NBA names Coach, Sixth Man of the Year Award Winners

All things NBA come to a head in the spring, with playoff basketball coming as award season begins as well. This week, the league handed out the first two of its major trophies.

Lou Williams of the Toronto Raptors was designated Sixth Man of the Year after a renaissance season, during which he averaged 15.5 points, the most of his career, and was often the No. 1 offensive option in crunch time for the four-seeded dinosaurs.

The heartening part of Williams’ victory is that it means he’s made more than a full recovery from a torn ACL suffered in January 2013. Lou struggled to find a larger role with the Atlanta Hawks after that malady, but has a found a new home in Canada.

Williams garnered 78 out of 130 first-place votes, edging Isaiah Thomas of the Boston Celtics and Jamal Crawford of the Los Angeles Clippers—last year’s winner of the award.

The mystery of why this honor has been typecast goes, on though: It almost always goes to a score-first guard:

Taj Gibson of the Chicago Bulls was arguably a more deserving winner last season, and the Cleveland Cavaliers’ rebounding hound Tristan Thompson somehow couldn’t crack the top three in 2015. Big men remain largely cursed in this category.

This morning, the league continued its prize-giving by naming the Hawks’ Mike Budenholzer the Coach of the Year recipient. The race had clearly been between him and the Golden State Warriors’ Steve Kerr for months, with Budenholzer edging him out with 67 first-place ballots.

Coach Bud’s Hawks were the best team in the Eastern Conference all season, and their sudden turnaround seemed to have a lot to do with his wisdom and discipline. Their 20-game winning streak in the winter was a blaze of glory that’s not soon to be forgotten, and their leader on the bench is getting his due props for it.

— John Wilmes
@johnwilmesNBA