to think about as a Portland fan. And if Grant was wrong to pass on Drummond does that mean all of the other GM's besides New Orleans that passed on him were too? Just because someone outperforms their draft position doesn't mean everyone who didn't draft them was wrong.

I realize the center position was a big hole at the time of the draft, but people seem to forget that SG was also a major question mark.
 
Taking Dion out of the equation, I just didn't see the value in drafting a scoring combo guard at 4 over a center. The old adage that you don't trade big for small still holds true in this case.

FA every year has reasonably priced scoring guards, it doesn't have a man-child like Drummond. You have to take centers/SF's/PG's inside the top 5 because they are the hardest spots to get production out of.

Selecting a combo guard in the top 5 felt like taking a running back in the top 5 value wise. They are plentiful, and easy to come by.

We had to spend $12 million a year on a center with no knees, that is how hard they are to come by as far as quality goes.

Drummond was worth the risk because of the difficulty associated with filling that position. Not to mention that he was a combination of youth, size/bulk and athleticism the likes of which we haven't really seen.

My biggest beef with Grant is that he doesn't get much value out of his picks, because PF's and combo guards are the 2 most plentiful commodities in the league. When you're drafting in the top 5 it has to be for guys/spots you can't readily address in free agency or the trade market very easily.

Drummond has become a symbol of the larger problem with Chris Grant. He doesn't look at the big picture in that respect.

Yea, when you frame it that way.....

The Cavs didn't draft Waiters to be a nice little scoring guard off the bench. They drafted him because they believed he could be a dynamic play-maker next to Kyrie.

And with that, there are more impactful centers in the league than there are shooting guards. I've said this before, but it's much harder to find a real star at the SG position than it is at the center position.

For instance, if I ranked the top 10 SGs (real SGs) by PER from last season (minimum of 40 games played) the bottom of that list was Ray Allen at 14.78

On the flip side, if I ranked the top 10 Cs from last year using the same parameters, the bottom of that list was Larry Sanders (or Noah, depending on who you feel like calling a C) at 18.92. There were more impactful players at C than there were at SG last season.
 
Yea, when you frame it that way.....

The Cavs didn't draft Waiters to be a nice little scoring guard off the bench. They drafted him because they believed he could be a dynamic play-maker next to Kyrie.

And with that, there are more impactful centers in the league than there are shooting guards. I've said this before, but it's much harder to find a real star at the SG position than it is at the center position.

For instance, if I ranked the top 10 SGs (real SGs) by PER from last season (minimum of 40 games played) the bottom of that list was Ray Allen at 14.78

On the flip side, if I ranked the top 10 Cs from last year using the same parameters, the bottom of that list was Larry Sanders (or Noah, depending on who you feel like calling a C) at 18.92. There were more impactful players at C than there were at SG last season.

The SG position has been watered down with the advent of scoring PG's.

As long as there is only 1 ball to go around the SG is marginalized if you have a PG more oriented toward being Allen Iverson on offense than John Stockton.

Not unlike how RB's in the NFL have been marginalized with the switch to a pass happy league. Having a star SG is about as important as having a star RB.

I don't know what they drafted Dion to be, but as long as Kyrie was on the team he wasn't ever going to be able to be a James Harden type scorer.

I think his roll the past few games is suiting him perfectly and he is playing as well as he has as a Cav.

I am not getting down on Dion as a player, just the idea that he was never going to be an elite scorer here as long as there is only 1 ball at a time and Kyrie is on the team.

I think ultimately he will be a 16-18 pt a night guy (18-20 in his peak seasons) with a few assists and rebounds a game like we are seeing.

That would make for a really solid NBA career, but that level of production can be bought for about $8-10 a year in free agency as there are always a few guys in that kind of range available.

Impactful centers on the other hand almost have to be taken in the draft, because there teams almost never let them hit the market unless it is a Bynum situation.

Remember the contract Hibbert got, he wasn't exactly putting up Shaq numbers, but there is such a premium on finding a functional center a team like Portland was willing to try and max him out.

It is why you have to take them in the draft, because otherwise you are left wildly overpaying for one or just not having one at all.

So while the spirit of your argument about the lack of SG's is right, scoring PG's and SF's have largely made them obsolete. The fact we were willing to pay Bynum $12 million a year with no knee cartilage should tell you about the importance of the posiition.

We would never do that with a SG, no matter who they were.

That should reinforce where centers stand as far as their value.
 

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