Anthony Edwards is tracking to be one of the next faces of the NBA, if he’s not already there. We just voted him No. 10 on our annual CBS Sports Top 100 NBA players list, and it’s only going to be up from there if he continues the path of he’s on.
Edwards exploded with career highs across the board last season. He earned his first All-NBA selection and finish seventh in MVP voting before leading the Timberwolves to the Western Conference finals — taking out Kevin Durant’s Suns and Nikola Jokic’s Nuggets along the way.
And as great as he was in the regular season, he got better in the playoffs, which is no small feat against the best competition in the world. He went from 25.9 PPG to 27.6 and 5.1 assists to 6.5. Meanwhile, his shooting clips went from 46% overall and 35.7% from 3 to 48% and 40%, respectively. His defense can, and does, qualify as equally dominant when he puts his foot down.
It makes you wonder what Edwards can improve upon this season and in seasons to come with already such a high standard set. For that, he was paying close attention to his legendary Team USA teammates during their run to Olympic gold in Paris.
At Timberwolves media day on Monday, Edwards talked about the Team USA practices being the most impactful part of the Olympic process, as he was able to see the way some of the greatest players ever handle their business.
He marveled at the way Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry “don’t miss” in workouts. He kept a particularly keen eye on LeBron James’ pregame routine in terms of how he prepares to play at the highest level at damn near 40 years old.
But mostly, he was watching Curry move without the ball, and in that one takeaway Edwards believes he can find easier scoring opportunities that will take his production to another level as his NBA career hits full stride.
“I think the best part about the whole [Olympic experience] was the practices,” Edwards said. “I think the best thing that I learned was from Steph. I took Bron’s pregame routine, but Steph just playing without the ball. So like, the last few days [with the Timberwolves] we’ve been playing five on five, I just be cutting, getting out of the way, and I get easy shots. So I think I learned the most from Steph.”
This certainly isn’t the first time another player has pointed out the power of Curry’s off-ball movement — which, for all his theatrical skill displays on the court, has probably become his deadliest weapon. Almost every great scorer in the league does the bulk of his work with the ball in his hands, which Curry can do as well, but it’s a while different challenge to defend a player who never stops moving.
Defenders naturally let their guard down when their man gives up the ball, and it’s in these split seconds that Curry bursts to open space, be it with a cut to the basket or a relocation behind the 3-point line. It’s nearly impossible to cover for an entire possession, let alone an entire game. It’s a superpower, and it’s shocking that more players haven’t adopted this off-ball aggression.
Trae Young, notably, needs to add this to his bag. It’s difficult, because great scorers are control freaks. They don’t trust anyone else with the ball as much as they trust themselves, and there is an element of knowing if you move you are going to get the ball back later in the possession in a premium position to score that encourages you to give it up in the first place.
Curry has built that sort of trust and anticipatory chemistry with the Warriors over the years. They’re all on the same wavelength. It’s fantastic that Edwards has recognized the power of moving without the ball rather than passing and standing still until you get it back, and if he consistently implements it he will become even more difficult to defend.
But it takes a commitment. The conditioning aspect cannot be overstated. These top players expend so much energy creating offense that on the rare occasion that the ball isn’t in their hands, their instinct is to take a breather, both physically and mentally. Curry goes the other way. When he gives up the ball, he hits the turbo button.
Imagine a player with the speed and athleticism of Edwards doing that, and now imagine his teammates seeing it enough that they start to develop a chemistry to anticipate cuts and passes one beat ahead of momentarily disoriented defenses. That’s where the easy buckets Edwards is talking about show up, and the more success he has with it, the more he’ll commit to doing it consistently. That’s when things could get really scary for Timberwolves opponents.
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