Nets' Patty Mills wins the 2021-22 NBA Sportsmanship Award

Brooklyn Nets guard Patty Mills is the recipient of the Joe Dumars Trophy for winning the 2021-22 NBA Sportsmanship Award, the NBA announced today.  The annual award is designed to honor a player who best represents the ideals of sportsmanship on the court.

Each NBA team nominated one of its players for the NBA Sportsmanship Award.  From the list of 30 team nominees, a panel of league executives selected one finalist from each of the NBA’s six divisions.  Current NBA players selected the winner from the list of six finalists, with nearly 300 players submitting their votes through confidential balloting conducted by the league office.

In addition to Mills (Atlantic Division), the finalists were Miami Heat center-forward Bam Adebayo (Southeast Division), Phoenix Suns forward Mikal Bridges (Pacific Division), Cleveland Cavaliers guard Darius Garland (Central Division), Denver Nuggets forward Jeff Green (Northwest Division) and Memphis Grizzlies forward-center Jaren Jackson Jr. (Southwest Division).

Mills received 1,975 total points (58 first-place votes) in balloting of NBA players.  Green finished in second place with 1,841 points (60 first-place votes).  The six finalists were awarded 11 points for each first-place vote, nine points for each second-place vote, seven points for each third-place vote, five points for each fourth-place vote, three points for each fifth-place vote and one point for each sixth-place vote. 

A 13-year NBA veteran from Australia, Mills has won the NBA Sportsmanship Award for the first time.  He will be presented with a special edition 75th Anniversary commemorative trophy today in celebration of the honor, gifted in addition to the Joe Dumars Trophy, which he will receive later.  The commemorative trophy, composed of a solid crystal basketball, features the NBA 75 logo 3D laser etched and suspended within its center.

In the 2021-22 regular season, Mills averaged 11.4 points and 2.3 assists in 29.0 minutes in 81 games with the Nets, who signed him as a free agent in August 2021.  He ranked 11th in the NBA in three-pointers made (227) and 25th in three-point field goal percentage (40.0).  Mills was not assessed a technical foul this season.  He has been assessed two technical fouls in 820 career regular-season games, with no technical fouls in 11 of his 13 seasons.

Mills, 33, played the previous 10 NBA seasons with the San Antonio Spurs, winning an NBA championship in the 2013-14 season.  He played his first two NBA seasons with the Portland Trail Blazers, who selected him in the second round (55th overall) of the 2009 NBA Draft.

The NBA Sportsmanship Award trophy is named in honor of Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famer Joe Dumars, a six-time NBA All-Star and two-time NBA champion.  Dumars played 14 NBA seasons and won the inaugural Sportsmanship Award in the 1995-96 season.

Below are the voting totals for the 2021-22 NBA Sportsmanship Award: