2021-22 NBA MVP Discussion (Pt. 1)

[maxwellcu]

I’d be curious to know what the “Jokic isn’t one of the best players in the NBA” crowd thought about Minnesota KG. Pretty sure I heard a lot about “warrior” and “heart”, but what exactly did he accomplish before going to Boston that Jokic hasn’t already bettered?

[God Squad]

KD vs Curry vs Jokic.
It'll be one of these three with Curry and KD likly leading the races. But Jokic has the stats to back up his claim, he just needs to improve team record.

[B-easy]

If jokic keeps this up he will have the goat statistical season.

[GSP]

KD vs Curry vs Jokic.
It'll be one of these three with Curry and KD likly leading the races. But Jokic has the stats to back up his claim, he just needs to improve team record.

Wouldn't rule out Giannis we still got alotttt of ball left

[God Squad]

KD vs Curry vs Jokic.
It'll be one of these three with Curry and KD likly leading the races. But Jokic has the stats to back up his claim, he just needs to improve team record.

Wouldn't rule out Giannis we still got alotttt of ball left

Yeah he's in there somewhere. I'm not sure he's as high as Curry or KD. I'd even give the edge to Jokic in terms of raw/analytics. As of 12/17/2021 I got
1a. Curry
1b. KD
2. Jokic
3. Giannis

I'd personally lean Curry, but I understand KD because the Nets are depleted and KD still willing them to victory. But again, Jokic has the analytics to back him up.

[Educator]

Durant is the MVP.

I really don't see any argument for Curry over Durant. Durant is having a better statistical season and the difference in wins is negligible, especially considering that the West is the much weaker conference.

Harden has not been Harden. Durant is absolutely carrying the Nets.

[moderndarwin]

And what do the Warriors really have?

These pieces are all good pieces but they all only become great pieces because of Steph.

Bjelica
Looney
Wiggins
Iggy (old)
Lee
GP2
JTA

These aren’t some world beater names support cast. They are all amplified because of Steph and the belief that his ability drives. No one was talking about Iggy on Miami and it seemed like career was coming to a close. GP2 wasn’t even in the league and even now don’t think any ones pickkkg up the phone to try to get Dame Lee or JTA and give up any solid rotational player.

[Ron Swanson]

Literally all of the Top-4 candidates are dealing with injuries/COVID absences at this point. Curry (Klay), KD (Kyrie, Joe Harris), Jokic (Murray, Porter), and Giannis (Lopez, DiVincenzo, Middleton). Don't think the MVP race should keep turning into a giant pity party of "whose roster sucks more". Everyone's dealing with it right now.

[Dutchball97]

Durant is the MVP.

I really don't see any argument for Curry over Durant. Durant is having a better statistical season and the difference in wins is negligible, especially considering that the West is the much weaker conference.

Harden has not been Harden. Durant is absolutely carrying the Nets.

Curry leads KD in EPM (8.1 to 5.6), RAPTOR (8.4 to 5.4) and LEBRON (5.2 to 3.4). Curry even has a 7.8 to 6.8 edge over KD in the purely boxscore focused BPM if you think +- and player tracking are somehow too convoluted. The only 'statistical' advantage KD has is in the raw boxscore and even that is a pretty small advantage.

You've got something there with Harden as all the metrics I mentioned have him as a fringe All-Star with nearly identical impact as Draymond Green, he's definitely not been up to his MVP standards this year. The west being a much weaker conference is once again based on seemingly nothing and pretty blatantly not true.

[Alatan]

Literally all of the Top-4 candidates are dealing with injuries/COVID absences at this point. Curry (Klay), KD (Kyrie, Joe Harris), Jokic (Murray, Porter), and Giannis (Lopez, DiVincenzo, Middleton). Don't think the MVP race should keep turning into a giant pity party of "whose roster sucks more". Everyone's dealing with it right now.

Its not who is missing but who is left to play.

Since the MVP was historically avarded to the player with godly stats on on of the best teams, i dont expect Jokic to win it even as he is carying the hardest right now.

[MindState]

Curry has not played well for the past 3 weeks straight. While the Warriors still have the #1 seed, they will start losing some games soon due to the covid outbreak, if they drop to #3 and Curry is still in his slump, he might fall behind KD permanently.

He needs to break out of his slump and fast with some big memorable games. I cant even remember the last time he had a good game.

[Freighttrain]

1.KD
2.Steph
3.Giannis

then guys like Jokic, Lebron, etc,. Can't put Jokic higher than 4/5 with that record

[Big J]

Curry clutch.

[moderndarwin]

Curry has not played well for the past 3 weeks straight. While the Warriors still have the #1 seed, they will start losing some games soon due to the covid outbreak, if they drop to #3 and Curry is still in his slump, he might fall behind KD permanently.

He needs to break out of his slump and fast with some big memorable games. I cant even remember the last time he had a good game.

While I don’t disagree his team is still winning usually. Just shows how much impact he has out there because the only thing he’s not doing is hitting shots with the same efficiency. The gravity he’s creating is still way better than any other player and the result is Dubs are winning by 2-10 instead of by 10-20

[BoatsNZones]

1.KD
2.Steph
3.Giannis

then guys like Jokic, Lebron, etc,. Can't put Jokic higher than 4/5 with that record

Lol let's not skate over the fact that you're trying to couple Lebron with Jokic right now. He has been nowhere close to Jokic's level, has a better squad (with a similar record) and has missed >1/3rd of the season. Get that nonsense outta here my man.

It's Curry, KD, Giannis and Jokic. The first 3 clearly have better MVP bids, but Jokic has been the best player on the season and is deserving of the top 4 (with nobody else close) so long as he has that squad holding a winning record.

[Freighttrain]

1.KD
2.Steph
3.Giannis

then guys like Jokic, Lebron, etc,. Can't put Jokic higher than 4/5 with that record

Lol let's not skate over the fact that you're trying to couple Lebron with Jokic right now. He has been nowhere close to Jokic's level, has a better squad (with a similar record) and has missed >1/3rd of the season. Get that nonsense outta here my man.

It's Curry, KD, Giannis and Jokic. The first 3 clearly have better MVP bids, but Jokic has been the best player on the season and is deserving of the top 4 (with nobody else close) so long as he has that squad holding a winning record.

I could've put Chris Paul instead of LeBron, that's what etc means. LeBron had a stinker tonight but he played great in all the previous 10 games or so. But that was beside my point. Jokic doesn't get to be in the top 3 with his team record the way it is. Who cares about 4th of 5th in an MVP convo anyway.

[JN61]

Curry has not played well for the past 3 weeks straight. While the Warriors still have the #1 seed, they will start losing some games soon due to the covid outbreak, if they drop to #3 and Curry is still in his slump, he might fall behind KD permanently.

He needs to break out of his slump and fast with some big memorable games. I cant even remember the last time he had a good game.

You can pretty much extend this to 4 weeks by now (21.11-17.12):
Last 13 games: 38.9% FG, 38.9% 3pt, 88.9% FT.
With raw stats of: 24.1 ppg, 4.8 TRB, 5.5 AST

Numbers are even more horrid if you look last 9 games:
35.4% FG, 35.3% 3PT, 90% FT. 23.4 PTS, 4.9 TRB, 4.4 AST. 3.7 TOV. His assist to turnover ratio is terrible and he is shooting really horridly considering he adds nothing to the game but his shooting and scoring ability. You could live for a while with shooting slumps like that if he had ability to create for others but he has just twice broken over 5 assists in this span of games.

And before the sicko fans jump on me. In this span of game his +/- is half what the team's total is so he is actively hurting his team by making them worse.

How are people still having Curry even top 3 on MVP list is beyond me. Just having good record is not means to be in MVP discussion. See CP3.
To me it is:
Durant
Jokic/Giannis
Curry

[mademan]

I think the Nuggets end up with HCA. Is that gonna be enough for Jokic to win if he really does end up leading the league in every major advanced stat? The dude is legit competing for an all-defensive team too, tho i dont think he'll ever make it. Hard to overcome a rep

[therealbig3]

The Warriors have the best defense in the NBA, and a lot of that has to do with Draymond Green being a beast again.

Yes the Warriors have a great offense, but they win games when their offense struggles, and it’s because they have an elite defense…and this has always been the case, going back to their championship runs. The offense routinely sputtered in the playoffs, and they still won because their defense was legit.

That’s always been my biggest issue with giving Curry the overwhelming amount of credit for the Warriors success. The main thing he’s responsible for (the offense) has historically been inconsistent and not up to par come playoff time, and they still win on the back of a great defense, which Curry has a negligible contribution to.

The main difference between Curry and someone like Nash back in the day is that Curry has a great defense behind him, and Nash didn’t. That’s really it.

Green honestly has just as much of an MVP case as Curry, their defense has been better than their offense.

[Texas Chuck]

The Warriors have the best defense in the NBA, and a lot of that has to do with Draymond Green being a beast again.

Yes the Warriors have a great offense, but they win games when their offense struggles, and it’s because they have an elite defense…and this has always been the case, going back to their championship runs. The offense routinely sputtered in the playoffs, and they still won because their defense was legit.

That’s always been my biggest issue with giving Curry the overwhelming amount of credit for the Warriors success. The main thing he’s responsible for (the offense) has historically been inconsistent and not up to par come playoff time, and they still win on the back of a great defense, which Curry has a negligible contribution to.

The main difference between Curry and someone like Nash back in the day is that Curry has a great defense behind him, and Nash didn’t. That’s really it.

Green honestly has just as much of an MVP case as Curry, their defense has been better than their offense.

The counter to that is Curry is so special offensively that you can play such a defensive heavy lineup and score enough to win. Dallas made a similar shift around Dirk once Nash left and look at that championship season. Dallas started Chandler, Marion, DeShawn, and Kidd around him. That's about as limited an offensive lineup as we've ever seen on a champion. But it worked because Dirk's gravity was so enormous the offense was good enough. Same thing with the Warriors. Outside the KD years, this was never a team with a ton of offensive talent. That only works because Curry is so special.

I've never understood that argument. Gets used to diminish Iverson as well. Philly won with defense and AI wasn't a big part of that and he was inefficient so he sucked. Yeah okay. But also his ability to maintain that offensive load night after night allowed them to play that strong defensive lineup. Something they couldn't have done without him and survived.

Just like Rudy Gobert needs to get some credit for the Jazz offense outside of just his screen assists and rim running. His presence allows them to play lineups with a lot of weak defenders and still be good defensively.