Cade Cunningham’s final Rookie of the Year resume and odds

Cade Cunningham had an outstanding rookie season for the Detroit Pistons, but it may not have been enough to secure the Rookie of the Year.

The 2021-22 NBA rookie class has been one for the ages, as it has at least six guys who look like they are going to be stars in the league and any one of them has an argument for Rookie of the Year.

But the three frontrunners are Cade Cunningham, Evan Mobley and Scottie Barnes, so I am going to focus on them even though Jalen Green, Josh Giddey and Franz Wagner all had very good rookie seasons as well.

Cade Cunningham finished with 64 games played, while Mobley played 69 and Barnes played 74, which doesn’t help Cade’s RoY campaign. Detroit was forced to sit Cade several times in the home stretch to ensure their tank, which may have ultimately cost him a real shot at the award.

Cunningham averaged 17.4 points, 5.6 assists and 5.5 rebounds for the Pistons, who finished with just 23 wins. Cade is one of just 10 rookies in the history of the NBA to average at least 17 points, five rebounds and five assists.

Mobley averaged 15 points, 8.3 rebounds and 2.5 assists for the Cavs, who won 44 games and ended up as the 8th seed in the Eastern Conference play-in tournament.

Barnes went for 15.3 points, 7.5 rebounds and 3.5 assists for the Raptors, who won 48 games and made the playoffs as the 5th seed in the Eastern Conference.

Cunningham had the higher usage and far more responsibility on a bad team, while both Mobley and Barnes were more complementary (but very important) parts of teams headed to the postseason.

If you factor in team success (it shouldn’t matter too much) then Cade doesn’t have a chance, but if you are just looking at individual stats and the eye test, Cunningham was the best rookie this season in my very biased opinion.

The biggest arguments for Mobley and Barnes over Cade is that their defense was better and their teams had more success.

First off, I don’t accept that Cade is the worst defender of these three, as he was very good defensively, coming in second in steals among rookies and often taking on the tough assignments on the perimeter.

And if we are going by team success then this award has no point, as almost all of the top rookies join bad teams, but in the case of Mobley and Barnes, they joined bad teams that also had multiple All-Stars on them, while Cade joined a team full of second-year players and veteran cast-offs.

I think Cade Cunningham showed and did the most with the least and is the best player of the three but his lower number of games played and lack of team success will probably doom him to runner up (at best) in the Rookie of the Year chase.

Cade Cunningham’s final Rookie of the Year odds

According to WynnBET, Cade Cunningham actually has the worst odds of the three frontrunners for Rookie of the Year.

Evan Mobley is set at -250 and is the clear favorite, while Scottie Barnes is +175 and Cade is +1000 to win RoY.

This seems ridiculous to me, as team success has never been a factor in the Rookie of the Year award in the past and there is no way Mobley should be running away with the award.

According to Hashtag Basketball, which uses an algorithm to rank rookies based on a number of factors, Cade Cunningham was the runway winner when you factor in all of the traditional stats.

In the end, it doesn’t really matter, as all three are likely to have brilliant careers and in five years we won’t remember who won. If I had to bet, I’d say Cade will be the best of the three, so hopefully if he doesn’t win he will carry a huge chip on his shoulder into the offseason and come back ready to prove how wrong the voters were.