Ballot reveal: Picks for Most Improved, Coach of Year & other major NBA Awards
Mike Brown led the Kings back to the playoffs after a lengthy 16-year postseason drought.
In this space Tuesday, we had one voter’s NBA Awards ballot reveal for the Kia Defensive Player of the Year. Shaun Powell gave his rundown Monday of the new Kia NBA Clutch Player of the Year Award. On Wednesday, I’ll have my final pick for Kia Rookie of the Year. And finally on Friday, Michael C. Wright will offer up his final take on what mostly has been a three-headed monster of a Kia MVP race.
That still leaves several awards that weren’t tracked with one of NBA.com’s popular Ladders. Here are three for which I cast ballots, along with one – Executive of the Year – that media folks don’t decide:
Coach of the Year
1. Mike Brown, Sacramento Kings
2. Mark Daigneault, Oklahoma City Thunder
3. Joe Mazzulla, Boston Celtics
Typically this award is the equivalent of a Most Improved Team Award, presented annually to a coach who boosts a team by five, 10, 15 victories or more than that team won the previous season. In the case of Mike Brown and the Sacramento Kings, though, this was more than turning last year’s 30-52 squad into a 48-34 high seed in the West.
This was about reaching back across 17 years to restore some respect to the Kings franchise.
Brown, 53, rates the top slot on this ballot for what he accomplished in Year 1 on Sacramento’s sideline. This was his third team and fourth stop as a head coach after tours with the Cavaliers (2005-10, 2013-14) and the Lakers (2011-12). This was his heaviest lift yet.
"Mike has done a brilliant job. He's hands down Coach of the Year."
Warriors Head Coach Steve Kerr applauds Coach Brown for the excitement he has built around Sacramento. pic.twitter.com/Sim47e9YJn
— Sacramento Kings (@SacramentoKings) April 8, 2023
In his first Cleveland stint, LeBron James already had been on board for two years, the culture and expectations changing as Brown arrived. Heck, they already had gone to the Finals in 2007 when everything came together (except a title) for the 66-16 mark that got Brown his first Red Auerbach COY trophy.
With the Lakers, Brown had a decorated but aging core including Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol and Derek Fisher. That Kyrie Irving-led bunch in Brown’s brief second run with Cleveland, with rookie Anthony Bennett as a big miss as the No. 1 pick, was doomed from the get-go.
But this has been different. Thoroughly seasoned after six seasons on the Golden State bench, Brown went to Sacramento with eyes open on the work ahead. He had crafted a reputation as a defensive teacher – then helped turn the Kings into the most potent offensive team (118.6 points per 100 possessions) in the NBA.
He inherited talent, sure, with rising stars such as Domantas Sabonis and De’Aaron Fox, but he pushed and prodded them to new heights. And he has coached for the postseason, not simply a better regular season record to look good on his resume or win awards, well, like this.
Daigneault, 37, was ready when OKC’s front office took off the shackles of the previous two seasons. Finally permitted to win, he and the Thunder promptly chased a Play-In spot and showed so much potential – even with 2022 top pick Chet Holmgren getting hurt before the season – they already have generated excitement for next season and beyond.
Let’s not forget how Mazzulla landed this job – he was abruptly promoted to replace Ime Udoka after an embarrassing and potentially damaging front-office scandal that could have derailed the East’s NBA Finals representative last June. Things weren’t always as breezy as they looked early in the season, but the key was how the young coach and his determined Celtics team worked through it to give themselves what looks like another strong shot at a championship.
Kia Sixth Man of the Year
1. Bobby Portis, Milwaukee Bucks
2. Malcolm Brogdon, Boston Celtics
3. Norman Powell, LA Clippers
Bucks sixth man Bobby Portis makes his case for the Kia Sixth Man of the Year award.
There’s a tradition with this award, which will now be accompanied by the John Havlicek Trophy, that has favored potent scorers coming in with a green light to let it fly. That’s an awfully simplistic way to assess a role that across the league varies by team, based on the roster and what the starters might need or not provide.
That’s where a player such as Portis makes his presence felt in more than one dimension.
A cluster of players was grouped in that 14-to-17 point scorers from which a lot of Sixth Men winners are drawn. That includes Brogdon, Powell, Pacers rookie Bennedict Mathurin, New York’s Immanuel Quickley and a few more. But Portis offers size and rebounding that those scorers don’t, backing up his 14.1 points nightly with 9.6 rebounds and a solid touch on corner 3s even as he spells Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brook Lopez. If he were to win this award, he would tie Detlef Schrempf for the second-highest average in the SMOY’s 40-year history (Dallas’ Roy Tarpley was the only double-double winner at 13.5 and 11.8 in 1987-88.)
Brogdon flawlessly slipped into a backup role in his first year with the Celtics after starting 210 of 210 games in four previous seasons. He ran the offense like a starter and shot with the accuracy of a star (44.4% from deep).
Powell was one of those classic SMOY guys, playing better in his 52 games off the bench (17.6 ppg, 41.1% from the arc) than in the eight he started for the Clippers (12.8, 29.8%).
Kia Most Improved Player
1. Lauri Markkanen, Utah Jazz
2. Jalen Brunson, New York Knicks
3. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Oklahoma City Thunder
As the focal point of Utah's offense, Lauri Markkanen became a force this season with his versatile game.
There was a whiff of disappointment about Markkanen after his first five NBA seasons, four in Chicago and one in Cleveland. He flashed his potential early but hit a ceiling soon thereafter. The 7-footer from Vantaa, Finland also had trouble staying healthy. That all changed this season, with Markkanen anchoring and becoming an All-Star with Utah. His scoring average leaped from 14.8 ppg to 25.6, fueled by his most accurate season yet (49.9% overall, 39.1% from the arc). All of that made him the top choice here to be the first recipient of the newly named George Mikan Most Improved Trophy.
Brunson improved from 16.3 ppg to 24.0, and he gets bonus points on this ballot because he did it while stepping into a highly pressurized situation: signing as a big-money free agent with the Knicks, accepting the responsibility for what turned out to be a much-improved team.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander went from a scoring star to an All-NBA caliber player, sparking Oklahoma City’s overdue push for legitimacy. SGA went from 24.5 ppg to 31.4 and from 20 games of 30+ points in 2021-22 to 45 this season, all while taking only 1.5 more shots per game.
Executive of the Year
1. Monte McNair, Sacramento Kings
2. Koby Altman, Cleveland Cavaliers
3. Sam Presti, Oklahoma City Thunder
Maybe this award should go to NBA commissioner Adam Silver, the executive who was able to peacefully negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement with the players that should keep the golden goose fat and happy until deep in this decade. But that’s not how this one works, so we went with McNair, Altman and Presti.
It’s worth repeating that media peeps don’t vote for this one – it’s a peer review, which probably lends some credibility to the honor. McNair, who joined Sacramento in 2020 after 13 years with Houston, made moves that earned the Kings the West’s No. 3 seed and their first playoff berth since 2006. Among them: trading for Domantas Sabonis (giving up Tyrese Haliburton to Indiana in a move that helped both teams), hiring Mike Brown, adding Kevin Huerter, and drafting Davion Mitchell and Keegan Murray.
Altman gets the consideration here that Minnesota’s Tim Connelly might have earned if only the Timberwolves’ gamble for Rudy Gobert had worked out as well as the hefty price paid for Donovan Mitchell did for the Cavaliers. It was a signature move that turned last season’s tinkering with a Play-In spot into homecourt advantage for the first round this year.
As for Presti, it’s nice to finally see his stockpile of draft picks taking flesh-and-blood form and being allowed to win some games. The foundation in OKC looks to be strong, even with No. 2 overall pick Chet Holmgren missing the entire season.
* * *
Steve Aschburner has written about the NBA since 1980. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on Twitter.
The views on this page do not necessarily reflect the views of the NBA, its clubs or Warner Bros. Discovery Sports.
