How many Sacramento Kings have won Sixth Man of the Year before?

Malik Monk has the chance to take home some hardware this season. Averaging 15.7 points, 2.9 rebounds, and 5.3 assists off the Kings’ bench, Monk is currently the favorite to win the Sixth Man of the Year award. 

He has really blossomed in his role, infusing the team with great energy game after game, and leads the league in twenty-point games off the bench by quite a margin. He has plenty of competition in Normal Powell, Caris LeVert, Naz Reid, and Tim Hardaway Jr., but Monk has a solid case. 

Especially his playmaking sets him apart from the competition, and if the Kings keep winning down the stretch, it will only help his case. 

Which Kings players have won Sixth Man of the Year before? 

So far, Bobby Jackson is the only Kings player to take home the award in the 2002-03 season. Known as “Action Jackson”, the point guard was a fan favorite in Sacramento, where he played between 2000 and 2005. He was a part of the 2002 Western Conference Finals team that was eliminated by the Los Angeles Lakers just one game away from making the NBA Finals. 

When he won Sixth Man of the Year, Jackson actually averaged numbers very similar to Monk’s this season with 15.2 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 3.1 assists. Monk is a better playmaker but not quite as good of a rebounder.

So, if Monk were to win the award, he would only be the second Sacramento King to achieve that feat. That is not a bad way to etch your name in the franchise’s history books and let everyone know that the Kings’ are relevant again. 

They just broke the longest playoff drought in history last season, but it has also been quite some time since Jackson won the Sixth Man of the Year award. To put it in perspective, in 2003, Keegan Murray, Keon Ellis, and Kessler Edwards were all just three years old. Now, they are old enough to be NBA players. It is time for the Kings to be a team regularly mentioned in several award conversations again.