Dallas Mavericks bold prediction: DSJ, Most Improved Player

The Dallas Mavericks rookie had a pretty good season last year, but he is expected to do even better this year. Could Dennis Smith Jr. compete for the Most Improved Player by the end of next season? I think he may be in the conversation.

Most of the people that are reading this are avid Dallas Mavericks fans. We know and have seen just how good Dennis Smith Jr. can be, not just at finishing above the rim, but in many different areas of the game. His shooting is good and getting better, his passing has improved and he is a great rebounding guard.

Dennis Smith has shown flashes of brilliance. At the start of the season, Coach Carlisle was unsure how to use DSJ, putting him in the starting lineup but pulling him during crunch time. Junior was not happy about this and neither were the fans. When Carlisle finally gave him a chance, Dennis did not disappoint, showing his ability to score clutch baskets and make big plays when needed.

Another thing to remember is that Dennis Smith, despite his abilities, was still a raw talent last year. He is really coming into his athleticism with matching basketball skills and this year is going to show that he never should have dropped to ninth in the 2017 NBA Draft.

As far as numbers go, DSJ averaged 15.2 points, 5.2 assists, 3.8 rebounds, and 1 steal per game in his rookie season. Those numbers are pretty good but it is not hard to see that they could get substantially better this year. Despite the addition of Luka Doncic, I believe that we will see DSJ on the ball just as much, if not more this year.

Victory Oladipo won the Most Improved Player award in the NBA last season. Before that, Giannis Antetokounmpo, CJ McCollum, Jimmy Butler, Goran Dragic, Paul George, Ryan Anderson, and Kevin Love were the winners in order all the way down to 2010-11. Each of these guys obviously have gone on to great careers since then, but in the years that they won the award, they made a sizable jump.

That jump on average (aside from CJ McCollum) was between 6-7 points improvement from the previous season. Almost every one of them also started averaging over 20 points per game in that group as well. If DSJ jumped from his current rate to a potential 20-22 points per game, the case for him as the most improved player will be at least on the table.

The thing that will slow down this possibility more than anything is the added talent to the team. Luka, Barnes and DeAndre Jordan will all take some touches away from DSJ, but they will also take some focus away from him. I believe that Dennis will be better this year in both sheer numbers as well as shooting percentages.

Keep an eye out for DSJ at the end of the season. It will take a big step up obviously for Junior to be considered for the MIP award, but he is more than capable of making that step as we will all see soon. I predict that he will at least be one of the finalists for the award after next year.