Andrew Wiggins Finally Stepping Up for Warriors

Has Andrew Wiggins finally found a spot where he can be a valuable member of a championship-caliber team? 

It sure seems like it through the start of the 2021-22 NBA season. 

Wiggins is having an extremely efficient season for the Golden State Warriors, who are 20-4 on the season, and he continued it with a career game on Monday in a win over the Orlando Magic. 

The Warriors are inching closer to the Brooklyn Nets for the top spot in WynnBET’s NBA Championship odds, as they are +400 to Brooklyn’s +325, and it’s hard to overlook Wiggins’ impact on that. 

This season, the former No. 1 overall pick is shooting 48.8 percent from the field and 41.6 percent from 3 (both would be career-highs) and averaging 18.7 points per game. He’s the team’s second-leading scorer, and has essentially become a better version of Harrison Barnes on the old Warriors teams that made the NBA Finals before Kevin Durant came to Golden State. 

With Klay Thompson nearing a return, the Warriors will need Wiggins to continue to be efficient in his opportunities, as his shots per game may take a dip. However, the swingman has also become a valuable defender for Golden State, posting his best defensive rating per 100 possessions (104) of his career. Wiggins has never been below a 111 defensive rating per 100 possessions prior to this season. 

When talking about value, I like to look at how a team is when the player is on the floor versus off the floor during the season. Obviously, the Warriors are heavily reliant on Steph Curry, the team is plus-16.1 with Curry on the floor per 100 possessions this season, but Wiggins isn’t far behind at plus-11.3. 

It is just the third time in his career that he has been positive in this metric, going plus-0.1 last season and plus-3.5 in the 2017-18 season. 

After a few down seasons, the Warriors look to be back and better than ever, and Wiggins’ emergence as a truly valuable player has been a major reason why.