The All-Star reserves will be announced tonight on TNT where we will find out if Brandon Knight's career season has gotten the attention of coaches around the league. The starters were decided by fan-voting last week (which explains why Kobe was selected over scoring-leader and MVP candidate, James Harden) while the reserves are chosen by a vote amongst coaches in each conference earlier this week.
There are many factors to the Bucks unexpected success this season, the hiring of Coach Jason Kidd being the first to come to mind but it can't be understated how important Knight's play has been to the team who reached its win total from last season by December 26th. Although he gets scrutinized by Bucks fans on a daily basis about whether he is a point guard of the future or simply a two-guard who sucks the life out of the ball on offense, his numbers have steadily increased since his rookie season and he is the undisputed leader of the resurgent team. As Alex Boeder's article will suggest, Knight's numbers per 36 minutes have been better than his competition for the final spot at the point guard position, Kyrie Irving and Kemba Walker. Walker recently had surgery on his left knee so his name will be withdrawn from consideration and Irving will almost certainly get the nod over Knight but it has to be encouraging to see where Knight has come from since his rookie year (averaging 12.8 ppg and 3.8 apg). In a youth-driven league, he is still one of the younger point guards and as "nit-picky" as we want to get, he has produced and has been a huge reason the Bucks are in the position they are in today.
Although there is a better chance he won't get selected to the All-Star team tonight, Brandon Knight's relentless work ethic gives me reason to believe he will be in discussion among the other great guards in this league as a candidate for the mid-February festivities for years to come.
