It has been a somewhat underwhelming year for NBA rookies. No. 1 overall pick Ben Simmons has missed the entire season due to a foot injury, while other top selections from the 2016 draft – such as Brandon Ingram, Jaylen Brown, Kris Dunn, and Buddy Hield – have shown promise but haven’t provided consistent production throughout the season.
With the regular season winding down, a small handful of viable candidates for the NBA’s 2017 Rookie of the Year award have emerged, and none of them are 2016 first-round picks, which is somewhat unprecedented in recent history.
Since the turn of the century, 18 players have been named the NBA’s Rookie of the Year, including co-winners Elton Brand and Steve Francis in 2000. Of those 18 players, 17 were drafted in the first round a year earlier — the only exception is Blake Griffin, a first overall pick who missed his first NBA season and won the award in his second year. Additionally, all 18 Rookies of the Year were top-11 picks, with Michael Carter-Williams (11th) and Amar’e Stoudemire (ninth) representing the lowest-drafted winners.
This year, the top three contenders for Rookie of the Year don’t meet the criteria noted above. Joel Embiid was a top pick, but he missed his first two NBA seasons before finally making it onto the court this season. Dario Saric was selected outside of the top 11 (12th), and spent two seasons playing overseas before arriving stateside. And Malcolm Brogdon, the top non-Sixer in contention for the award, was selected in the second round last year, 36th overall.
Of those top three candidates, a group that includes two players drafted in 2014 and a 2016 second-rounder, Embiid was easily the most impressive on a per-game basis, averaging a staggering 20.2 PPG, 7.8 RPG, and 2.5 BPG in just 25.4 minutes per contest. However, injuries derailed his season once again, and he was limited to just 31 regular season games, making it tough to vote for him.
His teammate Saric emerged as a top contender for Rookie of the Year in recent months, bringing his season-long averages up to 12.9 PPG and 6.3 RPG after a slow start. Since January 24, around the time Embiid played his last game of the season, the Croatian forward has averaged an impressive 16.9 PPG, 6.8 RPG, and 2.9 APG in 36 contests.
In Milwaukee, meanwhile, Brogdon has been a steady contributor for the Bucks all year, chipping in 10.3 PPG, 4.3 APG, 2.8 RPG, 1.1 SPG, and a .404 3PT%. According to Scott Howard-Cooper of NBA.com, who spoke to about a dozen voters around the league, Brogdon has “real support” to win Rookie of the Year, though some voters still like Embiid, and Saric may have an overall lead.
What do you think? Is one of those three players is deserving of the Rookie of the Year award this year, or should another rookie take home the hardware? Submit your vote below and then jump into the comments section to share your thoughts!
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weakest draft class since 2013
They’ve only been in the league one year, give them some time… and to me it seems like a deep class if a guy who was taken in the second round could potentially be the Rookie of the Year…
It’d be cool if they could do co-ROY and just give it to Embiid and Saric.
Agree with that!!
As much as Embiid was without a doubt the best “rookie” this year, he shouldn’t get the award since he’s only played 31 games. Giving him the award would potentially set a bad precedent for other awards in terms of how many games played factors into consideration. Even if their numbers weren’t as good as Embiid’s, Saric and Brogdan should finish 1 and 2 (I don’t really mind which order, both are deserving of RoY to me). Giving the award to Embiid for 31 games played would be like giving a player the MVP award to somebody who only played in 31 games.
Saric.
Why not Brogdon? He’s actually the man for the award
Embiid played the best but played limited minutes and a lot less games. I got to say Saric has been great and really consistent all year for Philly
Brogdon, easily. Doing it at a more difficult position and efficiently within a winning context.
But Philly is the bigger market so more hype and people will just ignore the massive USG / poor efficiency of Saric on a tanking team.
If you go over to Basketball-Reference and do a query search of rookies of similar age who had similar USG/TS%/MPG as Saric…this is who you get:
link to bkref.com
Brogdon easily huh. Ur obviously from Milwaukee. Saric had taken over games on many occasions in the past couple months. I like Brogdon, but he’s not capable of leading a team to a victory without Giannis and Middleton taking the attention
I’m not a Milwaukee fan. I am though not fooled by media hype and the horde of 76er fans insisting its Saric.
All you have to do is watch both teams play and look at the advanced metrics…
Take a quick look at his massive USG and super low efficiency …and that disparity has grown since he became a starter.
Brogdon is superior in every advanced metric:
(PER) Player Efficiency Rating, (TS%) True Shooting %, (BPM) Box +/-, (WS) Win Shares, (VORP) Value Over Replacement Player
link to bkref.com
Brogdon blows Saric away in ESPN’s RPM (1.23 vs -1.93)
Brogdon blows Saric away in 3pt% (.404 vs .314)
The only thing that Saric does more is jack up shots, at an astronomical 21.2 per100 possessions and coverts that volume at a sad .469 eFG%.
Saric is a classic high volume, low efficiency shooter on a high lottery team…aka the designated chukker on a tanking team.
Meanwhile Brogdon is an efficient floor general leading within a winning context and a key contributor to a team heading into the playoffs.
You gotta be kidding me right .. Saric has dominated in a Starting role. Broggy has a much stronger cast and winning doesn’t mean a damn thing here as this isn’t an MVP award. Go do so more Queries.
Uh NO, I am not kidding.
…if you don’t want to account for W’s then all you have to do is watch both teams play and look at the advanced metrics…
Take a quick look at Saric’s massive USG and super low efficiency …a disparity that got even wider since he became a starter.
Brogdon is superior to Saric in every advanced metric:
(PER) Player Efficiency Rating, (TS%) True Shooting %, (BPM) Box +/-, (WS) Win Shares, (VORP) Value Over Replacement Player
link to bkref.com
Brogdon also blows Saric away in ESPN’s RPM (1.23 vs -1.93)…Brogdon blows Saric away in 3pt% (.404 vs .314)…He is also a much better defender.
The only thing that Saric does more is jack up shots, at an astronomical 21.2 per100 possessions and coverts that volume at a sad .469 eFG%.
Saric is a classic high volume, low efficiency shooter on a high lottery team…aka the designated chukker on a tanking team.
Meanwhile Brogdon is an efficient floor general leading within a winning context and a key contributor to a team heading into the playoffs.
ROY-Saric, All-Rookie 1st team-Brogdon,Hield,Jaylen Brown,Saric,Embiid. All-Rookie 2nd team is interesting to me
Brogdon? Ha ha ha
Saric. Guy has been a monster all over the court.