Chet Holmgren’s honest take on DPOY candidacy ahead of Thunder title defense

Amidst preparation for the defending champions’ first-round best-of-7 series, Oklahoma City Thunder All-Star forward Chet Holmgren addressed his candidacy for Defensive Player of the Year and All-Defensive Team honors. In a season where Holmgren earned his first All-Star selection, alongside San Antonio Spurs All-Star Victor Wembanyama, he is one of the odds-on favorites to win DPOY. Chet has also never been named to an All-Defensive Team.

Holmgren discussed what the defensive honors would mean to him amid Thunder practice on Thursday.

“Individual awards are great. I think they’re around to reward players for the hard work that they put in,” Holmgren said. “Anytime I’m able to be honored with something like that, it’s never taken for granted. I always appreciate it. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to earn something like that. At the end of the day, my focus is on our team, what we have coming up here in the playoffs, and we have the first round coming up.

“So, that’s where my focus is. At the end of the day, me sitting here thinking about—I don’t even know if the ballots are in yet — or not—it isn’t going to change anything one way or the other.”

Holmgren finished the regular season averaging career-bests in points (17.1), field-goal percentage (55.7%), and rebounds (8.9). He also averaged 1.9 blocks per game.

Chet Holmgren’s take on Thunder’s ‘dynasty talk’

After a historic 24-1 start to the regular season, Thunder All-Star Chet Holmgren learned his lesson from talking about a potential dynasty. The Thunder’s first championship led to dynasty talk after the defending champions broke the record for the best regular-season start in NBA history.

Then, the Thunder won 40 of the following 57 games to clinch the best record in the NBA — 64-18. Still, for a guy who missed his entire rookie season with a foot injury, Holmgren knows how quickly things can change, he said, alongside Gilbert Arenas, per Gil’s Arena.

“I feel like that’s a dangerous thing to be trying to think about, just because of how fragile things are in the NBA. We see it all the time,” Holmgren said. With how quick things can change, and nothing’s guaranteed. So you really do have to focus on each individual day.

“It’s one thing to speak things into existence; it’s another thing to distract yourself. So I think I’m going to avoid distracting myself.”

The Thunder will host either the Warriors or the Suns in Game 1 of their first-round, best-of-7 series on Saturday.

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