2025-26 NBA Awards, Pt. 1: Coach of the Year, Rookie of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year, and Most Improved

An announcement! Plus, a surprising Coach of the Year, the tough ROY debate, and far easier DPOY and MIP selections

You can fit the season’s remaining games in a half-filled egg carton, so it’s time to start handing out some hardware. I’m still making up my mind on a few races (and ill-timed injuries continue to throw a wrench in things — get well soon, Luka!), so keep an eye out for the rest of the awards next week. Several of my nominees haven’t technically qualified yet, but if they’re listed below, I’m assuming that they will.

First, an announcement: I’m officially a co-host of a RealGM Radio podcast! Every Thursday, I’m partnering with Wes Goldberg for Good Take, where we talk about the previous night’s games, debate a few things we think aren’t getting enough mainstream attention, and, of course, present our rock-solid, never-wrong NBA takes. You can even vote on YouTube for whose opinion is best! The winner, uh, gets more work and has to do another take the next time. I want that.

I’d consider it a personal favor if you check it out on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, RealGM’s new YouTube channel, or anywhere else. If you can get past the first minute, where I blank on the phrase “fait accompli” and my brain stops working, I think you’ll have a good time. Keep an eye out for more every Thursday.

RealGM also has a killer new lineup of pods. Wes has his classic RealGM Radio show on Tuesday with rotating guests, and Jared Dubin and Mo Dakhil (who you may know from their Double Dribble podcast or Dakhil’s frequent appearances on the Zach Lowe Show) are now every Monday and Wednesday. Subscribe to RealGM Radio to stay up to date. Thanks!

Alright, back to the written word. For now, let’s start with an award that definitely won’t make people mad.

Coach of the Year

1. Mitch Johnson, San Antonio Spurs

2. Joe Mazzula, Boston Celtics

3. JB Bickerstaff, Detroit Pistons

Generally, Coach of the Year goes to someone helming a team that either overperformed their perceived talent or landed at the top of the standings. It’s easy to pick this award when a single coach fulfills both criteria. It’s hard when three jefes do it!

Here’s the thing. COY is the award where expectations matter most. And expectations are a personal matter.

I was rather high on Boston’s playoff chances coming into this season, despite their summer talent exodus. I was too low on San Antonio, who I thought would be a middling play-in team.

Both squads will finish near the top of the standings, and the Spurs have an outside shot at the league's best record.

To be clear, Mazzulla has a very convincing COY argument! He’s led the Celtics to the two-seed despite an overhauled rotation and the absence of Jayson Tatum for most of the year. A coach famously confident in his basketball beliefs significantly altered his approach, leaning heavily into the midrange game and offensive rebounding to supplement an offense missing two of its three best passers (Tatum and the traded Jrue Holiday). They rarely foul (sixth in opposing free-throw rate) and have the second-lowest turnover rate in the league.

They are, to put it simply, extremely well-coached. I looked back at my previous years’ winners, and Mazzulla has a stronger case than many of them, if not all.

But Mitch Johnson still gets it for me.

Yes, he’s had Wemby for more of the season than Mazzulla has had Tatum (though it’s worth noting that the Spurs went 11-5 without their alien). But that’s an overly simplistic way to think about things. This Spurs roster is talented but wildly unconventional. It’s like someone hit a random number generator on every attribute from height to ballhandling to shooting 15 times.

The team’s three ballhandlers (Stephon Castle, De’Aaron Fox, and Dylan Harper) can’t hit a barn door with a shotgun, but make hay at the rim. The team’s forwards (Julian Champagnie, Harrison Barnes, and Keldon Johnson) are three of the team’s four best shooters, and Wembanyama is next in line. Their offense relies heavily upon their maximum-contract point guard setting off-ball screens and spacing the floor for a rookie and a second-year player. Their #2 overall pick happily comes off the bench.

Johnson has created an offense that’s top five in shots coming on off-ball screens and top five in transition despite his best player being a center averaging 3.0 assists per game. His defensive game plan is unique, befitting its star. No team in the league is as adept at communication and pre-switching to ensure their big man stays near the rim; it’s almost impossible to move Wembanyama out of the paint if he doesn’t want to be moved.

The Spurs’ defense is so good that they can even help off of the league’s best shooters without issue. Watch as Wemby blocks this shot at the rim; the real magic is in how quickly Devin Vassell (having a nice defensive season!) recognizes his rotation and sprints to Hauser in the corner. Vassell’s hustle didn’t even come close to mattering, but that’s the point:

Johnson has found the right mix of rolling and popping for Wembanyama and has generated space for his bevy of ballhandlers to sashay to the rim. The Spurs, miraculously, are fourth in halfcourt offense this year (better even than the Celtics!), which I simply could not have fathomed in the preseason. I looked at all these poor-shooting guards and limited forwards and foresaw an offensive disaster. Johnson saw a canvas.

There’s actually a heated battle for third place, too, but Bickerstaff deserves it. The Pistons have run away with the Eastern Conference virtually from the jump, haven’t missed a beat without Cade Cunningham (as I predicted), and have unleashed some of the most terrifying perimeter defenders I’ve seen since, well, last year’s Thunder. (But since a long time before that!)

Bickerstaff has fostered tremendous growth, both offensively and defensively, in his two best players, Cunningham and Jalen Duren (more on him below!). He’s even cobbled together a brutally efficient offense that relies upon Cunningham’s brilliance, free throws, and offensive rebounding. Most importantly, the team keeps winning, no matter what happens.

Veering back, Johnson won’t win the award in real life, and that’s fine. Nearly every media person with a vote I’ve seen or heard has already Sharpied in Mazzulla for the honors (although Bickerstaff is somehow the betting favorite, so maybe I’m reading/listening to the wrong guys). Mazzulla is phenomenal and, like I said at the top, more than deserving (even if he’s made it very clear he doesn’t want the award). Johnson also still needs to show what he’s made of in the playoffs, although I’m pretty confident he’ll be great.

Before we move on, I have a few honorable mentions. Jordan Ott’s ability to keep the Suns at the top of the play-in mix despite injuries and offseason departures has been inspiring, and I wish I could reward him further. Charles Lee has the sad-sack Hornets playing the league’s most exciting basketball. All Mark Daigneault did was lead the Thunder to the Association’s best record while missing his second-best player for most of the season. None of those guys quite crack the ballot for me, although I respect anyone who puts them on theirs.

Defensive Player of the Year

1. Victor Wembanyama, San Antonio Spurs

2. Chet Holmgren, Oklahoma City Thunder

3. Rudy Gobert, Minnesota Timberwolves

I talked about all these guys at length in my All-Defensive Teams, so check that out for meatier analysis.

There is absolutely no controversy at the top of this list. Victor Wembanyama will be the Defensive Player of the Year if he qualifies; the only drama remaining is seeing if he can do so as a unanimous choice.

The real question is who deserves to be second and third. Chet Holmgren and Rudy Gobert have very similar cases. Both are top-10 in the five all-in ones I looked at (EPM, LEBRON, DPM, Net Points, and XRAPM), and both are elite rim protectors.

While Gobert has decent defensive support, maximum-security jailers back up Holmgren. Gobert has the slightly worse on-only team defensive rating and much starker on/off splits to support that.

But Holmgren is denying everything at the rim — he’s the only qualifying player (yes, including Wemby) allowing less than 50% shooting at the rim. And while Gobert is a one-man army in the middle, Holmgren is nearly as good there while also dominating defensively as a power forward; I value that versatility.

It greatly pains me to leave off Ausar Thompson and Derrick White. Unfortunately, all else being equal, elite defensive bigs are more valuable than their counterparts on the perimeter (although White does have some major rim-protection chops). That shows up in the numbers and on tape.

But still, look at this effort from White. He throws the alley-oop, touches the opposing baseline, then flies back with supersonic speed to contest a Pelle Larsson finger-roll. Nobody else on Boston bothered to try; it was a 20-point game with 1.5 seconds left in the half. But White never lets up:

He’ll have to settle for a likely All-Defensive First Team nod.

Most Improved Player

1. Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Atlanta Hawks

2. Jalen Duren, Detroit Pistons

3. Ryan Rollins, Milwaukee Bucks

Thankfully, this season, I don’t need to go on my typical spiel about how high-profile second- and third-year players don’t deserve MIP. (I have no doubt I’ll be dusting that one off next season, when at least one of this year’s fabled rookie class will explode).

I can’t say enough about how fun Alexander-Walker’s evolution has been. A roller-coaster career seemed like it had stabilized at reasonably rarified air in Minnesota as a rock-solid 3-and-D-and-a-little-more wing. This season, he’s more than doubled his previous career scoring average of 8.5 points per game by dropping 20.6 points per night. He’s doing that on excellent 60.5% true shooting, too — the second highest of his career.

Alexander-Walker is bombing from deep (39.4% on eight attempts per game) and attacking the basket with a wide array of wiggly, jiggly moves:

That flair has carried over to his passing. Watch this Harden-esque self-nutmeg:

Basketball is more fun to watch when the players are having fun. Alexander-Walker is enjoying the time of his life.

NAW’s ascendance (he’s still very strong defensively, too) partially allowed the Hawks to change course midseason, and they’ve flourished with a Jalen Johnson- and NAW-centric attack. He’s the second-best player on a likely playoff team.

Like Alexander-Walker, Jalen Duren is scoring a whole lot more and in more complicated ways. His efficiency is technically down, but his 68.3% true shooting still leads the league, which is even more impressive when you consider that dunks dropped from 44% to 25% of his shot diet!

Still, Duren has always had plentiful offensive talent (which is shining like a lighthouse in Cunningham’s absence, by the way). His improvement on the other end is more surprising. He won’t be making my All-Defensive teams anytime soon, but he went from an abysmal defender to a solid one under Bickerstaff’s tutelage. (Advanced metrics actually love his defense, generally putting him in the 80th percentile or higher, but I think that’s giving him too much credit for Detroit’s success on that side.)

Finally, Ryan Rollins has been one of the few visible constellations during Milwaukee’s dark and stormy nights. He more than tripled his previous career scoring average. 17.1 points per game on exactly league-average true shooting (58.1%) and excellent long-range marksmanship (plus his typical solid defense) make a compelling case that Rollins isn’t just a fringe NBA player but a starter-quality one. That’s a monstrous stride from a guy who was clinging to his professional life a year ago.

Rookie of the Year

1. Kon Knueppel, Charlotte Hornets

2. Cooper Flagg, Dallas Mavericks

3. VJ Edgecombe, Philadelphia 76ers

This was tough. Knueppel is a better defender and Flagg a (slightly) worse one than expected, but the Mav is still significantly stronger on that end. He’s a more creative passer, too, although you can make a strong argument that Knueppel is a stouter positional rebounder.

Flagg also has survived an ecosystem that set him up for failure. He had to play point guard out of the gates because Nico Harrison forgot to sign one in the offseason. He had to deal with the relentless media hoopla surrounding Anthony Davis and the Luka Doncic trade (which eventually led to Harrison’s firing). He still has to elbow his way through defensive crowds because the roster has no spacing outside of a wind-eroded statue of Klay Thompson and Max Christie. He’s on a team that stopped trying to win games months ago.

While carrying all that, Flagg had to live up to the insane hype that’s followed him for years. He has!

But it hasn’t quite been good enough to surpass his former teammate.

Knueppel’s greatest strength is obviously the shooting, as we talked about in the All-Rookie Team selections. But it’s worth pointing out that while Flagg’s efficiency (understandably!) struggled under an immense burden, Knueppel was just as good to start the year, when the Hornets were injured and horrible, as he has been now.

Knueppel’s per-75 stats when the Hornets started 4-14? 20.3 points, 6.1 rebounds, 3.0 assists on 65.4% true shooting. Since then, when the Hornets are 37-22? 22.0 points, 6.2 rebounds, 4.2 assists on 63.9% true shooting. Knueppel has been playing winning basketball all season; it just took the rest of the team a while to catch up.

Should that matter? It seldom has before, but that’s partially because, as Henry Abbott wrote this morning, rookies almost never play winning basketball for good teams. I struggle with whether I’m moving the goalposts on this one, but there are few historical precedents for a rookie this good playing such a big role on even reasonably successful teams. That ought to matter. Right?

Knueppel has also played 230 more minutes than Flagg, if you care.

Flagg, partially by dint of his size, is a more well-rounded player than Knueppel. His bountiful athletic gifts give him a higher ceiling. I’d begrudge nobody who wanted to give the award to him, and I feel bad that I can only pick one player. But the most important part of winning basketball is efficient scoring, and Knueppel has been better at that than all but the biggest names in the league (without significant drop-offs in other areas). The fact that he’s been either the best or second-best player on one of the Association’s hottest teams seals the deal.

Edgecombe barely holds off a surging Dylan Harper for the third spot. Both rookies play large two-way roles on successful teams (a wildly successful one, in San Antonio’s case). Advanced stats are generally pretty positive on each, too.

Fair or not, Edgecombe has had a bigger opportunity in Philly. While Harper is better at getting to the rack, Edgecombe’s relatively reliable three-point shooting makes him an easier fit in any lineup. And because he can be on the court next to anyone, Edgecombe has also been an absolute demon in crunch time. Almost nobody in the league, rookie or not, has as many highlights in the last few seconds of the game.

I talked about Edgecombe’s clutch threes already, but here’s another example. Against Golden State, down one with just eight seconds left, Edgecombe gets a steal on an inbounds play. Then, on the ensuing possession, he gets a tough go-ahead tip-in that’s followed by an insane Tyrese Maxey game-saving block. You should watch the whole sequence (skip to the 14:25 mark for the good stuff):