Duke's Cameron Boozer Has Easy Edge in Rookie of the Year Voting

The Rookie of the Year award in the NBA is going to be one of the most discussed in all of basketball next season. 

While there are many impressive rookies, there are reasons to believe that a guy like Duke star Cameron Boozer is in as good of a position as any other rookie that we've seen in quite some time. 

Boozer will play for a Memphis Grizzlies team that's actually better than I think people are giving them credit for. However, there's no guarantee that he's going to be a perfect player in the NBA as we saw in college. 

At the end of the day, guys are very talented, but ultimately, they also have to recognize that playing in the NBA is a lot different than dominating college basketball.

Still, many seem to believe that Boozer is the most obvious choice to win the Rookie of the Year award at the moment, and I think that's tough to disagree with.

“The names on this list won't surprise you, but what's interesting is just how tight the predictive voting came out, with Boozer, Peterson and Dybantsa falling within an extremely narrow seven-point band in the first three slots.

“These players all landed in situations that should be beneficial from an early usage and minutes standpoint, but it's Boozer who should have the biggest role of the three, with Memphis likely to orient its operation around him for the foreseeable future as it needs an offensive player who can shoulder a scoring load and connect teammates. On paper, he looks like the slight favorite,” ESPN wrote.

Boozer is a likely starter out of the bunch, though there's also reason to believe that guys like A.J. Dybantsa and Darren Peterson will have a chance to start early on as well, if not start from Day 1. They're both extremely talented players, but have some better players around them than the Grizzlies will have with Boozer.

Not that all of that matters regarding who is going to win the Rookie of the Year award, as one of those guys could be a contributing piece to a squad that makes the playoffs, but Boozer finds himself in a good position to put up the counting stats that he needs to.