When the NBA officially announces the winner of the 2021-22 Rookie of the Year award, odds are that Detroit Pistons fans will be upset.
According to the latest odds, Pistons rookie Cade Cunningham (+1000) trails both Evan Mobley (-225) and Scottie Barnes (+200) to win the award.
We all know that Cade deserves to be named the NBA’s Rookie of the Year and one person who agrees is Krysten Peek of Yahoo Sports.
On Tuesday, Peek released her final NBA Rookie Rankings article and Cunningham took the honors, finishing ahead of Mobley and Barnes.
Here is what Peek has to say about Cunningham being the NBA’s top rookie.
Draft slot: No. 1
Previous ranking: No. 3
2021-22 stats: 17.4 ppg, 5.5 rpg, 5.6 apg
Cunningham might have started the season slow, but he completely backed his No. 1 overall slot in his first year. The second half of the season, Cunningham was incredible and was named the MVP of the Rising Star game over All-Star weekend. Cunningham averaged 22.9 points, 5.9 rebounds and seven assists in March, joining Michael Jordan and Oscar Robertson as the only rookies in NBA history to average 22/5/7 in a month.
Each night, he found different ways to break down the defense and find the open man. The 6-foot-6 point guard had the highest usage rate among rookies (27.7) and led all rookies in points per game. He was streaky from deep early in the season, but showed more consistency after the All-Star break, stringing seven games in a row with 20-plus points and had at least two made threes in each outing.
In the first head-to-head matchup with Mobley, Cunningham knew what was at stake and didn’t back down, having on the best games of his season with a triple-double (19 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists).
The Rookie of the Year award is based on the entire season and with the way Cunningham ended on a high note, it will be interesting to see if his slow start hurts him at all in voting.
