“Almost three years ago, he came to the Bay Area and had excellent compatibility with the team. He won the championship for the first time in his career last season, winning the appreciation of many people in the league and consolidating his position as an “influential player with both attack and defense.”
If you only look at the comments of Warriors manager Miles, what kind of contract do you think a champion member who has both attack and defense, has excellent compatibility with the team and is highly sought after?
Top salary of $37 million per year? Is the annual salary above 30 million close to the top salary?
Wikins himself gave the answer-$0.109 billion in 4 years.
On October 16, Beijing time, only 27-year-old Wikins signed the contract, binding his peak with Warriors.
In the 2022-23 season, wikins’ annual salary was 33.6 million dollars. After the old contract expired next summer, wikins’ annual salary for the first year of the new contract came into effect was 24.3 million dollars. After completing the transformation to help Warriors win the championship and reverse the wind, Wikins’s value reached the highest point, but instead of pursuing a top salary or a contract close to the top salary, he accepted a huge salary reduction.
Suddenly, Wikins, who was once questioned about high salary and low ability, became one of the most cost-effective players in the league. At the peak of salary reduction, wikins’ spirit of sacrifice was highly praised. Wikins did not meet the expectations of the outside world to become “Maple Jordan”, but he lived out the most real self.
Time went back to February 7, 2020, and Wikins’s wind review was at its lowest point. In order to send Wikins away in exchange for Russell, Timberwolves posted the first round protection sign of the first three shunts in 2021 and the second round sign in 2021. The warrior who took over Wikins was regarded as a fool. ESPN expert Kevin Pelton gave the Warrior a C- level rating. His view was that Wikins’s attitude was not correct, his defense was poor, and his attack style was incompatible with the warrior’s system, this also represents the mainstream view.
It is no wonder that as the top star, Wikins has the qualification to be the star of the team. However, in the Timberwolves era, he not only failed to fulfill his talent, but also developed in the direction of “cancer.
Wikins was born with a golden key. His father Michelle Wikins was an NBA player and his mother Marita Payne Wikins won the sprint relay silver medal at the Olympics. Wikins naturally inherited his parents’ strong sports genes. At the age of 14, he became a Internet celebrity through social media with various violent attacks against the sky. Wikins represented Canada in the U17 World Championship at the age of 15. In the semi-finals, facing America with Bill, Wikins scored 20 points. University in Kansas, Wikins was regarded as the quasi-top in 2014 early.
Some players belong to God to enjoy the meal and put them in their mouths. Wikins is typical. According to ESPN, Wikins went to P3 laboratory, a famous sports science laboratory in the United States, to receive the evaluation of high-tech equipment. The result was surprising: at that time, the 19-year-old Wikins had a vertical take-off height of 43 inches (1.09 meters), a single-foot take-off height of 41.5 inches (1.05 meters), and a single-foot take-off height of 40 inches (1.02 meters). Among all NBA players evaluated by P3 laboratory, Wikins ranked in the top 10. Trainer Hanlan sighed with emotion that Wikins seemed to jump out of outer space.
In the 2014 draft, the knight was selected to Wikins with the first prize. After James announced his return home, the Knight packed Wikins to Timberwolves for loafers. From the very beginning, Wikins was under great pressure. He was regarded as “maple leaf Jordan” and was responsible for rewriting the fate of the Forest Wolf.
Wikins, who can be forcibly pushed to this position, is not ready. The top sports talent in history cannot guarantee that he will immediately become a reliable core at both ends of attack and defense. In the first two seasons of his career, wikins’ attack mainly focused on back attack and face frame singles. In the 2016-17 season, Wikins adjusted his style of play. The number of attacks in the hundred rounds soared to 9.3, at least in the way of attack, he changed from a classical scorer to a relatively more modern scorer.
The problem is that the change of attack mode has not improved the efficiency of Wikins. The defects of too many forced shots, left hand-held ball ability and three-point projection ability lead to its real hit rate being lower than 55% for a long time. As for the defensive end, Wikins never fulfilled his talent, and his defensive integration data was negative most of the time.
Wikins came to Minnesota with great pride at the beginning, but because his personal performance did not meet expectations, the team’s record was bleak. Slowly, wikins’ great pride fell into the mud like a mass of snow and disappeared.
At the beginning, Garnett introduced Wikins to reporters in the last season of his career, saying that Wikins would be the next super star. In everyone’s opinion, Wikins should be a super star. He must reach that height, otherwise it is a waste of talent. However, who asked Wikins what kind of player he wanted to be?
“He doesn’t want to be different. He just wants to play in the right way,” said coach Triano, who once coached Wikins in the Canadian national team. Playing alone in Timberwolves is not the right way to play.
The scout who once inspected Wikins in 2014 had long seen through everything. In an interview with ESPN, he said, “You can’t force him to be the next Jordan or Kobe. Maybe he is not born with that material. His talent is really amazing, but he may not be able to be a star, a second leader and a third leader. Maybe he will be very good at playing the fourth leader of the team.”
Outsiders can certainly question wikins’ heart-qi deficiency, but this is wikins’ own choice and ability. In fact, Wikins accepted the reality rather than heart-qi deficiency.
Only warriors in the whole league can pay Wikins more than $30 million a year while making him four heads. After being sent to the warrior by the Forest Wolf, Wikins saw a light that lit up his life exit.
Last season, Wikins played his representative work after the transformation in the Warriors. He became “a 3D player with the ability to hold the ball and attack”. On the offensive end, Wikins occasionally took over with a ball-holding attack, but his attack was mainly fixed-point shooting and fast attack. His fixed-point shooting scored a 1.07-point career high in each round, the three-point shooting rate of receive the ball reached 41%, which became a reliable outside space point.
In fact, what the warrior wanted most was his height, athletic ability and defense in exchange for Wikins at the beginning. The sufficient reserve of attack line was a major feature of the warrior dynasty. Durant left and igodala grew old, warriors need new strikers.
“With Wikins, we finally have players who can match the opponent’s arrow characters,” Cole once said, “Wikins can match the opponent’s arrow with height and athletic ability. There are too many excellent fronts in today’s league. We need Wikins to match the stars such as James, DeRozan and George.”
Wikins’ response far exceeded Cole’s expectations. Wikins can not only defend against frontal line player, but also take over the defender. In the playoffs last season, wikins’ defense suppressed the opponent’s hit rate at 43.9 and the defender’s hit rate at 41.8 frontal line player. Wikins played many defensive masterpieces, especially in the finals. He limited Tatum to 56 shots and 21 shots and Brown to 13 shots and 2 shots. After gaining fame on the defensive end, wikins’ next step may be to impact the best defensive lineup.
“The level of Wikins in the finals is what I have never seen in him before,” said a general manager of the Eastern team. Another scout also sighed: “At the beginning, I thought Wikins was going to be expelled from the league. At that time, he was a loser.”
The story of Wikins changing from a loser to a winner illustrates how important the role and environment suitable for him is. The halo of “team boss” is certainly dazzling, but as Wikins himself said, no one will pay attention to the bad team boss, in a strong team, the light of becoming a winner as a role player is more dazzling.
The sense of achievement that other teams can hardly feel is probably the key to Wikins’s willingness to cut his salary and renew his contract.