Sixers reunite with Andre Drummond, add shooting with Eric Gordon

Philadelphia might've lost a fan favorite as Sunday's free-agent frenzy began, but out with one and in with another.

The Sixers are signing center Andre Drummond and wing Eric Gordon, a source confirmed to 97.3 ESPN on Sunday evening.

Drummond's deal is for at least $10 million over two years, according to Shams Charania. Drummond will have a player option on the second year of the contract, The Philadelphia Inquirer's Keith Pompey reported.

Drummond's signing marks a return to Philadelphia for the fan favorite. He was traded to the Brooklyn Nets as part of the deal that sent guard James Harden to Philadelphia at the 2022 NBA trade deadline.

The soon-to-be 31-year-old spent the last two seasons with the Chicago Bulls, with whom he averaged about seven points and eight rebounds in 15 minutes per game.

But, if you're familiar with Drummond's game, you know the value isn't in the basic box score. It's in those figures relative to minutes played.

If we extrapolate those numbers out to a "per 36 minutes" rate, Drummond averaged 17 points and nearly 19 rebounds across his two seasons in the Windy City.

That number on the glass should stand out. Drummond ranked on the 100th percentile amongst bigs in offensive and defensive rebounding rates on missed shots last season, per Cleaning The Glass. He also ranked on the 95th percentile amongst bigs in steal rate last season.

Drummond certainly isn't without his flaws. There have been seasons marked by good passing scattered throughout his career. But, there's a record-scratch moment when he's tasked with putting the ball on the deck for every good pass he makes around the elbows. You would say he's a lob threat because, as a non-shooter, he naturally roams by the rim on offense. But, he's been an awful finisher at the rim by big man standards for most of his career. You can verify his poor hands by looking at free throw percentages over the course of his career.

For as great a rebounder as Drummond is, he lacks versatility on defense. That, alone, is why he's either a regular-season minutes eater or someone you have to pad around in the playoffs. Asking Drummond to guard in space is setting him up for failure and spoon-feeding opposing offenses opportunities to hunt switches.

He's a drop big. His skill set is his skill set. But then again, head coach Nick Nurse did deploy the defensively-versatile Paul Reed as a drop big in the playoff series against the New York Knicks. It was a huge part of why the team suffered in those minutes that Joel Embiid was not on the court. So, perhaps Philadelphia will overlook his defensive limitations when the games matter most, betting on the pieces around Drummond to help cover for his weaknesses on either end of the floor.

The Sixers, many would argue, lost that series because of their inability to secure the glass on either end of the floor. It's been a problem ever since Ben Simmons took off the jersey for the last time. Philadelphia did something about it by reuniting with Drummond on Sunday night.

As Philadelphia looks to re-shape its roster this summer, adding Drummond might put the writing on the wall for fan-favorite big man Paul Reed, whose contract for next season is non-guaranteed. At $7,723,000, Philadelphia could create more cap space by cutting him. The Sixers could also trade him. According to the league's new collective bargaining agreement, Philadelphia's finances allow for them to take back a player making $15 million in a trade sending Reed out.

As for the 35-year-old Gordon, the deal is a one-year pact for the league minimum, according to Pompey.

A veteran of 16 years, Gordon projects to sign for $3,634,148, the league's scaled value for players with at least 10 years of experience. $2,087,519 of that, the equivalent for a player with two years of experience on the league's minimum scale, goes on the Sixers' books for 2024-25. The NBA will cover the remainder, a provision that creates an equal playing field for older veterans on minimum contracts so that they aren't phased out of the league by teams wanting to fill their rosters with younger, cheaper players on veteran minimum deals.

Gordon, who stands at 6-foot-3, averaged 11 points per game with the Phoenix Suns last season. He shot 38 percent from three. 62 percent of his shot attempts came from beyond the arc, per Cleaning The Glass. That volume as a percentage of total shot diet ranked on the 74th percentile amongst NBA wings last season.

He's in Philadelphia to do two things - add to the veteran experience the Sixers already have, and shoot the leather off the ball.

While any lineup featuring both him and Tyrese Maxey will rightfully draw skepticism on the defensive end due to their respective sizes, Gordon's catch-and-shoot gravity will help the spacing for the star with whom he's on the floor.

Less than 24 hours into free agency, the Sixers have already addressed two vastly different needs. Yet, there's still much work to be done.