How Immanuel Quickley seized control of the Sixth Man of the Year Race with the best week of his career
As we've covered frequently this season, the NBA's Sixth Man of the Year award tends to be handed out fairly formulaically. Of the past 17 winners, 10 have simply been the season's highest-scoring reserve. This year's race appeared to be the rare exception, but in a similarly predictable way. Former MVP Russell Westbrook was the betting favorite for most of the season, and while he didn't lead all reserves in points, he did lead them in assists (7.7 per game in 49 bench outings) while leading all reserve guards with 6.1 rebounds per night. Sixth Man of the Year, more often than not, is a box score award. But once Westbrook was traded, a bit of a vacuum opened. The season's two leading bench scorers both had flawed candidacies. Bennedict Mathurin plays for a possible lottery team, and 19 of the past 20 winners have made the playoffs. Norman Powell plays for the team Westbrook joined, and We...