Why Andre Drummond Is an All-Star

NBA All-Star voting can feel like a sport of its own. The Players’ Tribune asked a handful of current NBA players to go to the mat for a fellow player who’s never made an All-Star team.

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My man went Super Saiyan.

Y’all are talking about “Andre Drummond for All-Star,” but I’m sorry — you’re late. We’re off that. We were on that, months ago … but then Dre blew all the way past it. It’s not your fault. You didn’t know.

I’m here to rectify the situation.

Is Andre Drummond an All-Star this year? Without a doubt. Should he be the Eastern Conference starting center? Absolutely. Is he having an All-NBA, All-World, All-Galaxy, play-on-the-Space–Jam-team caliber year? 100 percent.

But let’s step up our vocabulary a little.

Below are all of the 20-20 lines in the NBA so far this season. For those keeping score at home, that’s 20-plus points and 20-plus rebounds — in the same game:

Dwight Howard.
Andre Drummond.
Andre Drummond.
Andre Drummond.
Andre Drummond.
Andre Drummond.

Let’s go through that one more time.

There have been six 20-20 games in the league this season — and Dre has five of them. Now you see what I’m talking about? “All-Star,” as lofty as that is, might not cut it for what Andre’s been up to these last few months. What Andre is doing this year … man, it’s hard to put into words.

Luckily for us, I have just the words.

Andre went Super Saiyan.

Watch and learn:

“Super Saiyan” is a term from Dragonball Z, the most important TV show ever. The main character, Goku, is a member of the alien race known as Saiyans. When Saiyans train to a certain level — and get really angry — they transform into what’s known as a Super Saiyan: their hair gets all spiky and they get crazy, crazy strong.

Here, look:

Now compare that to Andre this year:

You’re starting to see it, aren’t you? This season, we’re not just getting Andre — we’re getting Super Andre.

Let me show you how super. My man is leading the league in rebounds — the only player in basketball averaging over 15 per game. He’s top 15 in blocks — and steals. And then to top if off, not only is Dre scoring 18 points a night, but he’s doing it efficiently — on 53% shooting, sixth-best overall.

Oh, yeah, and one more thing: We’re winning.

When the season started, the Pistons were nobody’s favorites to make the playoffs. I think that people saw we had talent, saw we had a great coach … but figured we also had a lot of question marks. So you could tell, when those preseason predictions came around, that most of the experts were holding back a little on their Pistons love. People were looking at our roster up and down, and saying, “Let’s wait and see.”

All they had to do was ask.

I think it was pretty clear going into the season, to anyone on our team, that Andre was ready to make The Leap. We knew what kind of raw potential he had — and how hard he was working to realize it. We knew what kind of killer instinct he had — and how ready he was to upgrade it from “asset” to “signature.” And we knew that, once Dre did make his leap, it was going to show up for us in the win-loss column in a very big way.

To me, that’s the most telling sign that Andre has officially become a superstar: We’re winning. If the playoffs started today, we’d be in it. And that’s what superstars do in this league. They make the playoffs — and then they do damage in those playoffs.

Anyway, like I said: You’re late on “Drummond for All-Star.” Thanks for reading, it’s been a pleasure — but that movement is over and done with. Guy is a lock.

You know what, though? Let’s get greedy. When you finish this — still vote for him.

I mean, why not.

My man went Super Saiyan.