Like switching from fluorescent tubes to an LED ring light, winning a championship puts everything in gentler relief. Flaws tend to be waved away (“Well, they won last year, didn’t they?”) and strengths more notably appreciated. The warm glow gives everyone involved a boost.
One player whose game should gain more notoriety is Payton Pritchard. After watching him evolve last season, I’m more convinced than ever that he has a chance to win Sixth Man of the Year this season.
Let’s get the caveat out of the way first. No, Pritchard might not even be the Celtics’ sixth man. But that’s the sort of paradox we live for — after all, Jaylen Brown is the best player in the world but only the second-best player in Boston!
Nothing in the rulebook says that 6MOY actually has to go to a sixth man. To qualify, a player must simply come off the bench in more games than he starts. So, for the purposes of this award, it doesn’t matter whether Pritchard edges out Sam Hauser or Al Horford in average minutes (although Al seems likely to be disqualified for starting too many games in Porzingis’ absence, anyway).
Payton does fit the profile better than Hauser or Horford, too. Like your college roommate’s obsession with tattooed blondes, media voters have a type. According to research I did last year, 17 of the previous 20 winners have gone to bucket-getting guards.
Luckily for Pritchard, there’s been a slight shift in how much scoring needs to be done. The previous two winners, Boston’s own Malcolm Brogdon in 2022-23 and Timberwolf Naz Reid last season, averaged fewer than 15 points per game and still won the award despite competition that scored more. Voters are increasingly willing to look at impact instead of just points per game.
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Even the rosiest Pritchard forecasts don’t call for him to make it rain that hard, so he won’t win an outright points contest. But after a poor Finals performance (the end-of-quarter heaves whitewashed struggles with his shot and defense), he’s talking about improving all the right things: his defense (which will keep him on the court) and his three-ball off the dribble, where he only shot 30.6% last season.
Expect a motivated Pritchard to come back new and improved on both sides. Plus, circumstances should afford him more opportunity. He averaged a career-high 22.3 minutes per game last year, and there will be room for him to earn more run.
Jrue Holiday is no spring chicken, and Boston may elect to rest him more during the regular season — his 2,263 minutes played last season were his most in five years. With nothing in the regular season to prove, the Jays may take more rest days, too. And Porzingis’ absence creates a 20-points-per-game vacuum in the lineup. Without his shooting, Boston seems likely to run far fewer two-big lineups this season, opening the door for more small ball.
The 26-year-old Pritchard is a likely candidate for an increased minutes load, at least until Porzingis comes back. And he doesn’t need much time to fill it up — he has scored 35 points in 40 preseason minutes so far, looking for his shot aggressively. A couple of extra attempts sent his way will goose his numbers.
We have a starting place if Pritchard hovers around 26 minutes per night and can eke his scoring up to 13-ish points. Pritchard’s solid assist numbers and surprising rebounding, particularly on the offense end, should fill up box scores to whatever minimum threshold voters require for consideration.
From there, Pritchard’s advanced metrics should shine. His Estimated Plus/Minus (the most well-regarded publicly available all-in-one stat) was higher than last year’s top four vote-getters, including Reid. It’s no coincidence that the Celtics’ reserves, by and large, had better on/off numbers than most of the starters. Aided by Mazzulla’s numbers-driven offensive engine and Pritchard’s playmaking, the second unit smeared foes like so many windshield flies.
That opens up a narrative for national audiences. Look at Payton Pritchard, the super-sub who comes in and makes the NBA’s best team even better! If he can continue his penchant for buzzer-beaters, Pritchard will have the highlights to keep him top-of-mind, too.
Competition will be stiff, even within his own team. One could argue that both Horford (again, likely not to qualify) and Hauser are as important or more to the team’s success. Defending champ Reid will have even more opportunity to put up big numbers off the bench this year after the Karl-Anthony Towns trade. Sacramento’s Malik Monk has been a top-five vote-getter in the last two seasons, and someone always comes in as a surprise candidate (Alex Caruso in OKC and CJ McCollum in New Orleans are intriguing dark horse picks).
Is Pritchard winning Sixth Man of the Year likely to happen? No. It’s a difficult award to project, and a lot has to go right for whoever nabs it. But the fact that I’m even talking about Pritchard’s candidacy shows the opportunity he’ll have and the high expectations he’s engendered. I’m ready to see Pritchard add some accolades to his Basketball Reference page.
