Holy Smokes, Anthony Davis Just Had The Game Of The Season

Thank God the Pistons kept today’s game against the Pelicans close enough to force Anthony Davis to stay in until the end, because he put forth the best game anyone’s had all NBA season. Young Brow dropped 59 points on 24-for-34 shooting and collected 20 rebounds in 43 minutes of work. That’s the first 50-20 game since Chris Webber did it in 2001, and only the third such game in modern NBA history. He’s also the youngest player to score 59 or more since 1963.

Okay, here, enough words, watch the destruction.

Towards the end of the game, the Pistons kept inexplicably doubling the pick-and-roll ball handler off of Davis, and he roasted a much slower Andre Drummond. When they’d double him, he’d pull up and swish heat check after heat check, including a three, an easy dunk, and this absurd shot that everyone in the arena, including his defender, knew he’d take:

It probably bears mentioning here that Anthony Davis stands to earn $23 million if he makes an All-NBA team and activates the Rose Rule bump in his contract. Today’s obliteration of Detroit is probably just the start of a second-half reign of terror as Davis goes for that huge pile of coin. The Pelicans are bad and sort of pointless right now, but Davis has an incredible carrot in front of him, and it’ll be entertaining as hell to watch him try to make up for a slow start to the season in New Orleans’ last 27 games.

Photo via AP