NBA
At what place Jaime Jáquez Jr. came in the ‘Rookie of the Year’ vote?
The Miami Heat forward received ten votes for third place, which was not enough to beat the San Antonio Spurs’ Victor Wembanyama, who won it unanimously.
Víctor Wembanyama was unanimously chosen as the NBA’s ‘Rookie of the Year.’ It is the first time since the 2015-2016 season when Karl-Anthony Towns was the honoree, that the winner receives the distinction with 100% of the first-place votes. The news did not take anyone by surprise, as ‘Wemby’ came to mark a before-and-after in the NBA.
Five players shared the remaining votes for second and third place behind the French center of the San Antonio Spurs. These included Jaime Jáquez Jr., who scored a total of 10 points; The Mexican forward of the Miami Heat was the fourth most voted rookie, below ‘Wemby’ himself, Chet Holmgren (of Oklahoma City Thunder), and Brandon Miller (of the Charlotte Hornets). Brandin Podziemski of the Golden State Warriors closed the count with four points, and Derek Lively II of the Dallas Mavericks only obtained one.
The voting system for awarding end-of-season awards in the NBA consists of granting points to a third of candidates chosen by each member of the panel of specialists. Each one will rank the three players and give them five points if placed first, three if it is your second choice, and one if it is the third. Ten voters chose Jáquez Jr. as the third-best ‘Rookie of the Year.’ ‘Wemby’ took 99 first-place votes, which multiplied for a grand total of 495 points. Holmgren totaled 295 and almost all the second-place votes (98).
Jaime Jáquez Jr.’s stats in the season were the most comprehensive in terms of points for the Mexican basketball player: his scoring average was 11.9, in addition to 3.8 rebounds, 2.6 assists, 48.6% field effectiveness, 1 steal, 0.3 blocks, a positive plus/minus of 1.4, and 28.2 minutes on the floor. ‘Triple J’ played 75 games in the regular season, 20 of them as a starter. The vote, despite not really competing for the ‘ROY’, places him, yes, in the race to reach a place in the All-Rookie Team, the ideal quintet of rookies of the year, along with ‘Wemby’, Holmgren, Miller and Podziemski. It would be the first time a Mexican basketball player is part of an outstanding end-of-season team in the NBA.