| Unsurprisingly, Chris Paul was named Rookie of the Year for the 2005-06 season. Surprisingly, he only received 124 of the 125 first place votes, the highest total since David Robinson was a unanimous selection in 1990, with Deron Williams receiving the vote of the lone dissenter. The only questions here are who voted for Williams, what was he thinking, and has his vote been revoked yet? A lot of time there are legitimate debates as to MVP, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year, etc., but here Williams doesn't even come close to Paul.
Stat-wise, Paul takes the cake. The following are stat-by-stat comparisons, and I've included in parentheses Williams' per-36 minute totals, as he only played 28.8 minutes per game compared to Paul's 36.0 minutes per game.
PPG: Paul, 16.1 to 10.8 (13.5)
APG: Paul, 7.8 to 4.5 (5.6)
RPG: Paul, 5.1 to 2.4 (3.0)
SPG: Paul, 2.2 to 0.8 (1.0)
A/TO ratio: Paul, 3.25 to 2.5
FG%: Paul, 43.0% to 42.1%
FT%: Paul, 84.7% to 70.4%
So maybe Deron Williams meant more to his team? I don't have each players' plus-minus stats offhand, but even though Utah finished three games ahead of New Orleans, neither team made the playoffs, so I don't see giving Williams the edge there. The only way I see it is someone felt bad that the Jazz took Williams over Paul, and gave them the benefit of the doubt in the Rookie of the Year voting. Or maybe there was a problem with a hanging chad. But absent any mistake in voting, at the very least someone should look into who voted for Williams and demand an explanation. Maybe they'll overturn a scandal like in the NCAA coaches poll where the guy had his assistant vote for him. This is almost as big of a travesty of Johan Santana and Roger Clemens not winning the Cy Young awards last year... but that's a different debate for a different time in a different blog.
Posted by Bret Cohen at 5/10/2006 4:02:00 PM |
