Apr 17 2023 7 mins
Defensive Player of the Year
Jaren Jackson Jr. won Defensive Player of the Year. He's a perfectly reasonable choice. Nate and I had him second. Danny had him third.
Jackson is an elite rim protector who can also guard further out. Misguided accusations about how the Grizzlies count his stats ultimately led to more attention on Jackson's defensive excellence. (Scrutiny would've been better placed on Jackson's still-too-high foul rate.)
Nate, Danny and I all picked Draymond Green, who finished fourth. But I saw him, Jackson and runners up Brook Lopez and Evan Mobley all fairly close.
Full voting with first-, second- and third-place votes and voting points:
1. Jaren Jackson Jr., Memphis: 56-35-6-391
2. Brook Lopez, Milwaukee: 31-47-13-309
3. Evan Mobley, Cleveland: 8-10-31-101
4. Draymond Green, Golden State: 3-2-13-34
5. Bam Adebayo, Miami: 1-2-7-18
6. Giannis Antetokounmpo, Milwaukee: 0-2-8-14
7. O.G. Anunoby, Toronto: 0-1-5-8
7. Jrue Holiday, Milwaukee: 0-1-5-8
9. Joel Embiid, Philadelphia: 1-0-2-7
9. Nic Claxton, Brooklyn: 0-0-7-7
11. Alex Caruso, Chicago: 0-0-2-2
12. Jimmy Butler, Miami: 0-0-1-1
Awards finalists
The NBA announced finalists for other major awards:
- Most Valuable Player: Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid, Nikola Jokic
- Rookie of the Year: Paolo Banchero, Walker Kessler, Jalen Williams
- Most Improved Player: Jalen Brunson, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Lauri Markkanen
- Sixth Man of the Year: Malcolm Brogdon, Bobby Portis Jr., Immanuel Quickley
- Clutch Player of the Year: Jimmy Butler, DeMar DeRozan, De'Aaron Fox
- Coach of the Year: Mike Brown, Mark Daigneault, Joe Mazzulla
Biggest snub: Bobby Portis Jr. over Larry Nance Jr. for Sixth Man of the Year. Nate and I had Nance second, and Danny had him third. But it's no surprise. Despite his defense and ability to unlock dynamic lineups as the Pelicans' small-ball five, Nance just didn't score enough (6.8 points per game) to compete for this award.
Besides, Immanuel Quickley should win and likely will.
Russell Westbrook
Russell Westbrook called a Phoenix fan "motherfucker" and repeatedly told him "watch your mouth" during halftime of last night's Clippers-Suns game, video of the incident shows. The fan called Westbrook "Westbrick," according Eddie Gonzalez of Boardroom.
The altercation occurred in a lounge for Phoenix fans. Visiting players often go through the lounge as a shortcut between the court and locker room, Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic shows in a video. Players could go around through a hallway and keep greater distance from fans.
Westbrook is fighting a losing and trivial battle in his loud objections to "Westbrick." The insult isn't racist/sexist/homophobic/vulgar/etc. Fans are allowed to taunt players within certain boundaries. This isn't even near the line.
My guess: Visiting players will be prohibited from cutting through the lounge – at least for a while. That'll probably wear off (if the area isn't redesigned). Blaming architecture is obfuscating, anyway.
Zion Williamson
C.J. McCollum seemed to take a thinly veiled shot at Zion Williamson for not properly preparing physically after another season largely lost to injury.
Pelicans lead executive David Griffin is just saying it, via Christian Clark of nola.com:
“I think a big part is on him,” Griffin said. “I think there is a lot he can do better. And he would, I think, tell you that. I think we need to do a better job examining the whole situation top to bottom a little bit better.”
Ideally, this public statement will lead to Williamson taking accountability and improving his habits.
But there has been friction between Williamson and Griffin. We'll see how this goes over.
Dallas Mavericks
The Mavericks planned to start tanking in late March but Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving refused, according to Kevin O'Connor of The Ringer.
How embarrassing for the Mavericks, who apparently deemed their season a lost cause even earlier than it seemed. Regardless of whether tanking was savvy, being positioned to tank was a colossal failure.
Good for Doncic and Irving resisting. Dallas had an opportunity to make the postseason and maybe even make some noise. Players are too competitive to throw away that opportunity. The competitiveness of people within the league is a big reason tanking isn't more pervasive.
I'm curious whether this happened before or after the Mavericks lost consecutive games to the lowly Hornets on March 24 and 26. Those were ugly.
O'Connor also reports Dallas' plan to tank involved playing JaVale McGee and Markieff Morris more. Love that detail.
Second apron
"As part of the new CBA, if a team goes over the second tax apron, their 1st round pick 7 years out is unable to be traded, sources told me & @wojespn. Teams that then exceed the apron twice over the following four years will have that pick dropped to the end of the 1st round."
"If teams stay under the second apron in three out of the following four years, however, the pick becomes unfrozen and is able to dealt, sources told me and @BobbyMarks42. This rule goes into effect at the start of the 2024-25 season."
Would a team that triggers this rule but misses the playoffs really have its pick drop from the lottery to No. 30? As usual, the devil is in the (not-yet-known) details.
But this at least sounds QUITE punitive for big-spending teams.
The second apron already seemed far closer to a hard cap than I ever thought the union would accept. If this rule resembles what it sounds like… It'd be incredibly risky to regularly exceed the second apron.
Awards criteria
Shams Charania of The Athletic:
"Sources: Full terms of NBA's 65-game minimum to be eligible for honors such as MVP, All-NBA, DPOY: Players must play 20 minutes in at least 65 games – with protections against season-ending injury (62 games), near misses in minutes (2 games at 15 min.), bad faith circumstances."
We already knew players will be generally required to play at least 20 minutes in 63 games and at least 15 minutes in another two games and there'd be injury protections.
But if the only injury protections are for season-ending injuries with a player playing at least 62 games, that's an incredibly narrow needle to thread. That might never be relevant – except when tanking teams and players consider the requirement when determining when a player suffers a "season-ending injury."
Did Damian Lillard suffer a season-ending injury? Though he played just 58 games, the example could be illustrative. The Trail Blazers talked about calf tightness before shutting down Lillard, but we all know they were really just tanking late in a lost season. Would a circumstance like that count?
Tiebreakers
The Bulls will have a slightly higher chance of keeping their top-four-protected pick (8.5% vs. 8.0%, per Tankathon) thanks to a random drawing today.
More likely, though, the Magic will get the No. 11 pick rather than the No. 12 pick from Chicago.
Full results of today's draft tiebreakers:
- The Rockets will pick ahead of the Spurs in the unlikely event neither get drawn into the top four via the lottery.
- The Pacers (No. 7 seed in lottery) will pick higher than the Wizards (No. 8 seed in lottery) if neither moves up in the lottery. Indiana also gets a single ping-pong-ball combination more than Washington does.
- The Magic via Bulls (No. 11 seed in the lottery) will pick ahead of the Thunder (No. 12 seed in lottery) in the likely event neither get drawn into the top four via the lottery. Chicago also gets a single ping-pong-ball combination more than Oklahoma City does..
- The Heat get the No. 18 pick. The Warriors get the No. 19 pick. The Rockets (via Clippers) get the No. 20 pick.
- The Suns get the No. 21 pick. The Nets get the No. 22 pick.
- The Grizzlies get the No. 25 pick. The Pacers (via Cavaliers) get the No. 26 pick.
Charge
If you've listened to Dunc'd On for more than 10 minutes, you've surely heard calls to ban the charge. Those have been echoed and amplified in the aftermath of injuries to Giannis Antetokounmpo and Ja Morant.
But John Hollinger of The Athletic advocates for keeping the charge – with tweaks.
Officiating
Via Nate, required viewing before you complain about playoff officiating: The NBA's points-of-emphasis videos.
-Dan Feldman
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