2021-22 NBA MVP Discussion (Pt. 1)

[Ballerhogger]

It’s curry award still right now , followed by Durant then Giannis . A lot season to go

[dribble1614]

quite a joke that durant is 5th in this poll when he has as strong an argument as anyone. 1st seed in the east and carrying the nets team with 30/8/6 on monstrous efficiency as usual.

[JN61]

quite a joke that durant is 5th in this poll when he has as strong an argument as anyone. 1st seed in the east and carrying the nets team with 30/8/6 on monstrous efficiency as usual.

Curry is having his worst eFG% since he was selected as an all-star first time, 3rd worst 2pt% and the worst 3 point%. His numbers are down across the board and team keeps winning despite his poor play. It feels every few games he has sub 40% shooting and people think he plays on MVP manner. Just crazy. If Curry leads the polls now Paul should definitely be 2nd by any logic they follow.

This is just what ever year the Atlanta hawks had the best record in the league. No MVP level players just several players playing and meshing really good level.

[JN61]

Watch on YouTube

;ab_channel=ESPN

Check this video and ESPN's propaganda, look what they put in Kevin Durant shooting statistics against Raptors They are propping up the usual suspects by the committee . Look at the reactions of the former player clowns after Lowe have mentioned Jokic's name

Let Zach Lowe speak the truth. Hopefully him stating the obvious will allow other media members to seriously consider Jokic for MVP. If 2017 Westbrook got it as the 6th seed and a much inferior statistical profile then Jokic this year, I dont see why the Nuggets record should be used against him, especially considering his absurd on off numbers

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Yeah well and nuggets are 8th seed with significantly worse record ..

[ocelot17]

Jokic is surprisingly the best offensive and defensive player in the league and it’s not even close. He’s not even in the mvp discussion this season.

Read on Twitter

?s=21

[Ron Swanson]

Well......no. He's clearly a "good" defender at this point, but can we really stop with the "Jokic is the best defensive player in the league" stuff? We can talk about how he's putting together one of the best individual seasons ever without engaging in massive hyperbole simply because TPA and DBPM (lot to do with high rebounding numbers) yield some of these wonky defensive metric results.

[Ballerhogger]

Jokic is surprisingly the best offensive and defensive player in the league and it’s not even close. He’s not even in the mvp discussion this season.

Read on Twitter

?s=21

His team barley in 8th spot right now . He’s not winning back to back as lower seed

[BelgradeNugget]

I'm Nuggets fan and I think that team record should be strong argument for MVP conversation, but we should recognize one of the best seasons in NBA history.

Watch on YouTube

[BoatsNZones]

quite a joke that durant is 5th in this poll when he has as strong an argument as anyone. 1st seed in the east and carrying the nets team with 30/8/6 on monstrous efficiency as usual.

Curry is having his worst eFG% since he was selected as an all-star first time, 3rd worst 2pt% and the worst 3 point%. His numbers are down across the board and team keeps winning despite his poor play. It feels every few games he has sub 40% shooting and people think he plays on MVP manner. Just crazy. If Curry leads the polls now Paul should definitely be 2nd by any logic they follow.

This is just what ever year the Atlanta hawks had the best record in the league. No MVP level players just several players playing and meshing really good level.

His numbers have fallen the past 2 weeks, but let’s not pretend for a second he has been anything other than elite on the year. He’s still averaging 27/6/6 on a >60% TS. He is top 5 in WinShares (4), VORP (3), BPM (5), EPM (2), RAPTOR (2), +/- (1).

Look for the advanced metric CP is top 10 in, let alone top 5.

[Hobo4President]

I'm actually curious. Can anyone provide an argument for why record should factor into MVP voting without just descriptively pointing out "thats how it's always been?" I've never heard a convincing argument.

[BoatsNZones]

I'm actually curious. Can anyone provide an argument for why record should factor into MVP voting without just descriptively pointing out "thats how it's always been?" I've never heard a convincing argument.

There's no team sport where one player effects winning as much as in the NBA, so winning is seen as directly correlated to the best players impact. You also won't win MVP unless you are considered a top 3 player on the year at worst (there might be a random example here and there, but those would be the exception to the rule).

Random OT, but what happened to RPM? It's usually out well before now, I wonder if ESPN shelved it after the controversy of them changing the (non open source) formula.

[Hobo4President]

I'm actually curious. Can anyone provide an argument for why record should factor into MVP voting without just descriptively pointing out "thats how it's always been?" I've never heard a convincing argument.

There's no team sport where one player effects winning as much as in the NBA, so winning is seen as directly correlated to the best players impact. You also won't win MVP unless you are considered a top 3 player on the year at worst (there might be a random example here and there, but those would be the exception to the rule).

It doesn't make sense though, because a players impact doesn't change based on wins. It's looking at the wrong thing to judge players and is honestly just lazy. I understand WHY people use it but it shouldn't be used.

[BoatsNZones]

I'm actually curious. Can anyone provide an argument for why record should factor into MVP voting without just descriptively pointing out "thats how it's always been?" I've never heard a convincing argument.

There's no team sport where one player effects winning as much as in the NBA, so winning is seen as directly correlated to the best players impact. You also won't win MVP unless you are considered a top 3 player on the year at worst (there might be a random example here and there, but those would be the exception to the rule).

It doesn't make sense though, because a players impact doesn't change based on wins. It's looking at the wrong thing to judge players and is honestly just lazy. I understand WHY people use it but it shouldn't be used.

I hear you, but it's just another factor, and it correlates to that teams preseason expectations (accounting for that player and his teammates along with who is or is not injured). When a team like the Warriors were projected to be a ~5-8 seed and they are the overall 1 seed, it's going to make a difference in the minds of MVP voters when they are led by a sole superstar. I'm looking now and they were projected to win 47 games (same as the Nuggets), and that was projecting a return from Klay sometime around a week from now. But instead they're on pace for the most wins since themselves in the 2016/17 season with KD (and this is with no Klay). Probably worth noting that in the entire time Durant was on the team and did not play (which was a lot), they maintained a 67 win pace. In the games Curry sat and KD was in (also a fairly large sample), they had a ~50 win pace.

It's not as if it's everything though, just one important factor. The Nuggets were the 3 seed last year and Jokic won. I'm pretty sure OKC was a 6 or 7 seed when Westbrook won.

[shoresy69]

I'm actually curious. Can anyone provide an argument for why record should factor into MVP voting without just descriptively pointing out "thats how it's always been?" I've never heard a convincing argument.

I think it's because we still don't have the statistical answer to measure exactly how much someone's play impacts winning. We're closer than ever with all of the advanced metrics available, but there's still no concrete number we can look at. Until then, people will use team record combined with stats as an estimate.

[WarriorGM]

I'm actually curious. Can anyone provide an argument for why record should factor into MVP voting without just descriptively pointing out "thats how it's always been?" I've never heard a convincing argument.

There's no team sport where one player effects winning as much as in the NBA, so winning is seen as directly correlated to the best players impact. You also won't win MVP unless you are considered a top 3 player on the year at worst (there might be a random example here and there, but those would be the exception to the rule).

It doesn't make sense though, because a players impact doesn't change based on wins. It's looking at the wrong thing to judge players and is honestly just lazy. I understand WHY people use it but it shouldn't be used.

Winning is the goal—not assists, not rebounds, not even points. There is no measure that accounts for all the factors involved in winning as well as actually winning.

From a practical perspective an award that goes to a winner will not end up looking as dumb as one that goes to someone who does not win. What will happen to the prestige of the award if it keeps going to a loser? Awards do not have much value on their own, they derive much of their value from the halo effect of being associated with success.

[Woodsanity]

Well......no. He's clearly a "good" defender at this point, but can we really stop with the "Jokic is the best defensive player in the league" stuff? We can talk about how he's putting together one of the best individual seasons ever without engaging in massive hyperbole simply because TPA and DBPM (lot to do with high rebounding numbers) yield some of these wonky defensive metric results.

Agreed but its still nice to see an improvement from poor defender, to averagish defender and now a clearly good defender.

[Hobo4President]

There's no team sport where one player effects winning as much as in the NBA, so winning is seen as directly correlated to the best players impact. You also won't win MVP unless you are considered a top 3 player on the year at worst (there might be a random example here and there, but those would be the exception to the rule).

It doesn't make sense though, because a players impact doesn't change based on wins. It's looking at the wrong thing to judge players and is honestly just lazy. I understand WHY people use it but it shouldn't be used.

Winning is the goal—not assists, not rebounds, not even points. There is no measure that accounts for all the factors involved in winning as well as actually winning.

From a practical perspective an award that goes to a winner will not end up looking as dumb as one that goes to someone who does not win. What will happen to the prestige of the award if it keeps going to a loser? Awards do not have much value on their own, they derive much of their value from the halo effect of being associated with success.

Sure winning is the goal but basing a players impact on record is absurd. All winning tells you is your team outscored another team. KD wouldn't be a worse player if you gave him a team full of d-leaguers, but people would judge him as so because their analysis is results based.

My problem with it isn't that it obscures the truth, my problem is it's not a valid method for rating players so it actively harms discussions.

Until the NBA is a 1v1 league that'll always be the case.

[BoatsNZones]

It doesn't make sense though, because a players impact doesn't change based on wins. It's looking at the wrong thing to judge players and is honestly just lazy. I understand WHY people use it but it shouldn't be used.

Winning is the goal—not assists, not rebounds, not even points. There is no measure that accounts for all the factors involved in winning as well as actually winning.

From a practical perspective an award that goes to a winner will not end up looking as dumb as one that goes to someone who does not win. What will happen to the prestige of the award if it keeps going to a loser? Awards do not have much value on their own, they derive much of their value from the halo effect of being associated with success.

Sure winning is the goal but basing a players impact on record is absurd. All winning tells you is your team outscored another team. KD wouldn't be a worse player if you gave him a team full of d-leaguers, but people would judge him as so because their analysis is results based.

My problem with it isn't that it obscures the truth, my problem is it's not a valid method for rating players so it actively harms discussions.

Until the NBA is a 1v1 league that'll always be the case.

Hence why teammates are always a monumental factor when discussing a teams preseason expectations. We then continue to adjust if there were mid-season injuries. For example in this season, even though the Nuggets and Warriors were projected to have the same record, midseason injuries have allowed for him to have an MVP narrative if he can even pull his team to say the 4 seed (an extremely low seed for an MVP, but one that has been adjusted for him based on his current situation). The Morant-less Grizzlies are the 4 seed, it's not asking the world.

[Ron Swanson]

Record isn't everything and despite the inaccurate declarations of some on here, the MVP hasn't gone to a player on the #1 seed nearly half the time (9 out of 20) in the last two decades (hell, Jokic won it with only the 5th best record last season). But are we really at the point where we're all but dismissing the actual outcome of games in favor of predictive models/metrics?

I mean, that's absurd, and the MVP would become nothing more than a fantasy sports award given too often to the superstar that's forced to carry a bad roster and rack up gaudy box and plus-minus numbers. That doesn't accurately reflect actual value any more than the traditional criteria which, surprise, voters have actually gotten right the vast majority of the time:

https://towardsdatascience.com/nba-mvp-predictor-c700e50e0917

[MrBigShot]

My MVP rankings rn:

1a. KD
1b. Jokic
3. Giannis
4. Curry