MVP Rankings 1.0

[JimMurray]

What was so superior about the team? The Cavs won more games than Orlando only because of LeBron and Nelson's injury. In the playoffs they were competitive against them only because LeBron played like god. There was nothing superior about the team compared to the Magic and anyone who watched the Cavs for the whole season and especially against the Magic could see that. Not to even mention that Magic were just HOT in the series, they shot insanely well for three and Dwight was even hitting free throws, even the Lakers would have their hands full with them if they were hitting shots like against the Cavs. It also didn't help that Cavs' second best player played terribly in the first four games of the series. And about "Turkeyglue", they also had that one guy who won them two games in the series, his name was Rashard I believe.

Thats the point! They didn't even have their starting PG, and they were terrible with out Nelson in the regular season. My point is the Cavs played terrible because Lebron didn't have those boys focused. If you ever wanted to see the leadership / focus / attitude / argument personified between Kobe and Lebron, that was it. The Cavs in the ECF, and the Lakers in the finals against the same team. Lebron let those guys get too lose in the playoffs and that was his mistake. I watched every game in that series.

[CzBoobie]

It doesn't matter, nobody thought of the Lakers as a great team the year they went to the finals against the Celtics, after that the general consensus among Cavs fans was "Well, Kobe can't be MVP because his supporting cast is too good. His supporting cast was virtually identical to the team that was bounced in the first round the year before. You only get to play that card once. Once you establish that you can win with a team, by default, they are a good enough team. The Cavs had the best record in the league last season and got better in the off-season. You guys can no longer use the "Lebron has no supporting cast" card.

Call me disingenuous, call me insulting...but the Magic had no business being in the finals last season. They were a three point shooting team, those teams don't normally win in the playoffs. They took advantage of a beat up Celtics team and abused an overconfident Cavs team (That was Lebron's fault, the Cavs had no business losing to that team). The Magic are better this year because of VC, but don't tell me the Magic were a finals caliber team last year.

LeBron has supporting cast. There are just teams with better ones, the Lakers for instance. To call Kobe a champion maker or whatever is to imply that he would have won with the Cavs, if he was to switch teams with LeBron. And if you really believe that, I don't have anything else to say...

[CzBoobie]

LeBron would have won a championship last year if he was on the Lakers instead of Kobe. I'm 100% positive about it. Kobe has had much more help than LeBron ever had. Trade Bosh to the Cavs, steal Popovich from the Spurs and then you can brag about how Kobe is a miracle champion maker all you want...

I guess we should take your word on it if your 100% positive.

Well, I don't really care if you believe it or not...

[CzBoobie]

It's also unfathomable to play 62 games at home, that's the pace the Lakers are at right now...

It all evens out in the end, don't worry about it . What kind of argument is that. "Oh look, the Lakers play 17 or 21 at home, they have an un-fair advantage!". That only means they'll be living on the road in the 2nd half, so I don't see why that even needs to be mentioned. You're reaching.

Did you see what I was reacting to...He was using Lakers' better record as a proof Kobe should be the MVP, after 16 games. My point is it's not like the Cavs are bottom feeders right now, they are still up there with the best teams. Oh well, they lost two more games. So I pointed out that the Lakers played 75% of their games at home.

[Chris Hansen]

almost nobody thought of the Cavs as a great team last year. In fact just about everyone was astounded that they won as many as they did. The Cavs lost to the Magic for the exact same reason that the Magic won the season series against them. It's not as though you couldn't have seen that coming and to view the Magic as some kind of awful team is both disingenuous and insulting to that team.

It doesn't matter, nobody thought of the Lakers as a great team the year they went to the finals against the Celtics, after that the general consensus among Cavs fans was "Well, Kobe can't be MVP because his supporting cast is too good. His supporting cast was virtually identical to the team that was bounced in the first round the year before. You only get to play that card once. Once you establish that you can win with a team, by default, they are a good enough team. The Cavs had the best record in the league last season and got better in the off-season. You guys can no longer use the "Lebron has no supporting cast" card.

Call me disingenuous, call me insulting...but the Magic had no business being in the finals last season. They were a three point shooting team, those teams don't normally win in the playoffs. They took advantage of a beat up Celtics team and abused an overconfident Cavs team (That was Lebron's fault, the Cavs had no business losing to that team). The Magic are better this year because of VC, but don't tell me the Magic were a finals caliber team last year.

What was so superior about the team? The Cavs won more games than Orlando only because of LeBron and Nelson's injury. In the playoffs they were competitive against them only because LeBron played like god. There was nothing superior about the team compared to the Magic and anyone who watched the Cavs for the whole season and especially against the Magic could see that. Not to even mention that Magic were just HOT in the series, they shot insanely well for three and Dwight was even hitting free throws, even the Lakers would have their hands full with them if they were hitting shots like against the Cavs. It also didn't help that Cavs' second best player played terribly in the first four games of the series. And about "Turkeyglue", they also had that one guy who won them two games in the series, his name was Rashard I believe.

Thats the point! They didn't even have their starting PG, and they were terrible with out Nelson in the regular season. My point is the Cavs played terrible because Lebron didn't have those boys focused. If you ever wanted to see the leadership / focus / attitude / argument personified between Kobe and Lebron, that was it. The Cavs in the ECF, and the Lakers in the finals against the same team. Lebron let those guys get too lose in the playoffs and that was his mistake. I watched every game in that series.

How is going 29-11 without your all star PG bad?

[CzBoobie]

Thats the point! They didn't even have their starting PG, and they were terrible with out Nelson in the regular season. My point is the Cavs played terrible because Lebron didn't have those boys focused. If you ever wanted to see the leadership / focus / attitude / argument personified between Kobe and Lebron, that was it. The Cavs in the ECF, and the Lakers in the finals against the same team. Lebron let those guys get too lose in the playoffs and that was his mistake. I watched every game in that series.

No, they were not terrible without him, they won 59 games. That's 2 more than the Lakers two years ago. They owned the Cavs worse in the regular season than in the playoffs. Every Cavs fan rooted for the Celtics to win the 2nd round series because we knew the Magic would give us infinitely more problems than Boston. And they did just that.

[JimMurray]

LeBron has supporting cast. There are just teams with better ones, the Lakers for instance. To call Kobe a champion maker or whatever is to imply that he would have won with the Cavs, if he was to switch teams with LeBron. And if you really believe that, I don't have anything else to say...

You see? Now that's a fair argument. The Lakers certainly have a better supporting cast than the Cavs, and it's not really a matter for debate.

I do believe the Cavs would have got past the Magic if they had Kobe instead of Lebron.

[JimMurray]

Did you see what I was reacting to...He was using Lakers' better record as a proof Kobe should be the MVP, after 16 games. My point is it's not like the Cavs are bottom feeders right now, they are still up there with the best teams. Oh well, they lost two more games. So I pointed out that the Lakers played 75% of their games at home.

Dually noted, and you are absolutely right. I think Lebron deserves a lot of credit for having the Cavs where they are right now. He's had to overcome Shaq being injured and West losing his mind. To his credit, he's held it together for the first quarter of the season. I don't think Lebron should be penalized for the Cavs record at this point.

[JimMurray]

That was post Gasol numbnuts. They were already in the Finals.

How is going 29-11 without your all star PG bad?

Compared to what they were before, and how good the Cavs were that season...it's bad...it was ordinary, par for the course.

[YLSKillaCam]

Thats the point! They didn't even have their starting PG, and they were terrible with out Nelson in the regular season. My point is the Cavs played terrible because Lebron didn't have those boys focused. If you ever wanted to see the leadership / focus / attitude / argument personified between Kobe and Lebron, that was it. The Cavs in the ECF, and the Lakers in the finals against the same team. Lebron let those guys get too lose in the playoffs and that was his mistake. I watched every game in that series.

No, they were not terrible without him, they won 59 games. That's 2 more than the Lakers two years ago. They owned the Cavs worse in the regular season than in the playoffs. Every Cavs fan rooted for the Celtics to win the 2nd round series because we knew the Magic would give us infinitely more problems than Boston. And they did just that.

Clearly Lebron was the MVP last year. There was no doubt in my mind. Having said that, the reason that he was the MVP is because the Cavs were the favorites to win the championship. If you're being honest with yourself, there were only two teams anyone was talking about as having a chance: Los Angeles and Cleveland. So Lebron's selection as MVP was recognition that he had amazing numbers and he transformed Cleveland into a championship contender.

His performances in the series against Atlanta and Detroit were solid, but those were pretty bad playoff teams. I think both of those teams failed to win 50 games in the regular season. The first challenge to Cleveland was the Orlando series. They had more time to prepare against Orlando since they swept their first two series and they had homecourt advantage.

Your point about knowing Orlando would give you problems is pretty weak. Cleveland only played Orlando three times. They lost twice, but won at home and in one of the Orlando wins, Jameer was playing (you'll recall that he did not play against Cleveland in the postseason). Having only lost two games at home all year (with only one of those losses being legitimate), Cleveland should have been sitting pretty against Orlando. So I don't understand how you can extrapolate from their regular season matchups that Orlando would win a seven game series. It is pretty clear that Cleveland should've gotten past the Magic and being unwilling to admit that is sad.

[CzBoobie]

I didn't predict the Magic to win, I wanted the Cavs to win. But to say I didn't have my doubts going to the series based on what I knew about matchups and how they played in the regular season is false and I thought it could go either way. And despite what the popular opinion is, it almost did...My point is the Magic were very good team and they played very well against the Cavs, that's all. And yet, the Cavs were right in the series. Mostly because LeBron played great, much better than Kobe in the Finals. To spin it like it's Lebron's fault they lost is pathetic.

And I'm not sure if playing 4 games in 24 days like the Cavs did is the best way to play in the playoffs.

[TheOUTLAW]

almost nobody thought of the Cavs as a great team last year. In fact just about everyone was astounded that they won as many as they did. The Cavs lost to the Magic for the exact same reason that the Magic won the season series against them. It's not as though you couldn't have seen that coming and to view the Magic as some kind of awful team is both disingenuous and insulting to that team.

It doesn't matter, nobody thought of the Lakers as a great team the year they went to the finals against the Celtics, after that the general consensus among Cavs fans was "Well, Kobe can't be MVP because his supporting cast is too good. His supporting cast was virtually identical to the team that was bounced in the first round the year before. You only get to play that card once. Once you establish that you can win with a team, by default, they are a good enough team. The Cavs had the best record in the league last season and got better in the off-season. You guys can no longer use the "Lebron has no supporting cast" card.

Call me disingenuous, call me insulting...but the Magic had no business being in the finals last season. They were a three point shooting team, those teams don't normally win in the playoffs. They took advantage of a beat up Celtics team and abused an overconfident Cavs team (That was Lebron's fault, the Cavs had no business losing to that team). The Magic are better this year because of VC, but don't tell me the Magic were a finals caliber team last year.

You do know that the Lakers were favored in the finals 2 years ago, they just didn't win. That being said, MVP is atuallya regular season award. You guys appear to be attempting to manufacture justification just because the Cavs didn't make the finals. The argument really isn't legitimate.

[semi-sentient]

Mostly because LeBron played great, much better than Kobe in the Finals. To spin it like it's Lebron's fault they lost is pathetic.

Much better my ass.

One of the big reasons that Howard was so ineffective is because Kobe was doubling him instead of leaving Pau on an island to fend for himself. He also spent considerable time on Hedo and disrupted his game. Kobe was big on both ends of the floor, whereas LeBron only really contributed on offense. Even then he was getting to the line way more than he should have as a resulted of getting quite a bit of preferential treatment from the refs (and I generally hate complaining about crap like this, but Howard was getting jobbed).

Stop looking at PER and thinking that it means he played better. He might have put up better cumulative stats, but Kobe played smarter, more effective basketball -- better teammates or not.

[semi-sentient]

For the record, I believe I picked the Magic in 6 games. The Magic, even without Nelson, had too many mismatches for the Cavs to deal with.

Edit: And I should note that I wanted the Cavs instead of the Magic, primarily because the Magic match up better with the Lakers as well.

[JimMurray]

You do know that the Lakers were favored in the finals 2 years ago, they just didn't win. That being said, MVP is atuallya regular season award. You guys appear to be attempting to manufacture justification just because the Cavs didn't make the finals. The argument really isn't legitimate.

What does them being favored by ESPN analysts have to do with anything? They were significantly worse than the Celtics that year, and I believe they finished 10 games worse then them in the regular season? That Celtics team was VASTLY superior to the Lakers in the Finals. And nobody said it wasn't a regular season award. Whats your point?

[Inhuman]

I think Lebron had alot to do with the cavs not making the finals.
First off he had the whole team believing that they were the best team in the nba by far and that they should just cruise into the finals and championship too. You could hear/see it in their interviews and body language/mannerisms, pre game, during and after.
Second i watched every cavs game in the playoffs. Lebron and the cavs style of play was/is VERY predictable. Any good team worth a damn can look at take and try to counter what lebron and the cavs do every damn time. I dont know if its lebron or mike brown who is to blame. Maybe a combination of both.
90+% of the time(doesnt matter who the cavs play) Who ever on the cavs gets the rebound, it is quickly passed to lebron. He then proceeds to dribble the ball at the top of the key from 10 to 20 seconds. Pretty much trying to play 1 on 5 most of the time.
He then does 1 of 2 things. He either takes a 3 or a contested 2 or he tries to drive in for a lay up and most likely try to get fouled or get the call regardless. Once in a while he will dish it out to an obvious open guy for an easy catch and shoot assist.
This is pretty mush how the cavs play all the time. Its not a stretch to think a good team can see this in the tapes and devise a game plan to counter this type of play.
Also about kobe. He was dead serious the whole playoffs. He had his team in the same mindset. He was on a mission. Even when LA had 1 more game to win to be champs the lakers still said "we have not won anything yet". In contrast before being eliminated the cavs were dancing celebrating after each dunk or nice play and pretty much after each win. I put the blame on lebron for not being 100% focused thus his teammates not being focused as well.
You could tell that Lebron was pretty much going for personal glory in the playoffs. Always going all out to make his stats inflated. you pretty much knew what lebron was going to do the whole game.
If you watched the laker games in the playoffs, you never knew what kobe was going to do. he played a bit different each series, even different each game. Sometimes he came out aggressive, other times he got his teammates involved early to take over later, etc. He adjusted to the situation.
LA played every opponent differently. Cavs did not.

[tracey_nice]

Czbron, stop. You don't need to be making all these stupid arguments to support your claim. There are way better, rather obvious arguments that support Lebron is MVP, stick with them.

[CzBoobie]

What? I wasn't even arguing lebron should be the MVP now. I just hate the stupid notion YLSKillaCam (I think) presented that Kobe is some inherent champion while LeBron simply can't win. Like everything around them doesn't even matter.

[Dr Positivity]

Duncan's playing less than 32mpg so his raw numbers are a less impressive 18/10/3.5/2, but look at his per 36: 21.0ppg, 12.3rpg, 4.2apg, 2.3bpg, and his TS% is .586 which is higher than he's ever finished at in a season. His PER so far is over 28 which is incredible at this stage in his career. And after a slow start the Spurs have won 5 straight and are shutting teams down again

If they crawl back into best in the West conversation and Duncan maintains this pace, he deserves to get top 5 votes again. Duncan never stops

[tracey_nice]

What? I wasn't even arguing lebron should be the MVP now. I just hate the stupid notion YLSKillaCam (I think) presented that Kobe is some inherent champion while LeBron simply can't win. Like everything around them doesn't even matter.

Yeah but one dumb argument doesn't require another.