lessthanjake wrote:uncleduck13 wrote:lessthanjake wrote:One thing I’ll never understand is why Shaq always says that he kept finishing 2nd to Nash. He did finish 2nd to Nash one time, but in Nash’s other MVP year Shaq didn’t get any MVP votes at all. And, in the year Shaq finished 2nd to Nash, he basically finished 2nd because people didn’t quite realize how good Wade was. Shaq played a very clear second-fiddle to Wade even in the playoffs that year (and that’s not even getting into that occurring to an even larger extent the next year). If there was a re-vote on that year in retrospect, I don’t think Shaq would even finish 2nd—for instance, Dirk and Duncan really deserved to be above Shaq.
Basically, Shaq definitely has a case to be made that he should’ve won more MVPs than he won, but he doesn’t really have a good case that he should’ve gotten MVPs in the years Nash won them.
It’s the Iverson MVP that should really have him triggered. But he won’t dare come for him since he “for the culture”
Yeah, I think 2001 is really the one where the guy who won it definitely didn’t deserve it and Shaq was the best player in the league at the time. Even then, there’s a solid argument that Duncan deserved it, but it’s definitely the one Shaq has a good case for being upset about, given also what ultimately happened in those playoffs. He also had an argument in 1995, but Robinson probably did deserve it by a slight margin. Same with 2002 with Duncan. I think Shaq has a better case in all those years than he did in either of the Nash years.
One theory I have is just that when 2005 came around, Shaq knew his days of contending for MVPs were about to end, so barely losing the vote in 2005 stung particularly hard, because in prior years he’d always just felt like he could win it another year.
Not sure how great the argument for Duncan in 2001 is.
PER
Shaq - 1st
Duncan - 9th
Win Shares
Shaq - 1st
Duncan - 4th
BPM
Shaq - 1st
Duncan - 15th
VORP
Shaq - 2nd
Duncan - 11th
On/Off
Shaq - +15.6
Duncan - +12.5
I know advanced stats aren’t everything and do a poor job for defense where Duncan was better, but Shaq was the most dominant player at that time and would get other big men to foul out, which the advanced stats don’t really measure either.
KG actually led the league in PER, WS, BPM, and VORP in 2005 but his team missed the playoffs. It probably should have been a race between Duncan and Dirk, but instead it was a race between Shaq and Nash.
I can understand that Duncan won in 02 and 03 and there was voter fatigue and no narrative around him. Nash and Shaq winning with new teams was the narrative. But the Mavs winning more games without Nash didn’t fit the narrative for some reason. Dirk didn’t get to play with a Wade, Amare, Marion, Ginobili, or Parker. He won all those games with Jet Terry. And if Nash really was the most valuable player, what does that make Dirk for winning more without him?
