Anthony Edwards has turned his greatest weakness into his greatest strength

It is extremely rare to not only have a generational superstar on your team, but also one who continues to improve every year of his career. Now in his sixth season, Anthony Edwards looks to add to his impressive resume by winning the NBA’s Clutch Player of the Year award.

In his previous years, Edwards had few setbacks in his game, but one of them was his ability to make clutch shots in the final minutes. He struggled with tunnel vision at times, which would lead to frequent turnovers or bad shots for him or the team around him. That has now turned completely 180 degrees.

This season he is the most feared player in the NBA

So far this season, Edwards has an effective shooting percentage of 83.7 in clutch time. No, that’s not a typo. In second place is Philadelphia’s VJ Edgecombe with an impressive 68.8 percent, but somehow not even close to Edwards. The things he has done in clutch time have been some of the best the entire league has seen in recent memory.

He is also improving as a playmaker in the clutch. In the Wolves’ most recent loss to the San Antonio Spurs, Edwards dropped a career-high 55 points. But in the clutch after he didn’t miss, Spurs started doubling him as soon as he crossed half court, causing him to step off the ball. Instead of forcing the issue, he created a pair of buckets for the Wolves, including two timely Donte DiVincenzo triples.

Last season, Edwards led the league in making and attempting 3-pointers, but his clutch stats were lacking as teams chased him off the line and caused him to shoot mid-range jumpers, which was a weakness at the time.

Notably, Edwards shot just 42.6 percent from the field with an effective field goal percentage of 51.7 in the clutch last year.

This year, after film studies of mid-range greats like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, he’s turned it into a real weapon. So now, in addition to his class-leading three-point ability, he’s a real threat in the midrange, and with his athleticism he can score on anyone at the rim.

Where does he stand in the league?

I don’t think it’s crazy to have Edwards as a top five player in the NBA. The only guys clearly ahead of him at this point are Nikola Jokic, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Giannis Antetokounmpo and you could talk about a healthy Jayson Tatum, but that’s no guarantee.

There are players like Luka Doncic, but he has major defensive question marks. Nevertheless, with this superhuman leap we’re seeing now, Edwards has cemented himself in the league’s upper echelon of superstars, and the scariest part is that at 24 years old, he’s still going to get better.