1973 MVP

[uberhikari]

I just realized that Dave Cowens was MVP in 1973 over Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Can anybody explain why?

Kareem averaged: 30-16-5 on 58 TS%. He also led the league on WS, OWS, and WS/48. This seems like one of the best RS seasons ever. And the Bucks won 60 games.

Meanwhile, Cowens averaged: 21-16-4 on 48 TS%. Although he did lead the league in DWS and BOS won 68 games.

Moreover, the Bucks also had a higher SRS (7.35 vs 7.84) but it looks like BOS had some win luck because they overperformed their expected win/loss by 7 games.

Were those 8 extra games BOS won really worth the huge disparity in dominance between KAJ and Cowens?

[Jaivl]

I just realized that Dave Cowens was MVP in 1973 over Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Can anybody explain why?

Kareem averaged: 30-16-5 on 58 TS%. He also led the league on WS, OWS, and WS/48. This seems like one of the best RS seasons ever. And the Bucks won 60 games.

Meanwhile, Cowens averaged: 21-16-4 on 48 TS%. Although he did lead the league in DWS and BOS won 68 games.

Moreover, the Bucks also had a higher SRS (7.35 vs 7.84) but it looks like BOS had some win luck because they overperformed their expected win/loss by 7 games.

Were those 8 extra games BOS won really worth the huge disparity in dominance between KAJ and Cowens?

I mean, you kinda answered yourself. Yes, they apparently were for the voters.

I'd say Kareem was easily the better player, though.

[Ron Swanson]

It's almost always either 2001 Iverson or 2011 Rose that get brought up as the worst MVP winners, but I'm surprised this one doesn't get talked about more. Cowens, simply put, had zero case over Kareem in '73 other than the most simplistic and lazy of criteria (team wins), but as has already been mentioned, the Bucks also won 60-games that year with a better SRS and net-rating than Boston. For a modern comparison, this would have been like if they voted Rudy Gobert or Donovan Mitchell over Jokic for the 2020-21 MVP, and even then I would think that Gobert would actually have a better statistical case over Jokic than Cowens did over Kareem. People can complain about how the MVP award has become too "narrative" driven, but the voters are still better today than they were 30+ years ago when the lack of data/statistics led to way more flagrantly unworthy award winners (looking at you Alvin Robertson and Michael Cooper...).

[Doctor MJ]

It's almost always either 2001 Iverson or 2011 Rose that get brought up as the worst MVP winners, but I'm surprised this one doesn't get talked about more. Cowens, simply put, had zero case over Kareem in '73 other than the most simplistic and lazy of criteria (team wins), but as has already been mentioned, the Bucks also won 60-games that year with a better SRS and net-rating than Boston. For a modern comparison, this would have been like if they voted Rudy Gobert or Donovan Mitchell over Jokic for the 2020-21 MVP, and even then I would think that Gobert would actually have a better statistical case over Jokic than Cowens did over Kareem. People can complain about how the MVP award has become too "narrative" driven, but the voters are still better today than they were 30+ years ago when the lack of data/statistics led to way more flagrantly unworthy award winners (looking at you Alvin Robertson and Michael Cooper...).

I think everything you and Jaivl are saying about the 1973 MVP voters being dead wrong and us being able to clearly identify how they got it wrong is correct...

but in Cowen's defense, while he shouldn't have won it over Kareem, I think he probably was more valuable than Iverson or Rose in their MVP years.

[Colbinii]

I think both with Wes Unseld winning in 1969 and Cowens in 1973, we saw the NBA voters having voter fatigue and really looking for the "next best thing" after the Russell/Wilt era. There was voter fatigue in 1973 after Kareem winning in 1971 and 1972 and in 1969 with Wilt winning in 1966, 1967 and 1968.

[capfan33]

I just realized that Dave Cowens was MVP in 1973 over Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Can anybody explain why?

Kareem averaged: 30-16-5 on 58 TS%. He also led the league on WS, OWS, and WS/48. This seems like one of the best RS seasons ever. And the Bucks won 60 games.

Meanwhile, Cowens averaged: 21-16-4 on 48 TS%. Although he did lead the league in DWS and BOS won 68 games.

Moreover, the Bucks also had a higher SRS (7.35 vs 7.84) but it looks like BOS had some win luck because they overperformed their expected win/loss by 7 games.

Were those 8 extra games BOS won really worth the huge disparity in dominance between KAJ and Cowens?

Voter fatigue and the 8 extra games, most of which can be explained away by the Celtics having 2 bottom-feeding expansion teams in their division, hence the SRS difference.

I've brought it up before, but it's easily one of the most egregious MVP choices ever, theres 0 argument for Cowens over Kareem. I'm not even sure Cowens was a top-3 player that season.

[RCM88x]

At the time I'm sure players didn't wanna keep giving it to the same guy and many probably felt that winning games was the best gauge of success as they played the same position and a similar role.

Obviously it was an incorrect choice in hindsight, as was thinking the Earth was the center of the solar system. But it's hard to blame them considering the information they had available at the time and the credibility of the voting pool to decide such things.

[-Luke-]

Tiny Archibald also had 11 more first-place votes than Kareem (though Kareem had more votes overall). Tiny averaged 34 ppg and 11.4 apg. But his Kings only had a 36-46 record.

[Doctor MJ]

I think both with Wes Unseld winning in 1969 and Cowens in 1973, we saw the NBA voters having voter fatigue and really looking for the "next best thing" after the Russell/Wilt era. There was voter fatigue in 1973 after Kareem winning in 1971 and 1972 and in 1969 with Wilt winning in 1966, 1967 and 1968.

I think with both Unseld & Cowens what we're seeing is the basketball world thinking of value in terms of Bill Russell, which is quite literally the opposite of what happens today where people refused to consider Rudy Gobert for MVP on the grounds that he's not an offensive star.

I think the Unseld in '69 pick is more defensible because it really was a year without any great candidate. If you look at the other guys in the top 5 it's really crazy:

2. Willis Reed
3. Billy Cunningham
4. Bill Russell
5. Elgin Baylor

Reed & Cunningham aren't guys who are generally seen as drastically better than Unseld at this time.

Russell - Celtics finished 4th of 7 teams in their conference

Baylor - shouldn't have gotten any consideration from anyone. Period. The entire Laker team massively underperformed their talent, and Baylor being the leading shooter on the team when that really should have stopped permanently more than a half decade earlier is part of the equation for why.

[70sFan]

Baylor - shouldn't have gotten any consideration from anyone. Period. The entire Laker team massively underperformed their talent, and Baylor being the leading shooter on the team when that really should have stopped permanently more than a half decade earlier is part of the equation for why.

Wow, didn't realize that Baylor finished 5th in MVP voting during that year, that's insane He's at best 3rd best player on his team and likely outside of top 15 (maybe even top 20?) at that point.

[prolific passer]

Weren't the players still voting at that time? If so they probably had their reasons like they did in 62 with Russell.

[DQuinn1575]

It's almost always either 2001 Iverson or 2011 Rose that get brought up as the worst MVP winners, but I'm surprised this one doesn't get talked about more. Cowens, simply put, had zero case over Kareem in '73 other than the most simplistic and lazy of criteria (team wins), but as has already been mentioned, the Bucks also won 60-games that year with a better SRS and net-rating than Boston. For a modern comparison, this would have been like if they voted Rudy Gobert or Donovan Mitchell over Jokic for the 2020-21 MVP, and even then I would think that Gobert would actually have a better statistical case over Jokic than Cowens did over Kareem. People can complain about how the MVP award has become too "narrative" driven, but the voters are still better today than they were 30+ years ago when the lack of data/statistics led to way more flagrantly unworthy award winners (looking at you Alvin Robertson and Michael Cooper...).

It's not like Gobert; it's a case where the team had the second best record in history, and one of the best players in the league got the mvp. It's more like Durant or Curry winning in 2017.

The players did the voting and it was a pretty divided vote.

The Sporting News, who also used players's votes, had a Player of the Year and the winner was Nate Archibald.
Note Kareem was also All-NBA center, picked by the media.
Additionally, TSN had the players pick their All-NBA teams. The results at center were:

Jabbar 114
Cowens 42
Wilt around 15 (almost 100 less than Kareem)
So the players who were the MVP voters voted Kareem the best player at center.

The league had picked Unseld and Reed in prior years, Cowens & Reed stats were relatively close, and both were considered good defenders.

No one was arguing that Kareem wasn't the better player - they were defining what they thought MVP was.

[Doctor MJ]

Weren't the players still voting at that time? If so they probably had their reasons like they did in 62 with Russell.

Well in 1962, their reason was that Russell was an obscenely valuable player, so this was clearly not at all the same thing.

Here's my theory:

1. Despite the disappointment of the Lakers regular season performance, they still had an elite record which meant it made sense to consider someone for MVP from the team.

2. West missed a chunk of the season.

3. Wilt was the new arrival and the team didn't take the leap forward with his presence - plus word had probably gotten all around the league that Wilt and the coach weren't getting along.

4. There was clearly a lot of sentiment toward Baylor who was on the last legs of his career. I remember that the Laker organization had made very clear that after the Lakers won the championship it was Baylor who was to be interviewed first. I feel like it was a bit like when the Denver Broncos won the Super Bowl with Terrell Davis (running back) being the best plyer on the team but with John Elway still being seen as the face of the franchise.

5. As was the case for basically the entirety of the back half of Baylor's career, it really did seem like as long as Baylor was still getting a lot of PPG, it was taken as a given that he was among the best handful of players in the league, and thus not egregious to consider him for something like MVP.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Weren't th3 players voting at the time?

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