2012-13 Player of the Year Voting Thread (LeBron wins)

[nunemouse]

The Spurs were a "lucky bounce" away from winning the championship in Game 6. About half of these lists don't have a Spurs player on them. The Heat had a 1.X% chance of winning game 6 (don't take this too serious, I think i read it on some ESPN twitter. It is just supposed to highlight the "against all odds" nature of their win). If that ball had bounced different and Bosh wouldnt have got that rebound, and Ray wouldnt have made that shot, would you have put a Spurs player in the top 5?

[B_Creamy]

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. James Harden

Taking this spot as a placeholder. May edit my choices before voting ends.

[ElGee]

2013 RPOY Ballot

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. Tim Duncan

Further explanations later, time pending.

[GSP]

Lebron
Cp3
Kd
Tim
Curry

[ardee]

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. Kobe Bryant

Honorable Mention: Tim Duncan, James Harden, Tony Parker, Russell Westbrook

[TheRobin]

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. Kobe Bryant

Honorable Mention: Tim Duncan, James Harden, Tony Parker, Russell Westbrook

They need to take your vote away.

[ronnymac2]

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. Deron Williams

Super-HM: James Harden (RealBig3 convinced me about Deron)

HM: Paul George, Dwight Howard, Carmelo Anthony



Russell Westbrook would have definitely made my top 5 with his normal playoffs and health.

Kobe Bryant is useless to me this season. You get injured and miss the entire playoffs, what's the point?

Dwyane Wade had a great NBA Finals, but he was atrocious in the majority of the Indiana series (and the two series before), which leads me to believe he was injured to the point that he couldn't up his playing level consistently. He was hurting the majority of the entire season (playoffs included). He's a great player who sucked it up and gave it his all in the Finals, and I admire that, but it's not enough even in a weak year. ECF went 7 games, so it's not like Miami didn't need Wade.

[Doctor MJ]

The Spurs were a "lucky bounce" away from winning the championship in Game 6. About half of these lists don't have a Spurs player on them. The Heat had a 1.X% chance of winning game 6 (don't take this too serious, I think i read it on some ESPN twitter. It is just supposed to highlight the "against all odds" nature of their win). If that ball had bounced different and Bosh wouldnt have got that rebound, and Ray wouldnt have made that shot, would you have put a Spurs player in the top 5?

Put it another way:

No Spur were in the top 5 of MVP voting, and the Spurs pre-finals didn't do anything in the playoffs they weren't supposed to do. Should it be a given that they move into the top 5 simply because they put up a good fight in the next series?

[Doctor MJ]

Vote:

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. Tony Parker

LeBron: Not necessary to expound here but sufficed to say he's an all-timer of the highest degree.

Durant: Felt like this was this was the year Durant really took it to MVP levels. People will knock him for his team's falloff after Westbrook, and obviously it would be better if that hadn't happened, but OKC is built around the combination of the two and Westbrook's a great player. Fall off should be expected. And ftr, I think the falloff would be worse if they had lost Durant instead, though it might be that against a team defense like Memphis the ball handler is the most important piece.

Paul: Best guard in the game by a good margin.

Now it gets interesting.

Curry: I'm worried about overrating Curry here based on some impressive stuff in the playoffs, particularly because it's not like he set the world on fire at all times. Still, this was a guy with an absolutely striking game in the regular season that seemed to make an impossibly primitive offensive strategy not only okay, but actually effective. Then come he got put in a very different role, and did amazing things there to the point of being the only team other than Miami to really scare the Spurs.

His shooting, his passing, his IQ, his unselfishness which didn't stop him from being aggressive when it was needed, all while playing extreme minutes. I watch him play and I just think that every team anywhere would want him in a leading role.

Parker: It was not easy even choosing which Spur I'd consider first. The way Duncan played late against Miami made it feel like it was the old Duncan Spurs again, but let's not kid ourselves, this is a very different Spur team than before and Duncan's resurrection wasn't simply possible because of the "leave it all on the court" aspect of the finals but also because of how the Spurs matched up against the Heat.

The telltale series for the Spurs this year was actually the WCF against the Grizzlies, seemingly a better version of the team that upset them two years ago totally tearing apart their offense...but this year the Spurs offense tore the Grizzlies defense to shreds. First and foremost this is about adaptations made by Pop, and the emergence of Kawhi is very nice, but Parker was at the front of this team as they did this.

Now, Parker wasn't in my Top 5 in the regular season. MVP of the Spurs he may be but he's not a real MVP candidate in my book because the team doesn't depend on any one player like you'd typically expect. So I reeeeally agonized over him, but the number of guys I could justify over him ended up being so small.

Honorable Mention:

Duncan, as mentioned before.

Melo: My debate for the 5th spot was really Parker vs Melo. Melo had my #5 spot going into the playoffs, and I don't actually think it's fair to totally write him off based on the playoffs. They went up against and Indy team that wasn't actually much worse than NY in the regular season, and got better in the playoffs specifically in an area that gave them a major matchup advantage over NY.

But when you look at the year even aside from the upset, the Knicks weren't really THAT great, and all of the forward progressed happened based on Melo getting shifted out of his preferred role. It's unfair to knock a guy purely because of how he might have played had circumstances been different, but when these "fortunate" circumstances involve the loss of a major talent and help lead to mismatches like what we saw in Indiana, I think it's easy to get over-excited about some periods of elite-looking play.

It's easy to knock Parker because of Pop, but the fact is I actually have more confidence in building something real around Parker than I do Melo. That's kind of a big deal. Even with all this I'd have a tough time siding with Parker if the team had only gotten where they were based on leaning on Melo for huge minutes, but they didn't. Melo this season didn't play that much more than Parker after all.

Still, I have no qualms for those picking Melo here. This was an important step forward for him, and with another step forward if he can do it, he truly becomes an MVP candidate.

Harden: I'm blown away by the Beard, but I think the criticisms we see of the all-Harden-all-the-time system in Houston were pretty dang on the nose. This plan as is won't scale to elite team play. I believe that Harden can grow and become someone who can have high primacy on an elite team, but he WILL have to grow.

Gasol: Now, here we have a guy who I'm just not confident enough in. I've got confidence that he's an excellent team player that could do well in lots of places, but anointing him a step beyond? It's wrong to say that all the attention on him is based on the playoffs - obviously - because he had a great regular season, but still, the first healthy Top 4 team they played in the playoffs absolutely destroyed the Grizzlie D...which was Gasol's claim to fame. Let's see what he and they can do next year.

George: I guess similar issues here. I don't have enough confidence yet in him. He's quite good, but nobody was seeing him on this level before the playoffs really, and in the playoffs it was teammate Doc Hibbert that really caught my attention. Let me see George really become a consistently effective offensive force.

Final notes:

Wade: Wade was my other Top 5 guy who fell out because of the playoffs, and he falls right out of HM, though that might be overreacting. Bottom line is that I was expecting him to kick ass in the playoffs and he really didn't.

Kobe/Howard: I've talked about this before, I don't want to debate it again here - the Lakers failed. They failed, and while there were injuries, there were also difficulties where difficulties need not be. Some look at failures which stars participate in and essentially assume that the stars were still the stars, and so a situation distinct from the stars is to be blame. However it is the stars they shape the situation, and when a star's team fails to add up to the sum of its parts, this cannot be looked at as something unrelated to gravitational pull of that star.

[therealbig3]

Just to get an idea of how the voting is breaking down...there are 19 ballots so far if I counted correctly:

1. LeBron James: 190 points (19 first place votes)

2. Kevin Durant: 129 points (17 second place votes, 2 third place votes)

3. Chris Paul: 99 points (2 second place votes, 17 third place votes)

4. Stephen Curry: 25 points (8 fourth place votes, 1 fifth place vote)

5. James Harden: 16 points (5 fourth place votes, 1 fifth place vote)

6. Tim Duncan: 13 points (3 fourth place votes, 4 fifth place votes)

7. Tony Parker: 6 points (1 fourth place vote, 3 fifth place votes)
7. Marc Gasol: 6 points (1 fourth place vote, 3 fifth place votes)

9. Paul George: 5 points (1 fourth place vote, 2 fifth place votes)

10. Deron Williams: 2 points (2 fifth place votes)

11. Russell Westbrook: 1 point (1 fifth place vote)
11. Kobe Bryant: 1 point (1 fifth place vote)

[nunemouse]

My Ballot:

1. Lebron
2. Durant
3. CP3
4. Duncan
5. Harden

Will explain 4/5 and respond to Doctor MJ later when I get time. Just wanted to get the ballot out before the deadline first.

[Doctor MJ]

No one has voted for Melo?

That really surprises me.

[therealbig3]

No one has voted for Melo?

That really surprises me.

Yeah, I'd have him over Kobe or Westbrook, personally. Can't put guys who couldn't even play in the playoffs over someone who was physically able to, even if he played poorly, imo.

But I wasn't all that impressed with Melo in general this year, I thought he got overrated. And he reverted back to his same bad habits in the playoffs.

[ardee]

1. LeBron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Steph Curry
5. Kobe Bryant

Honorable Mention: Tim Duncan, James Harden, Tony Parker, Russell Westbrook

They need to take your vote away.

Well even if they did, they certainly wouldn't give it to you if you make posts like that

I already explained my reasoning in the discussion thread and I'm not the only guy voting for Kobe. If you don't want to respond with a reasoned and logical argument I really don't give a **** what you say.

[mysticbb]

Voting result so far (20 voters):

Code: Select all

Player               Pts    Shares  1   2   3   4   5
LeBron James         200    1.000   20
Kevin Durant         136    0.680       18  2
Chris Paul           104    0.520       2   18
Stephen Curry         25    0.125               8   1
James Harden          17    0.085               5   2
Tim Duncan            16    0.080               4   4
Tony Parker           6     0.030               1   3
Marc Gasol            6     0.030               1   3
Paul George           5     0.025               1   2
Deron Williams        2     0.010                   2
Russell Westbrook    1.33   0.007                  1.33
Kobe Bryant           1     0.005                   1
Dwyane Wade          0.33   0.002                  0.33
Carmelo Anthony      0.33   0.002                  0.33


[Narigo]

Changed my 5th vote to Stephen Curry

[Doctor MJ]

Changed my 5th vote to Stephen Curry

Okay, if you haven't already, make sure you change it on your actual Vote post.

[Doctor MJ]

Voting result so far (20 voters):

Code: Select all

Player               Pts    Shares  1   2   3   4   5
LeBron James         200    1.000   20
Kevin Durant         136    0.680       18  2
Chris Paul           104    0.520       2   18
Stephen Curry         25    0.125               8   1
James Harden          17    0.085               5   2
Tim Duncan            16    0.080               4   4
Tony Parker           6     0.030               1   3
Marc Gasol            6     0.030               1   3
Paul George           5     0.025               1   2
Deron Williams        2     0.010                   2
Russell Westbrook    1.33   0.007                  1.33
Kobe Bryant           1     0.005                   1
Dwyane Wade          0.33   0.002                  0.33
Carmelo Anthony      0.33   0.002                  0.33


Appreciate you tallying this up.

One thing for everyone to know: There are no ties.. iirc, what I've done in the past is just award the "win" to whatever name was listed first.

[mysticbb]

One thing for everyone to know: There are no ties.. iirc, what I've done in the past is just award the "win" to whatever name was listed first.

Ok

Code: Select all

Player               Pts    Shares  1   2   3   4   5
Lebron James         200    1.000   20
Kevin Durant         136    0.680       18  2
Chris Paul           104    0.520       2   18
Stephen Curry         26    0.130               8   2
James Harden          17    0.085               5   2
Tim Duncan            16    0.080               4   4
Tony Parker           6     0.030               1   3
Marc Gasol            6     0.030               1   3
Paul George           5     0.025               1   2
Deron Williams        2     0.010                   2
Russell Westbrook     1     0.005                   1
Kobe Bryant           1     0.005                   1


Changed my 5th vote to Stephen Curry

Westbrook out and Curry in, correct? At least that's how I changed it in the above tally.

[Narigo]

Changed my 5th vote to Stephen Curry

Westbrook out and Curry in, correct? At least that's how I changed it in the above tally.[/quote]

Yes