A bit of flesh to the bones of the NBA Rookie of the Year bet.
It's been known for years that there's a number of really good players coming into the league this coming season. This is slightly different to the past two, where we've been on the winner of this award at 6-1 and 14-1, as really there wasn't much talent and we had to look around for players going to bad teams that would get plenty of court time, plus were pretty talented.
This year should be a tougher field to find a bet, but circumstances have prevailed and I think it's a two horse race between the favourite, Jabari Parker, and Nerlens Noel, who was drafted last year, and was the consensus number one pick in a poor year before getting injured in Feb and dropping down the picks, missing all of last year with a knee injury. I think it's down to these two basically because you can put a line through all the competitors.
Number one pick
Andrew Wiggins has gone to Cleveland. They weren't that bad last year, and actually only had a 1.5% of getting the first pick, which they did for the third time in four years. This means their team isn't that bad and Wiggins won't be thrust into a starring role on it. They have now signed LeBron and this is even more so the case. There's talk of him being traded for Kevin Love, which would alter his outlook completely (he'd be a star on a crap team and back into the betting) but he's been assured he won't be dealt and it's unlikely. LBJ didn't mention either Wiggins or last year's number one Anthony Bennett in his letter (he listed 4 others) so it could be done, but it's doubtful. If he's dealt we'll revisit this.
Number two pick
Parker ticks all the boxes and is rightly favourite. Super talented, will go straight into Milwaukee's starting 5 and is instantly their best player. Some question marks remain, Jason Kidd's coaching, a packed front court that might hold him back slightly if Kidd shares the minutes around. He's NBA ready tho and his team are desperate.
Philly took
Joel Embiid third. He was touted to go first but is injured and out for 4 to 6 months, much like Noel the year before. This takes him out of the Rookie of the Year race, which is good for us looking for a bet.
Julies Randle of the Lakers is third in the betting and is a danger. He looks like he'll slot straight in at power forward and could be a double double man straight away. However, the Lakers have a lot of money to spend on free agents and Kobe should be fully fit. It's hard to see a rookie getting enough of the ball to impress, and if the Lakers line up a similar kind of roster as last year, with loads of fun nomadic players looking like they're on the playground, it's not great for a rookie to shine. He'll be close tho.
Marcus Smart of the Celtics might benefit if they trade their All-Star point guard Rajon Rondo. If that happens he may have a chance, if it doesn't he doesn't. I don't see him as a threat whatever happens, not good enough.
Utah have
Dante Exum and he's the great unknown in this. He's a 19 year old guard from Australia and not much is known about him. He's sposed to be pretty good, but I can't believe a kid from Australia will come in and blow away a draft class as good as this. Utah drafted a guard last year, Trey Burke, and they'll have to fight each other for the ball, although Gordon Hayward leaving will help a bit. Hard to judge how good he'll be just yet. His old man played with Michael Jordan at North Carolina then headed to play pro in Australia.
Doug McDermott is next in the list and surely as he's a no channer then we don't need to go any further. 'Dougie McBuckets' is instant offence but playing for the Bulls he'll have to learn to be a great defender to get on the court, and that takes time. He'll be a slow burner.
That brings us back to
Nerlens Noel. Everything about this guy makes me wanna back him more. As we know from last year when we successfully backed Michael Carter-Williams, the Sixers are rubbish. They're rubbish with a purpose tho, they traded away their decent players for draft picks and now have the start of a young, exciting roster. Noel being injured all year meant they had another bad year and therefore got another high pick, and they've rinse repeated with Embiid so this year they won't be much good again.
It's been well known that even tho Noel has been out for 18 months, he's been fit and ready for at least 6 months, there just was no point playing him. Instead, he's been worked really hard on his basics. They've reconstructed his shot, which seems to be working a treat. His Achilles heal was his free throw shooting, just over 50% in his year in college. He hit his first nine in the summer league this week and shot 80% over 4 games. His shot looks great. His coach Brett Brown has been working one on one with him for months, much more so that any normal player/coach relationship. They know he's their future.
He's 6'11" and has a 7'4" wingspan. He is super athletic and can jump out the building. Defensively he's going to get loads of blocks and offensively some huge play of the day style dunks. He played really well in the summer league last week and said afterwards he hasn't thought about his knee in months.
The one drawback is that as Philly are gonna be crap again, they may limit his minutes and try and protect him with little reward for the risk. If they keep resting him or limit him to 20 minutes a game he won't be a runner. But with his teammate having won RotY last year and having been sat idle for 18 months, maybe up to half of that when he was fit, he'll be raring to go.
Here's our boy in action last week, fresh from injury, looks sharp already (and I don't just mean the flat top).
So we have £40 on Noel at 10-1, I think we should cover that with a bet on Parker to get our money back, suggest £20 at 3-1