True statophiles will already know this, but for those uninitiated in the sacred art of looking at basketball-reference for five hours a day, let me clue you in: Ed Davis is the best offensive rebounder in the league this year. On a per minute basis, at least. Andre Drummond is probably still a little better because he actually does his duty without fouling way too much.
In fact, according to total rebound percentage, Davis is the best rebounder in the league. Forget about the “offensive” part. He’s averaging almost 9 per game while only playing 18 minutes. That’s a lot of rebounds, I don’t need to tell you how many rebounds that is per 36. Rest assured, it’s a lot. So many that I’m wondering how the heck he’s doing it.
One theory is that he had some big rebounding games early in the season, he found out that he could just grab them whenever he wanted, and that propelled him through the rest of the season. That happens with scorers all the time. They score 30 in the opener or whatever, and then the season ends and they’ve averaged 20 despite no one believing in them coming in. But my theory falls apart when looking at Davis’ actual stats. Sure, he was getting double-digit boards in extremely limited minutes, but I was thinking like a 20-rebound-burger.
We may never know why Davis is such a beast on the boards this year. But we do know that he’s doing it, and no one is paying attention. Their loss, I guess. I’ll be over here watching him do his prime Rodman impersonation by myself with a bottle of lotion, thank you very much.