Andre Drummond close to five-year max deal with Pistons

TARRYTOWN, NY – AUGUST 21: Andre Drummond #1 of the Detroit Pistons poses for a portrait during the 2012 NBA Rookie Photo Shoot at the MSG Training Center on August 21, 2012 in Tarrytown, New York. (Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)

Oh, to be seven feet tall and great at basketball. With NBA free agency set to officially begin July 7, news is beginning to break of players signing max contracts due to the increased NBA salary cap. Some players at first glance are more than deserving of the max contract, others not so much.

One could argue Andre Drummond, 22, is very deserving of a max deal and that’s what he’s getting. ESPN’s Marc Stein is reporting the Detroit Pistons and Andre Drummond are close to agreeing on a five-year max contract for the center. The deal would end up paying Drummond around $130 million dollars.

While the deal can’t be signed and made official until the moratorium on signings and trades is lifted on July 7, Drummond and the Pistons can work on the framework of the deal now. The majority of the contract will most likely be agreed to by the time July 7 arrives.

Drummond was selected by Detroit with the No. 9 overall pick in the 2012 draft out of the University of Connecticut. The big man played in all 81 regular season games this season, averaging a double-double of 16.8 PPG and 14.8 rebounds per game, both of which are career-highs.

Before the beginning of the season in October, Stein reports the Pistons and Drummond mutually agreed not to work on a contract extension.

“It shows a sign of maturity on my side to really just take that leap and just give my team a chance to build on what we have here,” Drummond told reporters in October. “Would it be nice to have it? Absolutely. But that’s not the point right now. I’m into winning and trying to make my team as good as possible.”

However, the Pistons reportedly had planned on making Drummond their top offseason priority the second the season ended.

“Andre wants to be here long-term, we definitely want him here long-term, but after talking to Tom, I think Andre realized … that our best chance to build a contender was to have the additional cap-space flexibility next year,” Piston’s President Stan Van Gundy said in October. “So as much as Andre wants to be here, he wants to win, he wants to be part of a contender, so he wants us to have the flexibility to continue to add people to this team.”

Due to the odd NBA salary cap rules, Detroit owns Drummond’s “Bird Rights.” Those rights allow teams to go over the salary cap in order to keep their own free agents. As a result, the Pistons most likely won’t announce the signing until they have used up their cap space.

Drummond joins two other NBA players who have agreed to max contracts with their current teams. The Vertical reported the Wizards and Bradley Beal have agreed to a five-year, $128 million dollar deal. The Raptors re-signed DeMar DeRozan to a five-year $139 million dollar deal, also according to The Vertical.

[ESPN]

About David Lauterbach

David is a writer for The Comeback. He enjoyed two Men's Basketball Final Four trips for Syracuse before graduating in 2016. If The Office or Game of Thrones is on TV, David will be watching.

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