It’s not often you get to watch a player grow from a rookie to arguably the most dominant player in the NBA up-close. But that’s exactly what the last three years have been like for New Orleans Pelicans forward Ryan Anderson who’s had a front-row seat to the Anthony Davis Show.
Sportsnet’s Dave Zarum caught up with Anderson, who shares his thoughts on Davis—the player and the person. This is the extended version of the interview that appears in Zarum’s profile of Anthony Davis in the latest issue of Sportsnet magazine.
Dave Zarum: You’ve been a teammate of Davis’s for three years now. What were your first impressions of him, and how have they changed over the years, if at all?
Ryan Anderson: Anthony is such a gifted athlete, a freak of nature. You can tell. You can see his ability. When I first started playing with him, from watching him in college and what I’d learned about him, he was such a great shot-blocker, low-post scorer. But when he first started with us in the NBA, it really surprised me how well he could finish around the basket and how good his touch was; he was hitting shots from all over the court, consistently, and I didn’t really see that before. I remember talking to him about that a lot in his rookie year, and he told me that he just didn’t have to [shoot] in college. His job was catching alley-oops, running the floor and getting easy buckets.
It’s just been unbelievable watching him over the years. Obviously the way he’s improved each year is impressive, but this is such a mental game and to see the maturity he has in his approach over the years continues to surprise and amaze me. It surpasses so many other players that I’ve played with. He just has that ability to not let anything faze him. I think his rookie year the big thing for him was consistency, going out and figuring out how to score every night. It’s crazy. You look at the scoreboard and, out of nowhere, he’s got 28 points and 12 rebounds, and you just realize that now this guy does it night in and night out with ease, and that’s a special thing to watch firsthand.
I know you’ve only asked me that one question [laughing], but my favourite thing about Anthony and the biggest thing people don’t know about him, because it’s hard to look past his skill and his ability, is his humility. From the first day I met him in his rookie year to today, he’s the same Anthony, the same guy. You know, to be so young and looked up to as one of the best players in the NBA—if not the best—and to still be the same person, to care and want to come in and work hard every day, is really admirable. That’s what I love about him: He’s Anthony. He’s not a superstar, all-star, MVP, he’s just Anthony Davis.
Where do you think that comes from?
It’s a credit to his friends and family, the people around him. He doesn’t surround himself with Yes Men, you know? I’ve been around a lot of guys who pretty much [laughing]… they don’t allow their friends around them to speak up against anything they’re doing, don’t allow themselves to stay humble and grounded. Anthony is constantly around his family and people who genuinely care for him and have always been there for him. But he’s such a character guy in his own right.
Also, you know, he got so much attention with that huge growth spurt. Obviously he was talented, but he got that attention in high school maybe later than a lot of guys of his ability normally would, in contrast to superstars like LeBron who pretty much have a camera on them with a feed to ESPN from the womb, basically. [Anthony] is a guy that developed and came out of nowhere, and I think that does help a little bit. Credit to him still for his ability to keep good people around him.
I heard he doesn’t sleep. Like, at all. Any truth to that?
[laughing] I mean he doesn’t, and I’ve heard that. I don’t know his exact hours or anything, but it’s hard enough to get proper sleep during the season. We were talking the other day and he told me that, you know, obviously his life is getting a lot more intense and he’s being pulled in different directions; he’s getting more attention and with that comes more responsibility and a lot of people kind of picking at you, and can take up a lot of your time. But what’s cool is he said to me the other day that when he gets on the court everything else on the outside just shuts off and it’s his favourite place in the world to be because of it. And I can totally relate to that.
So as far as the sleep and stuff like that, I know he’s really tired some nights and he never shows it—he’s always ready to go for that game. It also helps that he’s, what, 21 years old? You don’t really need a lot of sleep when you’re 21.
There’s so many things Anthony does well, but how does his game and skillset affect you on the court?
His ability to run the floor is so huge. This team really thrives on transition points, and that helps clear me up to get transition threes. It’s tough for a big guy, especially if they’re trying to figure out how to guard us, because Anthony and I play a similar position, so every once in awhile Anthony has a centre on him, which is a total mismatch because he can out-run any big in this league, especially a centre. His ability to attract so much attention on his way to the basket means defences have to get back and make sure he doesn’t get an open dunk or layup, so it really frees me up.
And his athleticism—you see it particularly in pick-and-rolls toward the basket, he draws so much attention that it forces my man to help out and leave me open. I think Anthony does a real good job of balancing out how to play with me, or Omir [Asik], or whoever the other big man is. He does a great job in being versatile and recognizing where to be effective. He’s just very smart, very basketball savvy. And mature—especially on the court.
Has his progression forced your team to change along with him, in terms of your game plans, playing style, etc.?
It definitely has. Just today we were going over specifics of how Washington is going to double-team him in the post. In previous years that wasn’t the case—there weren’t any double-teams. He’s always been a pick-and-pop guy, he rolls to the basket, runs on fast-breaks, gets put-backs—but this year he’s really effective in the post and has had a lot of mismatches that allows him to take advantage of them.
Just now in practice we were working a lot on how he can escape the double-teams. The focus has shifted so much more on him this season particularly, because now he’s scoring from all over the place. There isn’t a specific spot on the court where defences can force him to and limit him offensively, except for maybe getting him to shoot threes four feet behind the line. You know what I mean. There’s not a whole lot else he can’t do.
Looking back to the first time you met him, what do you know now about Anthony that you didn’t know then?
I didn’t know that he… So, what’s so different about the NBA is that it can be such a selfish sport, self-driven, you know, that saying that you are your own business. And I’ve been on teams where guys are complete individuals in every sense. This is a team where we care about each guy, we have a really close group, each one of us.
But, you know, looking back, he was the No. 1–overall pick coming in, joking around a lot, I didn’t really know much about him. And then through that rookie year I learned that he’s got such a huge heart, and he really cares. I knew that about him after that season, but I really noticed it about him last year when I got hurt.
After my injury, I came home after spending a few days in the hospital. Without even calling or anything, he just drove over to my house and checked how I was doing, stayed for a few hours and hung out with my family. I’m not saying nobody else would have done that, but he was the one to take the initiative and do that. He didn’t have to.
It goes back to what I was saying about guys who just worry about themselves in the NBA. So to have a guy like Anthony make a gesture like that… It probably meant a whole lot more than he could’ve known. It just shows his heart. He really cares. That’s what I’ve learned over the years about Anthony Davis.
