By Robert Masusock

Around this time every year NBA.com writers perform a survey of  NBA general managers and today the results were released. In order to prevent any bias voting the poll does not allow GMs to vote for their own players, coaches, personnel, etc. Each GM was asked 49 questions and also worth noting is that these percentages are being based off of the responses from some and not ALL NBA GMs (assumingly because some didn’t respond). The poll yielded some interesting results this year including one that will put a bit of pressure to perform on Philadelphia’s own Jahlil Okafor.

Big Jah got the vote from 44.8% of GMs when asked “Who will win Rookie of the Year in 2015-16?”. This just goes to show that after a summer league and some preseason games the opinion on Okafor as a player who can step right in and be effective (particularly offensively) hasn’t changed. Many scouting reports had him as one of the most NBA ready prospects in the draft so this result isn’t much of a shocker.

Making this especially note-worthy is that Allen Iverson was the last Sixers rookie to win the ROY award in  1996 until Michael Cater-Williams won it for the 2013-14 season. If Big Jah can win the award that would make two Sixers rookies winning the award in three seasons. It could even be argued that Nerlens Noel was robbed of the award by Andrew Wiggins last season strictly due to name and hype, rather than actual performance and impact. Okafor could easily have been going for a Sixers’ rookie hat trick this season.

Long-term however, GMs believe the best player coming out of this draft will be Karl-Anthony Towns. This is no surprise given his shooting touch and sheer size to go along with the fact he was drafted number one overall. Okafor finished tied with D’Angelo Russell and Emmanuel Mudiay with 10.3% of respondent votes for second.

Controversial Hinkie draft choice Dario Saric was also shown some love by the general managers. When asked “Who is the best international player NOT in the NBA?” 28.6% of respondents said Saric was the best. Saric possesses elite ball handling skills and shooting touch for his size and can make the jump to the NBA as early as the 2016-17 season. Even with this skill set Saric would have a ways to go if he wanted to be the best international player in the NBA as that title was claimed by Marc Gasol with 62.1% of votes, ahead of his brother Pau who received 17.2%. The remainder of the top five is aging with names like Tony Parker and Dirk Nowitzki, with the exception of Goran Dragic. It appears a new Era of international players will be coming in soon and Saric could very well lead the charge.

Other league wide results showed that as expected, LeBron is viewed as the favorite for MVP and the best player in the NBA. Despite that belief GMs said if they were starting a team today they would build around Anthony Davis who has done nothing but improve since entering the NBA. Russell Westbrook was voted most athletic, nearly 15% higher than LeBron and double the percentage dunk champion Zach Lavine obtained. In a league full of fake tough guys, real tough guys like Tony Allen, Draymond Green, and Kobe were among those to receive votes for toughest player in the NBA. Also making the top 5 toughest players were Zac Randolph and budding Bulls’ star Jimmy Butler.

The NBA.com GM surveys are always interesting and give you a good insight into what the men who run the teams are thinking. As a Sixers’ fan it is comforting seeing optimism around the league for players such as Saric and Okafor. Hopefully it’s almost over so keep holding out faith and #TrustTheProcess.

Follow me on Twitter: @President_Rob51 Instagram: @RMasusock