Per Bleacher Report today, NBA executives are picking Reed Sheppard for ROY with Zach Edey coming in a close second. Funny how someone on this site (not naming names to protect the innocent) was screaming with all his might for the Rockets to consider Edey even when he was mocked to go late first round or even second round by almost all experts and those on this board. Some actually were polite and concurred, but most mocked me for being a crazy lunatic who didn’t know anything about basketball and said Clingan was much better. Last year I got mocked for doing a post saying Cam was a top five pick we should take. Hoping next year some of the doubters will give me the benefit of doubt.
Having a couple of decent takes amongst a sea of inane, unadulterated idiocy doesn't give you the credibility you think it does...
I don't think he'll play enough to get the raw stats that impress casuals, so I don't think he'll win ROY, but I think it's very possible he'll be the best rookie next season.
Typically ROTY winners are either the best rookie on a breakout team or a guy who puts up big stats on a terrible team. The Rockets already broke out of suckitude and I doubt Sheppard plays more than 20 minutes a night. Even Amen needed time to get into the rotation and Cam wasn't getting real minutes until the new year. Free money for the bookies, as usual.
Well, the bigger news here is that Edey is considered as high consideration for ROY. I also strongly advocated that we consider drafting Edey as he's NBA ready. Plus I feel he has a high floor and a moderately high ceiling. I felt he was as close to a zero risk draft prospect as you could get. I never understood why Klingon was considered a higher prospect based on inferior regular season stats, inferior combine stats, and inferior physical stats. Anyway, back to Rockets news, I'm super excited about Shepherd. It looks like he's better than advertised and a perfect match for this team. Is ~20min/gm is enough to get him ROY?
1. If Edey is better than most of the other high draft picks at the END of the year, I'll admit you were right. 2. You can be right and still be a crazy lunatic.
I mean he better be NBA ready, he's older than Sengun. I don't think anybody knocked him for being raw, it's the mobility. I think he'll do fine this year and he might well be in contention for ROY but more cause this whole class kinda sucks and not cause he's individually awesome.
Amen needed time to get into the rotation because he was injured. Sheppard is going to be better than both rookie Cam and Amen.
Doubt it. Edey has shooters around him and experienced vets surrounding him. Morant - Bane - GG - JJJ - Edey (pure inside out game) If Yao Ming came back to this era healthy. Yao would bust these chumps. As long as Edey doesn't develop Lisfranc fracture......he good. Sheppard will need to learn that letting everyone blow by him and stripping them of the ball from behind won't work in the NBA. Not consistently.
Yawn. Edey is in a good situation and he might (maybe) even have an especially good rookie season as a result of that combined with having four years of college experience under his belt, which is uncommon for a top 10 pick these days. Even if he wins RoY--we haven't played a single game of NBA basketball yet this season--that doesn't mean he will be even close to the best player in this draft class. Here are some prior winners of Rookie of the Year, and some other players drafted in their class: Emeka Okafor -- Dwight Howard, Andre Iguodala, Luol Deng, Al Jefferson Tyreke Evans -- James Harden, Stephen Curry, Blake Griffin, Demar Derozan, Jrue Holiday Michael Carter-Williams -- Giannis Antetokounmpo, Rudy Gobert Andrew Wiggins -- Nikola Jokic, Joel Embiid, Julius Randle, Zach LaVine Ben Simmons -- Jaylen Brown, Brandon Ingram, Domantas Sabonis, Pascal Siakam, Dejounte Murray Maybe hold off on the victory laps, not just until after the season, but also until after we see how the whole draft class shakes out. Side note: Holy sh*t was 2009 a stacked draft class
fwiw: Blake won ROY unanimously. However, Blake, Embid, and Jokic didn’t qualify for ROY at first, bc they didn’t play in their first year after being drafted. And Simmons was on his second yr when he won.
