It’s been a painful display to watch Andre Drummond fire bricked free throw after bricked free throw, but Friday he hinted that something has been working.
It’s no secret that Andre Drummond has struggled mightily–worse than anybody in NBA history, to be specific–with free throws throughout his career, but he hit rock bottom this past season when he hit just 35.5 percent of his free throws. When he was on the floor and opposing teams were anywhere close to being in the penalty, they would essentially forego playing actual defense.
Some teams, like the Houston Rockets, were even more shameless.
The NBA has introduced more punitive rules to prevent the rampant hacking, changing the final two minutes of each quarter to match the final two minutes of the fourth quarter and overtime. When an intentional foul is committed away from the ball in the final two minutes of each quarter, now the fouled team will get a free throw and to keep possession of the ball.
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Of course, that just means that a demonstration like the Rockets’ K.J. McDaniels fouling escapade will have to be done as shown, and then will have to be discontinued in the final two minutes. It’s not a huge deterrent, which means that Drummond will still have to be able to stand on his own two feet on the free throw line to stay on the floor late in games.
It looks like there may be some hope on the horizon for Drummond, fans and the organization alike. After hinting that he may be willing to shoot underhanded, another indication of light at the end of the tunnel was made on Friday at the press conference the Pistons held to announce the signing of his five-year $130 million contract.
#Pistons Drummond on FT: "I just try different tactics ... we've found something that works and we'll stick with it -- you'll find out."
— Rod Beard (@detnewsRodBeard) July 15, 2016
Related Story: Repairing Andre Drummond's missed free throws
Whether that involves shooting free throws underhanded or some other unknown adjustment remains to be seen, but hopefully whatever these different tactics are will translate to the floor in game action. It’s well known that Drummond can hit free throws in practice, but everything goes out the window when he gets in the game.