Summer is winding down, school is starting back up, and most importantly, predictions and previews for the upcoming NBA season are once again dropping. ESPN has just released their “Summer Forecast,” in which several insiders, analysts, and reporters each voted on who they think will take home the major awards for the 2025-26 season.
Each expert got to vote for their top three options, assigning five, three, and one point to each of their selections respectively. No. 3 overall pick VJ Edgecombe of the Sixers
received plenty of points in the Rookie of the Year straw poll — 25 to be exact. Funnily enough, that put him in third place for this projected award, behind Cooper Flagg (121 points) of the Mavericks and Dylan Harper (38 points) of the Spurs. The voting for this top five ended up going just chalk as the draft did. Kon Knueppel of the Hornets came in fourth with 18 points and Utah’s Ace Bailey rounded things out with 16 points.
After a highly touted draft, it makes sense that the experts are high on the top picks of the draft. As stated in the piece, Flagg especially should get a lot of opportunity at a high-usage role. Harper and Edgecombe on the other hand, will have their position groups a lot more crowded as they try to break into the league.
Balancing the fit of Edgecombe with Tyrese Maxey, Jared McCain and presumably Quentin Grimes will be one of, if not the most important storyline of this upcoming season. At least the most important storyline that has nothing yet to do with reconstructing the meniscus tendon (knocks on wood). Obviously the quality of competition is significantly different, but an encouraging performance from Edgecombe in summer league does give reason to feel hopeful he can make an impact in real games right away. He has a lot of rounding out to do as a guard, but his dominant athleticism will hopefully make him an exciting watch from game one.
If you can believe it, Edgecombe’s Rookie of the Year campaign was the only Sixer that appeared in ESPN’s projection of next year’s awards. Surely all of these supposed “experts” will feel silly after Adem Bona brings home Defensive Player of the Year after averaging six blocks per game.
