:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/46244986/usa-today-8507199.0.jpg)
The NBA awards a few special players every year with individual awards. Earlier this month we found out that the Basketball Writers of America think that Rudy Gobert is one of the five best defenders in the NBA. On the last day of the month we find, today, that none of them felt like the Utah Jazz legion of rookies were worthy of a single vote (Full Voting results there). I get that. these were not impact rookie years for any of our guys save for Rodney Hood. And as for Hood, he didn't get in enough games this year to make the right people notice. All and all, that's just more of a chip on his shoulder, and I'm okay with that. I'm also okay with who the NBA awarded the Rookie of the Year award to -- the Minnesota Timberwolves' Canadian Import Andrew Wiggins. Wiggins dominated the vote, and kind of got off easy with only 25 games of Jabari Parker this season. (Can you imagine what he would be doing in the playoffs? Man.) Wiggins is joined in the top three by Nikola Mirotic (Chicago Bulls, huge media market), and Nerlens Noel (Philadelphia 76ers, huge media market). But how do their stats compare a) against one another, b) against Jabari Parker, and c) against the nine Jazz rookies this year?
I'm glad you asked.
| Total | Votes | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Player | Team | Pos | Points | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | G | MPG | PPG | RPG | APG | A:TO | SPG | BPG | BARPS | PER | WS | BPM | VORP | ||
| 1 | Andrew Wiggins | MIN | 2 | 3 | 604 | 110 | 17 | 3 | 82 | 36.2 | 16.9 | 4.6 | 2.1 | 0.96 | 1.0 | 0.6 | 25.2 | 13.9 | 2.1 | -2.3 | -0.2 |
| 2 | Nikola Mirotic | CHI | 4 | 3 | 335 | 14 | 81 | 22 | 82 | 20.2 | 10.2 | 4.9 | 1.2 | 1.09 | 0.7 | 0.7 | 17.7 | 17.9 | 5.7 | 1.2 | 1.3 |
| 3 | Nerlens Noel | PHI | 5 | 141 | 3 | 22 | 60 | 75 | 30.8 | 9.9 | 8.1 | 1.7 | 0.88 | 1.8 | 1.9 | 23.4 | 15.0 | 4.0 | 0.8 | 1.6 | |
| 4 | Elfrid Payton | ORL | 1 | 79 | 3 | 8 | 40 | 82 | 30.4 | 8.9 | 4.3 | 6.5 | 2.63 | 1.7 | 0.2 | 21.6 | 13.8 | 2.3 | -0.7 | 0.8 | |
| 5 | Marcus Smart | BOS | 1 | 2 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 67 | 27.0 | 7.8 | 3.3 | 3.1 | 2.31 | 1.5 | 0.3 | 16.0 | 11.0 | 2.9 | 1.1 | 1.4 |
| 6 | Jusuf Nurkic | DEN | 5 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 62 | 17.8 | 6.9 | 6.2 | 0.8 | 0.58 | 0.8 | 1.1 | 15.8 | 14.8 | 1.6 | 3.1 | 0.4 | |
| 7 | Jordan Clarkson | LAL | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 59 | 25.0 | 11.9 | 3.2 | 3.5 | 2.15 | 0.9 | 0.2 | 19.7 | 16.9 | 2.4 | -0.3 | 0.6 | |
| x | Jabari Parker | MIL | 4 | 3 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 25 | 29.5 | 12.3 | 5.5 | 1.7 | 0.89 | 1.2 | 0.2 | 20.9 | 14.5 | 1.3 | -1.2 | 0.1 |
| Player | Team | Pos | Points | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | G | MPG | PPG | RPG | APG | A:TO | SPG | BPG | BARPS | PER | WS | BPM | VORP | ||
| 1 | Dante Exum | UTA | 1 | 2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 82 | 22.2 | 4.8 | 1.6 | 2.4 | 1.68 | 0.5 | 0.2 | 9.5 | 5.7 | -0.1 | -3.8 | -0.8 |
| 2 | Rodney Hood | UTA | 3 | 2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 50 | 21.3 | 8.7 | 2.3 | 1.7 | 1.84 | 0.6 | 0.2 | 13.5 | 12.3 | 2.2 | -1.1 | 0.2 |
| 3 | Joe Ingles | UTA | 2 | 3 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 79 | 21.2 | 5.0 | 2.2 | 2.3 | 1.86 | 0.9 | 0.1 | 10.5 | 9.6 | 2.2 | -0.8 | 0.5 |
| 4 | Elijah Millsap | UTA | 2 | 3 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 47 | 19.7 | 5.3 | 3.2 | 1.2 | 0.87 | 1.2 | 0.3 | 11.2 | 7.9 | 0.4 | -1.6 | 0.1 |
| 5 | Bryce Cotton | UTA | 1 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 15 | 10.6 | 5.3 | 1.2 | 1.0 | 1.25 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 7.8 | 14.5 | 0.2 | -4.4 | -0.1 | |
| 6 | Grant Jerrett | Team | 4 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 3 | 8.7 | 3.0 | 1.7 | 0.7 | 2.00 | 0.7 | 0.0 | 6.1 | 13.6 | 0.1 | -0.6 | 0.0 | |
| 7 | Patrick Christopher | UTA | 3 | 2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 4 | 7.3 | 1.5 | 1.5 | 0.0 | 0.00 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 3.3 | -2.6 | -0.1 | -16.3 | -0.1 |
| 8 | Jack Cooley | UTA | 4 | 5 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 16 | 5.4 | 1.7 | 1.6 | 0.1 | 0.33 | 0.4 | 0.2 | 4.0 | 11.4 | 0.2 | -4.0 | 0.0 |
| 9 | Jerrelle Benimon | UTA | 4 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 2 | 1.5 | 0.0 | 1.5 | 0.0 | 0.00 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.5 | 4.7 | 0.0 | -26.9 | 0.0 | |
As you can clearly see, a) the NBA continues to just give the ROY award to the guy who has the highest rookie PPG (kinda why Patrick Ewing was ahead of Karl Malone -- besides also being in a huge media market, and maybe playing a little better). As for b) Jabari was solid, but I can imagine that he would have been scoring closer to 20 as the season went on, collecting a few rookie of the month trophies along the way. And well, c), yeah. Our boys didn't really bring it this year.
I am offended that the Bosnian Beast got a 2nd place vote. None of our guys (Jody, Aaron, Booner) were homers though. So I guess that's good.
Rookie of the Month winners:
- November: Andrew Wiggins, Jabari Parker
- December: Andrew Wiggins, Nikola Mirotic
- January: Andrew Wiggins, Elfrid Payton
- February: Andrew Wiggins, Marcus Smart
- March: Jordan Clarkson, Nikola Mirotic
- April: Rodney Hood, Bojan Bogdanovic
Not really a surprise at all with the outcome. Wiggins is, after all, why teams tank. He'll be a great player and I wish him well. I do also hold, deeply, that our nine guys could beat him up in a street fight. And at the end of the day isn't that precisely what matters most?