Dennis Schröder robbed of Sixth Man of the Year Award

Some could consider this piece of news somewhat controversial: Los Angeles Clippers’ Montrezl Harrell was announced the recipient of the NBA’s the Sixth Man of the Year Award over Thunder guard Dennis Schröder.

This news is surprising, to say the least, as many have seen Schröder be more deserving of this award.

It seems that small-market teams, again, got the short end of the stick on this one.

Plain and simple: Dennis Schröder was robbed.

Schröder had better traditional and advanced stats than Harrell, he was more important to his team’s success than Harrell, and he had significantly better on-off numbers than Harrell.

Harrell’s only thing on Schröder is rebounding, which should be the case considering the size difference, and maybe defense. But even then, you can make a case that Schröder has been better on defense.

Schröder was the third guard in the infamous “Three Guard Lineup” with the league’s best net rating. Dennis’ scoring efficiency skyrocketed this season, averaging 18.9 ppg on 57.5% TS.

This is a regular-season award, but Schroder showed just how valuable he is to this team in the playoffs as he had the highest On-Off Net Rating on the team at 31.3, Which means that the Thunder were 31.3 points better than the Rockets per 100 possessions when he was on the court. This number is even more impressive when Schröder played the third-most minute this series on the Thunder, racking up 227 minutes on the court.

For comparison, Harrell had the worst on-fff net rating on the Clippers in their series against the Mavericks, being outscored by 29.7 points per 100 possession. This number is even worse when because Harrell was only eighth on the team in total minutes played against Dallas at 129. Even with Harrell’s short series, the Clippers were able to win their series in six games.

The wrong guy won this award, and it’s a shame that Schröder will not get the accolade for his impressive season off the bench.