The San Francisco team is back at the top of the NBA. The Warriors’ league best 20-4 start has been one of the best stories from the beginning.

Stephen Curry has been the runaway MVP favorite, while Draymond Green is vigorously defending the DPOY and Jordan Poole’s big leap has him among the MIP candidates.

Although Andrew Wiggins is not a favorite in any end-of-season awards, he is an invaluable member of the Warriors engine and some of the forward numbers agree.

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Recently, however, the Canadian wing has been in the news and trending only in one specific part of their game. Rapper J. Cole, the most recent guest on NBA HooperVision, dropped the beans and gave support to Wiggins.

“I was a huge Penny Hardaway fan,” said J. Cole speaking about which former player influenced his game the most. “Obviously, I’ve been watching him as a kid, but I still go back and see his highlights all the time.”

“Finally, that movement, the twist, and the recoil.”

As Cole describes the move, both hosts Quentin Richardson and Jamal Crawford chime in by saying “What Wiggins did / did.”

“I remember for years seeing that highlight and being in college and coming back as if this movement was an ‘alien movement.’

That’s high praise for Wiggins coming from a veteran duo like Richardson and Crawford, and Cole, who is a bit of a baller.

Along with the team’s resurgence, Wiggins is arguably enjoying his best individual season from an efficiency and impact standpoint.

Embracing and maximizing the 3-and-D role with the Warriors, he is averaging 2.2 3-pointers per game, the highest of his career, and posting an efficiency of 41.6 percent this season. In 108 games for the Warriors, he averaged two triples per game at a rate of 38.4 percent, a big jump from his nearly six full seasons at Minnesota of 1.2 triples with an efficiency of 33.2 percent.

His comprehensive growth and development in this role is helping the Warriors. His net rating with him on the court is 11.7, behind only Stephen Curry and Draymond Green among players who play long minutes.

In defense, he is making his presence felt. When he’s on the court, the Warriors have a defensive rating of 100.2, which is on par with the total best team rating in the league of 99.5.

So Wiggins may not have been on J. Cole’s ‘players to watch’ list, but he certainly got his attention.