RealGM

Is he the best defensive player in the NBA? No.

The reason why he should win, is that he had a historical season in the category blocket shots this year.

He averaged 3.7 blocks in 27 minutes playing time.

The last time any NBA player had an average of at least 3.7 was Theo Ratliff in 2000-2001 with 3.7 blocks and he played 36 minutes per game.
Alanzo Mourning did average 3.7 in 1999-2000 while playing 35 mins a game.
The year before that Alanzo had 3.9 blocks in 38 minutes playing time.
Mutombo had 4.5 blocks in 1995-96, but he averaged over 36 minutes per game.
In 27 minutes playing time that would be less than 3.4 blocks.

The last player who had a better line in blocks was Manute Bol back in 1988-89 when he averaged 4.3 blocks in 22 minutes playing time. Which is impressive, even though he was 7 foot 7.

So in the last 23 years!! no one had a better statistical year in the category blocked shots than Ibaka.
Thats why he, in my eyes, deserves to get the Award.

I agree wholeheartedly
The biggest statistic to me is the difference between Serge and second place in blocks
Huge seperation

BIG EDDIE wrote:Is he the best defensive player in the NBA? No.

Then he shouldn't.

His post D is great... No.

He blacks shots but he doesn't play good post defense. He a bad PNR defender. He a horrible defensive rebounder. As of now Serge only does 1 good thing on defense.

Ibaka did have a historical season blocking shots. He had damn near 10% BLK which is Manute Bol and Shawn Bradley territory and he didn't foul a lot on his way to that number.

That's why he even made it to 2nd place, despite being a poor or average defensively in almost every other aspect of team defense. It's why I believe his value is a little bit overstated and he will be almost certainly overpaid for his skillset. Hes' a great player, don't get me wrong. But DPOY? Ibaka gets burned all the time in PnR, isn't a good post or isolation defensive player, and isn't that great on the defensive boards. He's fantastic at blocking shots, and had a historic year doing it. But even someone like Marcus Camby had to block a lot of shots AND beat the heck out of the defensive boards to win a DPOY (he was not a great man defender either). Ibaka will have to be better on the boards to win this, or shore up his man to man and defensive awareness.