ROY Update

Up to 71 debuts this year now including Tyler Johnson (Heat), James McAdoo (Warriors), JaMychel Green (Spurs), Larry Drew (Sixers), Langston Galloway (Knicks) and Elijah Millsap (Jazz)

Julius Randle has slipped to 28th in Rookie MPG, let's look at the top 16: Wiggins (33.6), Noel (30.1), Galloway (29.6), Parker (29.5), Payton (27.7), McDaniels (26.1), LaVine (22.8), Bogdanovic (22.4), Smart (22.2), Napier (20.8), Papanikolau (20.0), Millsap (19.9), Exum (19.7), Drew (19.6), Ingles (19.6) and Hood (18.3)

Three eye-opening additions to the Rookie MPG list: Langston Galloway in only 10 games has already risen to 3rd in Rookie PPG and at a pretty good percentage, looks like a legit scorer for the Knicks;  Elijah Millsap in only 12 games for the Jazz is already getting more usage than Exum, Ingles and Hood...ouch!;  Larry Drew is getting minutes for the Sixers (well, it was either another rookie or go find an actual NBA player) but I'm not seeing anything in his numbers that indicate that he'll remain long on this list.

Wiggins, Noel and Payton are still firmly ensconced as the top three (remaining) ROY candidates with Jabari Parker still hanging in at 4th place in MPG.

McDaniels and LaVine are two slow starters that have cemented their rotations spots (McDaniels by being a high energy athlete on a very young roster; LaVine by getting the lion's share of injured Ricky Rubio's minutes).

Smart is rising again in MPG.  With Rondo and Green (and hell even Jameer Nelson and Nate Robinson) out of the way, Smart has plenty of minutes to himself.  I expect he'll get even more, as he's shown himself to be a surprisingly effective 3pt shooter and a pretty good assist/turnover ratio.

Bogdanovic, Papanickolau and Napier are firmly in their rotations as they have been pretty much since the beginning of the year.

I'm a little surprised that Mirotic (#18) and Hairston (#24) aren't higher, seems like those guys are always playing whenever I check out the Bulls and Hornets.

And Aaron Gordon is fully back from his injury, even getting starter minutes for the Magic, so I expect his MPG will be higher by year's end.

As of now your 2014-15 Rookie of the Year belongs to Andrew Wiggins (Wolves).  Barring injury (of course) the award is his to lose.  Noel and Payton are good solid players but Wiggins has really become a dynamic offensive player, a guy you wanna watch night after night.  I still think Jabari Parker may well be the most impressive player (and will probably get some votes despite playing only 25 games) but Wiggins is going to log the minutes and accumulate the stats to net him the award, it looks like.