Generally speaking, last year’s crop of NBA rookies was pretty average across the board.

This season, however, expectations were considerably higher since you have just the 34th time in history that a player 6'10" or taller averaged those marks for a season. One person who was able to put up similar numbers as a rookie is none other than Anthony Davis, the Brow! Even more interesting to me is that these two players are only one year apart in age. Davis is going to be 23 this year and Noel will be 22. There is clearly a much larger gap in their talents at this time on the playing floor, but it will be interesting to see if Noel can close it as he develops.

Elfrid Payton (nERD: -7.3, nF Efficiency: -2.5)

Elfrid Payton is a player who has really seemed to find a comfort zone during the first 50 or so games of this NBA season. At the beginning of the year, he looked overmatched, and his numbers reflected that as he was shooting approximately 40% from the field and under 50% from the free throw line. However, in January, Payton started to play much better, shooting 45.2% from the field and 67.5% from the free throw line. In addition, he averaged, over 15 games in January, 10.7 points per game, 4.3 rebounds per game, 6.9 assists per game, and 1.9 steals per game while playing almost 33 minutes per game. The Magic are by no means a good team (they rank 27th in team nERD), but Payton seems like a solid building block who can complement Victor Oladipo very nicely and should be fun to watch the rest of the way.

Joe Ingles (nERD: -3.3, nF Efficiency: -1.7)

It seems fair to say that nobody really knew much about Joe Ingles when this season started. Even a diehard hoops fan will have difficulty really following a player whose career has meandered through Australia, Spain, Israel, and a couple of NBA summer camps and is now an NBA rookie at the ripe old age of 27. On top of that, Ingles' first season statistics are nothing to write home about, as he’s averaging 4.0 points, 2.1 rebounds, and 2.4 assists per game. Yet, with the injury to Rodney Hood and Alec Burks' being out all year, Ingles has been given a chance to start recently. He’s now started 16 games over the past month, and you can see a glimmer of his overall ability. Ingles has averaged almost 28 minutes per game along with 6.2 points per game, 3.3 rebounds per game, 4.0 assists per game and 1.5 steals per game. Those are pretty solid numbers for someone that is clearly not the first, second or third option on offense for the Jazz.

The Jazz may not be very good as a team, but they certainly are a young and exciting team. The ages for the core starting five on that team range between 22 and 24 (Trey Burke, Alec Burks, Gordon Hayward, Derrick Favors, and Enes Kanter). In addition, there is another rookie, Dante Exum (who is all of 19 years old), who has been starting at point guard for the Jazz over the past few weeks. Overall, he’s started eight games for the Jazz and had pretty poor results. As a starter, he’s averaging 5.9 points per game, 1.8 rebounds per game and 2.4 assists per game with a bad shooting percentage from the field, 31.5%, and no ability to get to the free throw line. Exum is a big talented point guard, but it’s clear that much work needs to be done.

Langston Galloway (nERD: -1.3, nF Efficiency: -1.6)

Langston Galloway (just 23 years old and having played for the New York Knicks' D-League affiliate most of the year) appears to be everyone’s favorite player of the moment in New York. Over just 12 games, he’s managed to capture people’s imagination (Jeremy Lin anyone?) and put up decent numbers while averaging almost 30 minutes per game. Galloway is averaging 11.3 points per game, 4.1 rebounds per game, and 3.1 assists per game. With the possibility of a Jose Calderon trade, Galloway could see himself with an opportunity to play out the season as the Knicks starting point guard.