Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, David Robinson, Shaquille O'Neal, Chris Webber, Grant Hill, Jason Kidd, Allen Iverson, Tim Duncan, Vince Carter, Steve Francis, Pau Gasol, Amare Stoudemire, LeBron James, Chris Paul, Brandon Roy, Kevin Durant and Derrick Rose are all well known elite athletes that have won rookie of the year in the past. Who will be this years Rose?
I say this year's Rose because it's definitely going to a dynamic guard--either Tyreke Evans, Brandon Jennings or Stephen Curry.
Curry is third on my list because he has solid numbers for a rookie but not as dominant as the other two candidates. Curry averages 12.3 points per game, 3.6 rebounds per game, 4.4 assists per game, 1.8 steals per game and plays about 32.1 minutes each game. And although he is a much stronger three-point threat than the other two rookies, his team has a dismal record of 11-24. Sorry Curry but unless your team scratches the eight seed by going on a 20-0 stretch--the Warriors' are out of it and so are your chances of winning the rookie of the year.
This is where it gets real tricky, I'm not sure who should be second on my list but let's talk about Tyreke Evans before Brandon Jennings. Evans has better numbers, hands down but I'm not too convinced that he should be the rookie of the year. He averages 20.7 points per game, 5.1 rebounds per game, 5 assists per game, 1.5 steals per game and 37.2 minutes every night the arena is lit up. He does a bunch of lighting up on his own and is undoubtedly a wildfire fan favorite as he already has two game winning field goals in his resume.
Evans came out of Memphis and stands at 6'6" weighing 220lbs. His team is 15-21 and are not in good shape; they are the third worst team in the Western Conference. However they have a pretty well balanced team as seven players average double-digits in points per game (granted one of them, Kevin Martin has only played five games thus far and averaged 30.6 ppg). Evans has picked up where Martin left off, and is the dominant passing force in the team.
I'm a fan of players who know how to create for other players and the numbers show that if he wasn't there, Beno Udrih would be the next dominant passer and he started about half the games thus far.
Evans has been a solid player in the league--when a guard averages 20, 5 and 5--we're talking about an all-around performer. Kobe Bryant doesn't even average more than 20, 5 and 5 this season (he averages 29.6, 5.6, and 4.6). Of course I'm not putting Evans in the pedestal and comparing him to Bryant but it is an impressive statistic to see how Evans does a sufficient amount of everything--he's a box-score filler.
But Evans' downfall might be the fact that his team's playoff hopes are about as a real as Alice's Wonderland.
Finally we get to Brandon Jennings who I feel has a slight upper-hand over Evans just because of his team's record and spot in the East. Now Jennings does not have as great of numbers as Evans but some pretty impressive ones nonetheless. Jennings averages 18.3 points per game, 3.8 rebounds per game, 5.9 assists per game and 1.1 steals per game and is on the court for an average of 34.5 minutes every game. Of the three candidates, his team is playing the best (15-19 Bucks) and they currently hold the eighth seed of the playoffs.
Jennings is the team's leading steal-man, assist-man, and scorer (he also leads the team in turnovers but cut him some slack, he's a rookie). Jennings overpowered the team's prior number one player Michael Redd, and has now been the dependent offensive force. He is a better FT shooter than Evans and most importantly is just fun to watch.
Jennings is quick and reminds me of a bit of Rose and Paul; he doesn't have the strength and dunking ability of Rose nor the court-awareness of Paul but he has the explosiveness of Rose and the gliding-down-the-court vibe of Paul.
Jennings makes sharp moves and uses his freedom to do whatever he feels helps the team (unfortunately sometimes he hurts the team by shooting too much--.393 FG%) but he's the only player in the team that has started all 34 games. He is the only Bucks player that you know will be in the starting line-up no matter what.
Although it might be tough to decide who will win this years rookie of the year, it might come down to who can be this years Rose and bring their team to the playoff. Good luck rook's.
2 comments:
It is going to be Tyreke hands down chief. I saw this on facebook and figured I'd check out your blog, I like it. I don't think that team record should play a big role here simply because you don't expect rookies to carry a bad team, just not to be horrible.
Jennings came FLYING out of the gates and has faded more and more with each week. He is still good, but Tyreke takes over games on a horrible team. Without him his team is minimum 13-21 from the game winners, and probably much much worse, like Nets worse. Jennings team would be very similar record-wise without him. Call it the same reasoning alot of people use when it comes to MVP voting, which team would be worse without the guy.
Jennings is stone cold shooting right now, and if he can turn it around and at least get halfway back to lighting the world on fire like he did in ONE game with 55 points I might switch my opinion.
Hey Tom, thanks for checking the blog out and giving me some valued feedback! As for as your first point about rookies carrying a team in terms of a team's record--I feel that if a rookie can carry a team, then his potential rookie of the year candidacy improves (such as Jennings over Evans).
As for as your second comment goes; you are completely correct. I think the Kings would be extremely inefficient in anything they do--maybe even as bad as the Nets.
I think many people use that logic as to how a team would be without a specific player, which is understandable to fathom how essential an individual is to a team; however standards might be a bit skewed when it comes to the rookie of the year award. It might just be more geared to the numbers when it comes to rookies.
Jennings is pretty cold right now, as we can see through his poor field goal percentage. But I see something in that guy, his explosiveness--if trained, can be un-guardable. Evans might have a slight upper hand in your eyes, but let the playoff hunt come around and we'll see how Jennings performs. If he steps up "lighting the world on fire," or hits a couple big shots in the fourth quarter in any playoff seeding games--Jennings will have the award in his hands without a doubt.
That's where I was going with the article, Jennings is simply in a better place to control his own destiny.
Other then that, thanks a lot for you feedback!
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