2016-17 MVP Discussion Thread

[warriorschamps]

LeBron should win it if he can maintain 24-9-9 with 50% FG and Cavs being 1st seed. If not then I would go with Harden or Westbrook as long as Rockets or Thunder are top 3 in he west.

That's highly unlikely. Barring injury the top 3 in the West will almost certainly be Warriors, Clippers and Spurs.

[dautjazz]

Harden is putting up ridiculous numbers but as of now his team his team is only half a game ahead of Memphis, they could still miss the playoffs. No way a lower seed team produces an MVP.

OKC started red hot but are coming back down to earth. I would say OKC need 50+ wins for Westbrook to get an MVP.

Lebron is putting up 23.4ppg 9.3rpg 9apg with a 7-1 record. I like his chances if he can keep these rebounds and assists up around 9.

The Clippers are playing great, but I don't know if any of their players could make a push at the MVP.

[sixerhp3]

For me, Stauskas

[Alonzo_Morning]

For me, Stauskas

Nic rocks

[stayeduptolate]

Curry keeps playing like he has the last 3 games and they win 70 games him or Durant have a chance.

[Dadouv47]

To me harden & CP3 are more deserving right now but in the end it will be lebron against westbrook (and CP3 as outsider). Westbrook if OKC overperformes and gets 50+ wins, otherwise it will be Lebron ( or CP3 if clippers can maintain what they are doing).

Kawhi is not as popular as he should be and the spurs are struggling a bit, and Harden lost his credibility last year so it would be difficult for him to get him. Durant/Curry will split too many votes and feel most won't want to vote for any GSW player.

[alebaba]

Curry keeps playing like he has the last 3 games and they win 70 games him or Durant have a chance.

no, they will never win an mvp if they are in the same team.

[The411]

1. CP3
2. Demar Derozan
3. Kevin Durant
4. Kawaii
5. Steph Curry

[Tigersrule]

1. CP3
2. Demar Derozan
3. Kevin Durant
4. Kawaii
5. Steph Curry

1. Lebron/CP3
2. Demar
3. Kawhi
4.KD/Curry
Cavs and Clippers best record in the NBA.

[TurboTitan]

CP3.

[HotRocks34]

1. LeBron James (#1 seed)
2. Chris Paul (#1 seed)
3. Blake Griffin (#1 seed)
4. Steph Curry (#2 seed)
5. DeMar DeRozan (#2 seed)


Paul and Griffin hurt each other because it's unclear who is the MVP of the team, so you would expect them to split award votes. Both have stellar On/Off Net Rating numbers that are nearly equivalent (+23.5 Paul and +23.4 Griffin). Paul has meteoric advanced stats but his per game stats, including minutes per game, are less impressive.

Unlike Paul and Griffin, LeBron's two co-stars have terrible On/Off Net Rating numbers. This figures to help LeBron's candidacy, as Love is at -14.1 On/Off and Irving is at -15.9. Without LeBron on the court, the Cavs team doesn't work. LeBron's On/Off Net Rating is +23.0 at the moment.

Curry/Durant have similar issues as Paul/Griffin. Who is the best on the team? Durant has better advanced stats while Curry has the better On/Off figure.

DeRozan has great per game stats and great advanced stats. His problem is that his On/Off Net Rating is negative, meaning that the Raptors are actually better with him off the court per 100 possessions.

[Wargreymon]

Top 10 Player Efficiency Rating/W-L record as of 14/11/2016

1 Chris Paul, LAC (9-1) 31.92
2 DeMar DeRozan, TOR (7-2) 31.42
3 Russell Westbrook, OKC (6-4) 31.41
4 James Harden, HOU (5-4) 31.20
5 Anthony Davis, NO (1-9) 30.95
6 Kevin Durant, GS (8-2) 29.38
7 Kawhi Leonard, SA (7-3) 29.24
8 Jimmy Butler, CHI (6-4) 28.26
9 Damian Lillard, POR (7-4) 28.08
10 Kemba Walker, CHA (6-3) 27.75

It would appear Chris Paul is the MVP at the moment.

[Dame Lizard]

Top 10 Player Efficiency Rating/W-L record as of 14/11/2016

1 Chris Paul, LAC (9-1) 31.92
2 DeMar DeRozan, TOR (7-2) 31.42
3 Russell Westbrook, OKC (6-4) 31.41
4 James Harden, HOU (5-4) 31.20
5 Anthony Davis, NO (1-9) 30.95
6 Kevin Durant, GS (8-2) 29.38
7 Kawhi Leonard, SA (7-3) 29.24
8 Jimmy Butler, CHI (6-4) 28.26
9 Damian Lillard, POR (7-4) 28.08
10 Kemba Walker, CHA (6-3) 27.75

It would appear Chris Paul is the MVP at the moment.

CP3 really is playing himself out of it- he's not quite getting enough minutes to put up the raw numbers, despite what all the other stats say.

[QRich3]

1. LeBron James (#1 seed)
2. Chris Paul (#1 seed)
3. Blake Griffin (#1 seed)
4. Steph Curry (#2 seed)
5. DeMar DeRozan (#2 seed)


Paul and Griffin hurt each other because it's unclear who is the MVP of the team, so you would expect them to split award votes. Both have stellar On/Off Net Rating numbers that are nearly equivalent (+23.5 Paul and +23.4 Griffin). Paul has meteoric advanced stats but his per game stats, including minutes per game, are less impressive.

Unlike Paul and Griffin, LeBron's two co-stars have terrible On/Off Net Rating numbers. This figures to help LeBron's candidacy, as Love is at -14.1 On/Off and Irving is at -15.9. Without LeBron on the court, the Cavs team doesn't work. LeBron's On/Off Net Rating is +23.0 at the moment.

Curry/Durant have similar issues as Paul/Griffin. Who is the best on the team? Durant has better advanced stats while Curry has the better On/Off figure.

DeRozan has great per game stats and great advanced stats. His problem is that his On/Off Net Rating is negative, meaning that the Raptors are actually better with him off the court per 100 possessions.

I think you're reading too much into on/off stats on a 10 game sample size. Love and Irving having those numbers literally just means the Cavs happened to get outscored in a game or two while Lebron was sitting down. NetRtg is already a fishy enough stat for singular players with a season worth of games to analyze, let alone 10 games. A week ago, the Clippers bench had pretty much the same NetRtg as the starters, they're now 20-something points-per-100 behind. It wildly changes game by game for now.

I do agree that Paul having Griffin will hurt his chances, but Lebron is probably still dragging some voter fatigue, and voters will probably put too much weight in his PPG which are down from previous years (so far).

I still think Curry or Durant are gonna take it.

[Bad Gatorade]

Disclaimer - this isn't my MVP ranking by any means, but I thought i'd share.

I decided to create a simple, very crude metric that compiles PER, WS/48 and BPM into a single stat. I transformed all of the metrics onto an equally weighted, simple scale, where the mean is 0, and each rough benchmark is 1 point - a PER of 15 = 0, 20 = 1, 25 = 2 etc. 30 PER, 0.300 WS and 9 BPM all contribute a "3" in this ranking, so it kind of emulates the scale that RPM is on.

Generally, WS/48 and BPM alone do a decentjob of imitating RAPM. In fact, when you estimate RAPM using the 3 stats, PER comes up as a slight negative (yet almost negligible to the overall figure). However, I chose to include PER because of the adjustment that PER has for USG (which semi-reflects the desired adjustment many people would make for offensive primacy). I didn't use any team adjustment - WS/48 and BPM probably have larger than desired team adjustments at this point in the season anyway, so I didn't think it would be too fruitful.

Anywho, the numbers -

Chris Paul\paulch01 13.2
Russell Westbrook\westbru01 11.4
James Harden\hardeja01 10.5
Jimmy Butler\butleji01 8.2
Kawhi Leonard\leonaka01 8.2
Kemba Walker\walkeke02 8.1
George Hill\hillge01 7.4
Kevin Durant\duranke01 7.4
Anthony Davis\davisan02 7.1
DeMar DeRozan\derozde01 7.0
Damian Lillard\lillada01 6.9
Stephen Curry\curryst01 6.6
Giannis Antetokounmpo\antetgi01 6.6
Blake Griffin\griffbl01 6.2
Dwight Howard\howardw01 6.1
LeBron James\jamesle01 5.9

Now, I don't necessarily agree with these rankings (at the very least, LeBron should be higher, no doubt about it), but I suppose that they paint a decent box-score picture of productivity at the very least, with a minor stat-incorporated team adjustment. Far from resolute, but an interesting data set nonetheless.

Jimmy Butler might very well be the current "underrated player of the year."

[The411]

Lebron hasn't put up great numbers relative to other candidates and that is born out bin both his regular numbers and advanced metrics. I didn't include Davis, Westbrook, or Harden because their teams are top 3 in conference.

[Madhouse]

11/14

1 DeRozan
2 Lebron
3 Paul
4 Curry/Durant
5 Leonard

[HotRocks34]

1. LeBron James (#1 seed)
2. Chris Paul (#1 seed)
3. Blake Griffin (#1 seed)
4. Steph Curry (#2 seed)
5. DeMar DeRozan (#2 seed)


Paul and Griffin hurt each other because it's unclear who is the MVP of the team, so you would expect them to split award votes. Both have stellar On/Off Net Rating numbers that are nearly equivalent (+23.5 Paul and +23.4 Griffin). Paul has meteoric advanced stats but his per game stats, including minutes per game, are less impressive.

Unlike Paul and Griffin, LeBron's two co-stars have terrible On/Off Net Rating numbers. This figures to help LeBron's candidacy, as Love is at -14.1 On/Off and Irving is at -15.9. Without LeBron on the court, the Cavs team doesn't work. LeBron's On/Off Net Rating is +23.0 at the moment.

Curry/Durant have similar issues as Paul/Griffin. Who is the best on the team? Durant has better advanced stats while Curry has the better On/Off figure.

DeRozan has great per game stats and great advanced stats. His problem is that his On/Off Net Rating is negative, meaning that the Raptors are actually better with him off the court per 100 possessions.

I think you're reading too much into on/off stats on a 10 game sample size. Love and Irving having those numbers literally just means the Cavs happened to get outscored in a game or two while Lebron was sitting down. NetRtg is already a fishy enough stat for singular players with a season worth of games to analyze, let alone 10 games. A week ago, the Clippers bench had pretty much the same NetRtg as the starters, they're now 20-something points-per-100 behind. It wildly changes game by game for now.

I do agree that Paul having Griffin will hurt his chances, but Lebron is probably still dragging some voter fatigue, and voters will probably put too much weight in his PPG which are down from previous years (so far).

I still think Curry or Durant are gonna take it.

The issue with the Cavs and LeBron being off the court runs back into last year. Particularly as regards Irving (more than Love). Kyrie had a negative On/Off NRTG last year, as well.

I think Durant has the hardest case to make of any of the contenders. How do you prove your value on a team that won 73 games without you last year? It's going to be tough, I would think. Curry likely encounters voter fatigue and the "Karl Malone Effect," which is winning the MVP and then failing on the big stage (Curry has not won the Finals MVP either of the last two Finals, including when the Warriors won the title).

Anyways, back to stats. From NBAWowy, let's take a look at how the top 3 teams in the league perform given different on/off statuses of their top stars.


CAVS
Irving and Love on; LeBron off =====> 108 ORTG; 133 DRTG; -25 NRTG
Irving on; Love and LeBron off =====> 105 ORTG; 134 DRTG; -29 NRTG
Love on; Irving and LeBron off =====> 137 ORTG; 114 DRTG; +23 NRTG
LeBron on; Irving and Love off =====> 135 ORTG; 096 DRTG; +39 NRTG

WARRIORS
Durant on; Curry off ==============> 105 ORTG; 105 DRTG; +00 NRTG
Curry on; Durant off ==============> 115 ORTG; 096 DRTG; +19 NRTG

CLIPPERS
Griffin on; Paul off ===============> 094 ORTG; 105 DRTG; -11 NRTG
Paul on; Griffin off ===============> 089 ORTG; 068 DRTG; +21 NRTG


Again the data favors LeBron. Which is to say that LeBron relies less (needs them less) on the co-stars on his team than do stars on other teams in the MVP hunt.

LeBron without Love/Irving is a juggernaut Cavs team. Durant without Curry is an average Warriors team. Curry without Durant is a really good Warriors team. Griffin without Paul is a bad Clippers team. Paul without Griffin is a really good Clippers team.

The anomaly in the stats is Kevin Love. But I'm not surprised, given that Love is having a resurgent year. Minny Love was a stats monster when the offense ran through him. The problem for the Cavs seems to be how to play Love without Irving so that Love facilitates the offense rather than Irving. It's seemed to work better that way this season, so far.

Given this extra data, I would re-do my above ballot like this:

1. LeBron (#1 seed)
2. Paul (#1 seed)
3. Curry (#2 seed)

Not sure about 4 and 5. Would need to run similar data on DeRozan.

[HotRocks34]

One other quick thing with LeBron and the Cavs.

It makes intuitive sense that LeBron does not rely heavily on Irving and Love because Irving's and Love's defense (usually) sucks. And that poor defense affects the Cavs' overall NRTG when Irving and Love are on the court.

The reason why LeBron has a +39 NRTG with the other two off the court, and Love does not have such a good NRTG, is because LeBron is playing excellent defense while on the court and Love is not playing excellent defense. Even though Love, without LeBron and Kyrie on the court, actually has a superior ORTG compared with LeBron's ORTG minus the other two stars.

That is, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love are 1-way players, in general. So when you have them off the court (as was the case late in the Cavs' win against the Hornets yesterday), you actually get a boost because your defense improves.

[Johnny Firpo]

Curry keeps playing like he has the last 3 games and they win 70 games him or Durant have a chance.

no, they will never win an mvp if they are in the same team.

Nonsense, they said the same thing about Lebron, and he won two MVP's after joining the Heat. They are probably not winning this year, but the voters will give them a chance next year.