CLEVELAND — Evan Mobley has taken leaps and bounds in his development this season, a major part of the Cavs' 64-win regular season and current playoff success. Now, he's being recognized for that with one of the NBA's top honors, winning the league's Defensive Player of the Year Award.
Mobley was a finalist for the award, up against Atlanta Hawks' Dyson Daniels and Golden State Warriors' Draymond Green.
With the honor, Mobley has become the first player in Cavs history to win the award. He's the fifth youngest player to be named DPOY.
Mobley had been named the Eastern Conference Defensive Player of the Month twice in the regular season, was the only player in the NBA who averaged at least 1.5 blocks per game on fewer than two fouls per game, and recorded 34 multi-block games this season.
As the regular season came to an end, nearly all of Mobley's teammates made their cases for the Cavs' big man to win the award.
“He doesn’t hack. He doesn’t scream at the refs. He goes and blocks shots. His deflection numbers [are] out the roof,” Cavs guard Darius Garland said when asked why he thought Mobley was DPOY. “He guards one through five. I mean, what doesn’t he do? He just doesn’t express it how other people express it. If you look at the numbers, if you watch the Cavs games, you see all the impact that he does for us on both sides of the ball, not just defense."
Mobley sat down for an exclusive 1-on-1 interview with News 5 in January, mentioning how he has been called a "unicorn." The term is often given to big men in the NBA who have immense size but also have the technical skillset of a guard, making them a threat on both sides of the floor.
Cavs guard Ty Jerome was recently snubbed for the Sixth Man of the Year Award. Head coach Kenny Atkinson is still up for Coach of the Year.
