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If the future face of the league is to come from the slew of talented American players, Edwards will have some competition. Primary among them is Boston Celtics star forward Jayson Tatum.
Edwards faces even more heavyweights if the unofficial title is expanded to those athletes from outside the U.S.
The last five years have ended with international players capturing the regular-season MVP awards in Joel Embiid (Cameroon), Nikola Jokic (twice, Serbia) and Giannis Antetokounmpo (twice, Greece). Other possible candidates to become the face of the league include All-Star guards Luka Doncic (Slovenia) and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (Canada) of the Dallas Mavericks and Oklahoma City Thunder, respectively.
For Edwards to separate himself from the pack, there are two things that need to happen.
First, winning an NBA title would catapult the 22-year-old from being a well-known star from a relatively small market to a more widely recognized superstar.
Minnesota went just 23-49 during Edwards’ 2020-21 rookie campaign, but the Georgia product has since helped lead the team to back-to-back playoff berths for the first time in nearly two decades. The Timberwolves had a postseason drought from 2005-2017 and then again from 2019-2021.
Despite winning Game 1 of their 2022 opening-round series against the second-seeded Memphis Grizzlies, the seventh-seeded Timberwolves fell in six games. They entered last spring’s playoffs as a No. 8 seed and bowed out in five games against the eventual-champion Nuggets.
The other issue that could hold Edwards back is his image among some fans.
In four short seasons, he’s had a slew of on-and-off-court controversies.
Edwards was fined $40,000 in September 2022 after he made homophobic comments in a video posted to his Instagram account.
In April 2023, Edwards was criticized after being caught on video running down the players’ tunnel and throwing a chair that hit two bystanders. The incident came after he missed a potential game-tying three-pointer at the buzzer in the T-Wolves playoff game against Denver which ended Minnesota’s season. Edwards was fined $50,000.
Most recently, he made comments to a woman on social media, appearing to tell her to get an abortion. This came following an alleged text message thread between him and the woman regarding her pregnancy announcement.
Per a report by ESPN’s Jamal Collier, Edwards was tagged in a post on social media, which included a conversation via leaked text messages. The conversation allegedly shows a photo of a positive pregnancy test and responses from Edwards that say “hell nawl can’t do dis” and “Get a abortion lol.”
According to Collier’s report, it also includes a photo of a $100,000 wire transfer with texts saying, “I will send you money to help you out” and “you got da money whats the hol up.”
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