The Warriors' campaign paid off, with Andrew Wiggins receiving 933,355 votes in the first phase of the 2022 All-Star fan vote, ranking 4th among Western Conference frontcourt players, with a chance to overtake Clippers star Paul George into the top 3.
For the first time in his career, Wiggins saw hope of becoming an All-Star and even starting. You know, before joining the Warriors, the Wiggins fans in the Timberwolves era voted around 100,000-200,000 votes for a long time, and not many fans voted for him. But this season, Wiggins is expected to enter the All-Star with improved personal performance, the Warriors' excellent record and the team's super popularity.
Of course, the All-Star start is decided by the votes of fans, players, and the media, and the All-Star bench is decided by the coaches, and whether Wiggins will travel to Cleveland to participate in the All-Star this year is still difficult to predict. But through today's confrontation between Wiggins and Ingram, who is an All-Star in 2020, we can at least see what exactly Wiggins is from being an All-Star.
Judging from the all-star voting and coach selection over the years, those attackers with super personal ability are more favored, after all, this type of player is often the core of the team, and the playing style is more gorgeous, suitable for the all-star show. But Wiggins is not this type of player this season, and in the Warriors, he has been transformed into the number two or even number three and four possession points that are close to the 3D attribute.
The Warriors fought against the Pelicans, Stephen Curry and Draymond Green were sidelined due to injury, and Wiggins failed to carry the Warriors. The two cores that underpin the Warriors' offensive system are not there, and Wiggins can't hold up the team's offense. Throughout the game, Wiggins shot 7-of-17, including 1-of-6 from three-point range and 6-of-7 free throws from the free throw line for 21 points, 4 rebounds and 1 assist. After the increase in ball power and single-player combat scenes, Wiggins's efficiency declined.
In this year's All-Star Game quota battle, there will definitely be a competition between Wiggins and Ingram in the same position. Judging from the overall performance of the two this season, Ingram is above Wiggins, and what he lacks is the record. In today's head-to-head game, Ingram finished with 32 points, 11 rebounds and 6 assists on 12-of-20 shooting. In terms of the ability to hold the ball offensively and lead the team, Ingram is above Wiggins.
For years, industry insiders have believed that with Wiggins' talent, he should have been the cornerstone of the team and the top attacker. But in fact, with Wiggins's not very good weak side hand-held ball breakthrough ability, low-level ball holding ability and organizational tandem ability, in this era he is not suitable to play the core of the ball-holding attack.
There is data to prove it:
This season, Wiggins has scored just 0.802 points per game with the ball, shooting just 38.5 percent. Wiggins scored just 0.9 points per round on a singles shooter and shot 38.7 percent from the field. In addition, Wiggins scored only 0.633 points per game on his back-to-back singles, shooting just 25 percent from the field. His back-to-back singles efficiency is the bottom of the league, and the face-to-basket singles and blocking are only mid-to-low levels. In other words, Wiggins can occasionally score points by holding the ball, but this is not his strong point and is inefficient.
With a seven-point gap in the fourth quarter, Wiggins conceded four consecutive offensive attempts, including two turnovers, while Ingram scored key goals and the Warriors trailed by 10 points. After Wiggins was replaced, the Warriors instead scored 7 consecutive points under the leadership of Poole to narrow the point difference to 3 points, seeing the hope of a reversal.
Defensively, Wiggins has indeed made great strides since joining the Warriors, Klay Thompson is not there, and Wiggins is already the number one gate on the team's flanks. But Wiggins, who is 2.01 meters tall and has an arm span of 2.11 meters, has a clear flaw that he does not defend well against forward players who are similar in stature to himself, and his strength lies in defending against opposing defenders. Like before, Wiggins defended Paul George against 13 of 22 shots in two games, and today he was repeatedly forced to defend Ingram.
The data shows that Wiggins' defensive forward players have a shooting rate of 47.1% of opponents, and it is counted that most seasons his defensive front is not as effective as his defensive defenders.
Of course, these can only be said to be obstacles that restrict Wiggins to go to the next level and fight for an All-Star spot, and he cannot be denied his overall performance this season because of his problems. After all, the Warriors don't want a ball-holding attack core, they want to accept the transformation of the coaching staff, willing to play more without the ball, participate in the defense of Wiggins.
This season, Wiggins' transformation is near-perfect. Wiggins' three-point shooting rate exceeded 40 percent, and his true shooting percentage of nearly 60 percent was also a career high. Suddenly, Wiggins took off the label of "inefficient."
Defensively, even though Wiggins struggled to defend the top forwards, his overall defensive stats were still impressive. The data shows that Wiggins interfered with 358 shots from opponents, the warriors had the most in the team. When he interfered with his opponent's shots, his shooting percentage was only 39.4 percent, ranking seventh among the 87 players who interfered with at least 300 shots.
"As an individual, he's not the kind of player who has dominance. But as a team puzzle, he's the kind of jigsaw puzzle that has dominance," warrior assistant coach Fraser said.
Warriors coach Steve Kerr also said: "This version of Wiggins is a perfect fit for our team. ”
Simply put, Wiggins is "the all-star of the role players", and he has done the tasks that the Warriors have given him almost impeccable, and the team trident and the manager are extremely satisfied with him. Wiggins' recognition by the team and fans also shows that not only those who are the stars of the team are eligible to be selected as All-Stars, but also those who can help the team win.
If Wiggins can develop better ball-holding offensive ability and further improve his defense, he may become an All-Star regular in the future. But even without these abilities, Wiggins' role as the ultimate assistant around Curry is not without a chance to enter the All-Star. Mike Conley in 2021, Siakam, Adebayo and Wiggins teammates in 2020, and Klay Thompson, who was named an All-Star five times, are his role models.