2022-23 RealGM All-Season Awards - Discussion Thread

[ShotCreator]

Best seasons:

Jokic
Butler
Doncic
Embiid
Davis


Best players:
Jokic
Doncic
Butler
Davis
Embiid


Curry's defense was just too bad this season.

He's still top 10 for me but at no point did he create any non-Jokic separation or that close. LeBron is even worse overall, but he is genuinely injured.

Curry, Leonard, Booker, Tatum, Giannis all had great outside top 5 years.

Booker impressed me the most of this group. He's upped his defense in two out of three of his playoff runs now. And the shot-making can scale crazy high.

I don't think Giannis is a high substance player relative to his boxscore, so when the numbers go down. It's easy to judge him as a fringe top 5 kind of guy.


Embiid's play style and gas tank is very problematic, however he played really under the radar, dominant defense as his offense waned. Common theme in his playoff career.

[Colbinii]

Best seasons:

Jokic
Butler
Doncic
Embiid
Davis


Best players:
Jokic
Doncic
Butler
Davis
Embiid


Curry's defense was just too bad this season.

He's still top 10 for me but at no point did he create any non-Jokic separation or that close. LeBron is even worse overall, but he is genuinely injured.

Curry, Leonard, Booker, Tatum, Giannis all had great outside top 5 years.

Booker impressed me the most of this group. He's upped his defense in two out of three of his playoff runs now. And the shot-making can scale crazy high.

I don't think Giannis is a high substance player relative to his boxscore, so when the numbers go down. It's easy to judge him as a fringe top 5 kind of guy.


Embiid's play style and gas tank is very problematic, however he played really under the radar, dominant defense as his offense waned. Common theme in his playoff career.

What is Luka's argument over Curry?

[ShotCreator]

Best seasons:

Jokic
Butler
Doncic
Embiid
Davis


Best players:
Jokic
Doncic
Butler
Davis
Embiid


Curry's defense was just too bad this season.

He's still top 10 for me but at no point did he create any non-Jokic separation or that close. LeBron is even worse overall, but he is genuinely injured.

Curry, Leonard, Booker, Tatum, Giannis all had great outside top 5 years.

Booker impressed me the most of this group. He's upped his defense in two out of three of his playoff runs now. And the shot-making can scale crazy high.

I don't think Giannis is a high substance player relative to his boxscore, so when the numbers go down. It's easy to judge him as a fringe top 5 kind of guy.


Embiid's play style and gas tank is very problematic, however he played really under the radar, dominant defense as his offense waned. Common theme in his playoff career.

What is Luka's argument over Curry?

He's better on both ends. Luka using his size and putting his back to the basket more unlocked another level of his offense. Just a subtle step up.

The negativity surrounding Dallas is gonna keep people a couple years behind what'll be more obvious in a a year or two. But as it stands he clearly puts more pressure on defenses than Curry. 'Close but clear'.

And defensively Curry was a bit of a mess. Activity levels low. It's one of those down years. Last year the energy was better. He's old and tired. It happens. I expect him to be a bit better next year. Luka actually started the season pretty strong defensively but trended down. Still better than Curry.

[Outside]

so 10 days ago Tatum has a game 7 for the ages. This board loses their mind. Now they lose to a team with the best culture, the best coach, a known killer in Butler with a terrific sidekick in Bam and suddenly he's mid. Just like 10 days ago we had AD teh best player in the world and a guy the lakers wouldn't swap for Giannis because of a handful of good games. But the Lakers are about to get swept so now he sucks....

I get the huge importance of conference final games, but man are we way too reactionary to small sample size theater. Especially when clearly the better teams are winning these series.

Maybe we need to focus a lot less on narrative....

You're correct that people tend to overreact to the latest game or series. The way people overreact after game 1 of pretty much any series is meme-worthy, and that carries on to lesser degree after each game, and if a top player does particularly well or poorly, that can leave a lasting impression that overrides what the player did through an entire season and in prior series.

But to give being reactionary a little love, some of what we're seeing is striking. Jimmy being a playoff monster is a thing that makes a meh regular season an afterthought. Jason Tatum having spectacular games earlier but not showing any of that in the conference finals, that matters. AD looking best in the world against the Warriors was overreacting because Golden State was so undersized, so it's logical to look at his performance against Denver as a better gauge of where he is as a player.

The PS matters a lot more than the RS, and each round is a tougher test than the previous one that shows who has it to perform at that level and who doesn't.

Tatum's game 7 against Philly was great, but it turned into a rout, and he kept shooting to get the game 7 scoring record over Curry long after the game was decided, so that takes some of the shine off that for me. Tatum has been an enigma, having spectacular games in earlier rounds but then underwhelming in whichever series Boston ends up losing. I'm inclined to think that he's really the second guy on a championship team and won't ever be that number one guy. All this makes me think that he doesn't belong in the top 5 for POY, despite his excellent RS. Tatum is missing the drive and competitiveness that made, say, Jalen Brunson so valuable for the Knicks in the PS. Curry may not make many top 5 lists, but at least he showed heart and grit when his team went down.

As much criticism as can be leveled at Tatum, Embiid deserves double that. It would seem to defy sense to have a RS MVP left off the POY top 5, but man, his PS was not good.

Which leads me to how to value guys like Luka or SGA who didn't even make it to the PS. I personally don't see a justification for putting either of them on a POY ballot. Would they have done well in the PS? Who knows. But they didn't even get there, in a league where 20 of 30 teams make the play-in or playoffs. Maybe Tatum and Embiid didn't show well in the PS, but at least they got there.

Then there's Jamal Murray. He's been great in the conference finals, some would say better than Jokic (not me). That shows a lot to perform like this on this stage, but his RS was merely good, and his performance in the first two rounds was better than the RS but not like he's doing in the WCF. Assuming they close out the Lakers, we'll see how he does in the finals.

The finals is a whole nother thing. The pressure and quality of the opponent ramps up in each round, and that's doubly so for the finals. Giannis doing what he did in the finals cemented him as an all-time great. Curry doing what he did last year in the finals silenced the doubters (some of them, anyway). It's the ultimate stage. It's where Jimmy and Jokic and whoever else shows up can show the world who they are, and for others, it's when the clock strikes midnight for Cinderella.

So at this point in the playoffs, sure, there are some reactionary takes, and some of us are prisoners of the moment. But these are the moments that matter the most.

[LukaTheGOAT]

Best seasons:

Jokic
Butler
Doncic
Embiid
Davis


Best players:
Jokic
Doncic
Butler
Davis
Embiid


Curry's defense was just too bad this season.

He's still top 10 for me but at no point did he create any non-Jokic separation or that close. LeBron is even worse overall, but he is genuinely injured.

Curry, Leonard, Booker, Tatum, Giannis all had great outside top 5 years.

Booker impressed me the most of this group. He's upped his defense in two out of three of his playoff runs now. And the shot-making can scale crazy high.

I don't think Giannis is a high substance player relative to his boxscore, so when the numbers go down. It's easy to judge him as a fringe top 5 kind of guy.


Embiid's play style and gas tank is very problematic, however he played really under the radar, dominant defense as his offense waned. Common theme in his playoff career.

Do you believe Embiid is better than Giannis? I feel as if both have their flaws, but in a vacuum Giannis probably has better track record on offense (playmaking) and defense (versatility) than Embiid. Maybe you believe Giannis has heavily regressed from 2021 or 2022?

[eminence]

so 10 days ago Tatum has a game 7 for the ages. This board loses their mind. Now they lose to a team with the best culture, the best coach, a known killer in Butler with a terrific sidekick in Bam and suddenly he's mid. Just like 10 days ago we had AD teh best player in the world and a guy the lakers wouldn't swap for Giannis because of a handful of good games. But the Lakers are about to get swept so now he sucks....

I get the huge importance of conference final games, but man are we way too reactionary to small sample size theater. Especially when clearly the better teams are winning these series.

Maybe we need to focus a lot less on narrative....

Which leads me to how to value guys like Luka or SGA who didn't even make it to the PS. I personally don't see a justification for putting either of them on a POY ballot. Would they have done well in the PS? Who knows. But they didn't even get there, in a league where 20 of 30 teams make the play-in or playoffs. Maybe Tatum and Embiid didn't show well in the PS, but at least they got there.

SGA did make the play-ins. Great against New Orleans, underwhelming against Minnesota.

[Outside]

so 10 days ago Tatum has a game 7 for the ages. This board loses their mind. Now they lose to a team with the best culture, the best coach, a known killer in Butler with a terrific sidekick in Bam and suddenly he's mid. Just like 10 days ago we had AD teh best player in the world and a guy the lakers wouldn't swap for Giannis because of a handful of good games. But the Lakers are about to get swept so now he sucks....

I get the huge importance of conference final games, but man are we way too reactionary to small sample size theater. Especially when clearly the better teams are winning these series.

Maybe we need to focus a lot less on narrative....

Which leads me to how to value guys like Luka or SGA who didn't even make it to the PS. I personally don't see a justification for putting either of them on a POY ballot. Would they have done well in the PS? Who knows. But they didn't even get there, in a league where 20 of 30 teams make the play-in or playoffs. Maybe Tatum and Embiid didn't show well in the PS, but at least they got there.

SGA did make the play-ins. Great against New Orleans, underwhelming against Minnesota.

Man, that seems a long time ago. Thanks for the correction.

[eminence]

Which leads me to how to value guys like Luka or SGA who didn't even make it to the PS. I personally don't see a justification for putting either of them on a POY ballot. Would they have done well in the PS? Who knows. But they didn't even get there, in a league where 20 of 30 teams make the play-in or playoffs. Maybe Tatum and Embiid didn't show well in the PS, but at least they got there.

SGA did make the play-ins. Great against New Orleans, underwhelming against Minnesota.

Man, that seems a long time ago. Thanks for the correction.

It really does, and no worries man.

I'm personally quite unsure how much to weight play-in play, it's such a tiny/high stakes sample.

[LukaTheGOAT]

Best seasons:

Jokic
Butler
Doncic
Embiid
Davis


Best players:
Jokic
Doncic
Butler
Davis
Embiid


Curry's defense was just too bad this season.

He's still top 10 for me but at no point did he create any non-Jokic separation or that close. LeBron is even worse overall, but he is genuinely injured.

Curry, Leonard, Booker, Tatum, Giannis all had great outside top 5 years.

Booker impressed me the most of this group. He's upped his defense in two out of three of his playoff runs now. And the shot-making can scale crazy high.

I don't think Giannis is a high substance player relative to his boxscore, so when the numbers go down. It's easy to judge him as a fringe top 5 kind of guy.


Embiid's play style and gas tank is very problematic, however he played really under the radar, dominant defense as his offense waned. Common theme in his playoff career.

What is Luka's argument over Curry?

Believing Luka was better during the RS, and that Steph simply played at best up-to expectations in the PS, therefore not feeling the need to boost Curry over him.

[Texas Chuck]

But these are the moments that matter the most.

Of course. Goes without question.

But I think some are too confident to conclude that player X can't succeed in round Y as opposed to taking a look and asking why their play or why their team's play hasn't been as effective against team Z. Sometimes its not about them not really being a 3rd round and beyond player as much as it a matchup. Take Dirk in 2007. He played terrible in 2 of the 6 games and his juggernaut RS team whimpered out. But not because Dirk wasn't built for the playoffs. He had already demonstrated that he was. It was just the worst possible matchup and Mavs fans knew that in real-time and were angry the Mavs didn't go all out to beat GSW at the end of the regular season so they wouldn't have to play them. Instead, Avery sits the starters, the Warriors win and make the playoffs and.....

Did we decide KG wasn't built for the playoffs after a dozen seasons of only advancing out of the first round once? Did we decide Mike and Lebron weren't championship level players because it took them years to finally win one? Tatum may not be that guy. AD, when healthy and motivated(which sadly is a rare combo) might be the best player in the world except he's really got to do it for more than 20 games in a row imo.

Giannis doesn't suck because he got hurt, but we certainly had to have that talk. Jokic was dismissed before this year because his team didn't advance deep into the playoffs and this year he's showing that was premature.

I'm all for recognizing that certain players seem to always show up in the biggest moments. The Jimmy Butler flowers make sense because this isn't a one time deal. Guys like Dream who regularly outperformed their regular season selves should get a push.

But we go from Trae Young owns New York to Trae Young is a bum. One or the either may be right, but they shouldn't be decided in one series of his career.

More weight? Of course. A lot more weight? Maybe, though I hate to be too dismissive of 82. But for many itt, its literally about the most recent game and nothing more. And I'm not the smartest guy, but I know that's not right. You go broke in any industry reacting with the wind like this and being so incredibly results oriented. Especially as Doc reminds us, this is now just a 3 point league and thus the variance is going to be high on that alone.

[Ambrose]

100% agreed^

Simply being on a team making it this far does not make you a better player or mean you had a better season than other top players.

[The-Power]

With AD and LeBron now out, I'm wondering if they've done enough to make my ballot after all. Same goes for Curry and perhaps Booker, too. Giannis is a tough one as someone with playoff injury and first-round exit who also missed a bunch of RS games. Embiid likely did enough but his playoff woes are tough to ignore, too.

Just a really difficult ballot this year. Jokic feels like the only one who had a complete season and is most certainly a lock for the #1 spot. Tatum, I think, has also done enough to be a lock on the ballot even if the Celtics lose tomorrow. Butler is close to being a lock, too.

Let's see who fills out the other two spots on my ballot. With all the issues the others had in terms of missed games, Embiid's RS is likely enough for him to make it but it's much closer than it should have been. And then there's the group of players who all missed a lot of games in the RS and didn't have an ATG playoff run either, but who were excellent when they played both in the RS and the PS (except for Giannis).

I don't think anyone else (Luka, SGA) has a shot at making my ballot but it's still a crowded field and a tough choice.

[Colbinii]

100% agreed^

Simply being on a team making it this far does not make you a better player or mean you had a better season than other top players.

Ehh, correct, but there is also some story telling with these awards. I can't tell you who was better this year, Booker or Luka, but I can say when I think about this year, I remember Booker balling out against the best team in the NBA in the post-season while the Management of the team Luka played for decided it was best he not play when the playoffs were an inch away.

[Texas Chuck]

100% agreed^

Simply being on a team making it this far does not make you a better player or mean you had a better season than other top players.

Ehh, correct, but there is also some story telling with these awards. I can't tell you who was better this year, Booker or Luka, but I can say when I think about this year, I remember Booker balling out against the best team in the NBA in the post-season while the Management of the team Luka played for decided it was best he not play when the playoffs were an inch away.

No doubt that in the video that comes with your SI subscription that Booker would be more heavily featured than Luka.

The question is are we attempting to tell the best story or pick the best players?

'Note: This is not me arguing for Luka over Booker. I think Luka has zero place in the top 5 players this year. Just using the example given. I personally am not interested in the story(this leads to Derrick Rose having an MVP when he was at absolute best the 4th best player that year and I think that's stretching it considerably) but rather the best player.

[Ambrose]

100% agreed^

Simply being on a team making it this far does not make you a better player or mean you had a better season than other top players.

Ehh, correct, but there is also some story telling with these awards. I can't tell you who was better this year, Booker or Luka, but I can say when I think about this year, I remember Booker balling out against the best team in the NBA in the post-season while the Management of the team Luka played for decided it was best he not play when the playoffs were an inch away.

How would that be Luka's fault though? These things, imo, should be additive. People forget but Luka played more regular season games than Booker did rs+playoffs combined. We just saw a narrative driven MVP aging terribly, why repeat the same mistake? I'm not even necessarily saying Luka>Booker as neither are in my top 5, but I don't think that should be anything other than an extremely minor role. I know I'm certainly not going to push lesser players over Giannis because their team happened to go farther.

[jalengreen]

I don't think there were enough "all-around seasons" for me to dock Embiid down that much for his postseason. It was disappointing, but his regular season still holds a lot of weight for me. Tatum wasn't impressive enough in either RS or PS, LeBron/AD didn't have top level regular seasons and had good postseasons but not good enough, Curry was far worse in the regular season and not nearly good enough in the postseason to make up for that gap, etc...

With the Lakers season over and the Celtics season probably over, I'm looking at

1. Jokic 2. Butler 3. Embiid

After that it's a mess of candidates but I don't think anyone is passing that top 3.

[Colbinii]

100% agreed^

Simply being on a team making it this far does not make you a better player or mean you had a better season than other top players.

Ehh, correct, but there is also some story telling with these awards. I can't tell you who was better this year, Booker or Luka, but I can say when I think about this year, I remember Booker balling out against the best team in the NBA in the post-season while the Management of the team Luka played for decided it was best he not play when the playoffs were an inch away.

No doubt that in the video that comes with your SI subscription that Booker would be more heavily featured than Luka.

The question is are we attempting to tell the best story or pick the best players?

'Note: This is not me arguing for Luka over Booker. I think Luka has zero place in the top 5 players this year. Just using the example given. I personally am not interested in the story(this leads to Derrick Rose having an MVP when he was at absolute best the 4th best player that year and I think that's stretching it considerably) but rather the best player.

Well my point is when its difficult to differentiate players on the same tier, how they played in the post-season matters.

[The-Power]

The question is are we attempting to tell the best story or pick the best players?

I'd say neither. We're picking the best player seasons.

[The-Power]

With the Lakers season over and the Celtics season probably over, I'm looking at

1. Jokic 2. Butler 3. Embiid

After that it's a mess of candidates but I don't think anyone is passing that top 3.

I'd find making the argument for Embiid over Tatum increasingly difficult, to be honest. Yes, Embiid played at a clearly higher level in the RS when he played, but Tatum still played at an All-NBA level and 450 minutes more. So the lead for Embiid was considerable but not insurmountable, and then Embiid proceeded to have a really underwhelming postseason while Tatum continued at his high level which directly led to his team advancing instead of Embiid's team.

So, if you value the RS highly (relatively speaking), I absolutely see the case for Embiid. But at the same time, I don't think you need to overvalue the PS to a problematic degree in order to have Tatum ahead at this point. And even if you have Embiid ahead due to his RS performance, I think Tatum should be clearly ahead of the rest of the contenders for the ballot if you want to be consistent (i.e., I find it difficult to justify that LeBron, Curry, AD, Booker etc. made up for the big difference in games missed by superior performance in the RS and PS).

[GSP]

Best seasons:

Jokic
Butler
Doncic
Embiid
Davis


Best players:
Jokic
Doncic
Butler
Davis
Embiid


Curry's defense was just too bad this season.

He's still top 10 for me but at no point did he create any non-Jokic separation or that close. LeBron is even worse overall, but he is genuinely injured.

Curry, Leonard, Booker, Tatum, Giannis all had great outside top 5 years.

Booker impressed me the most of this group. He's upped his defense in two out of three of his playoff runs now. And the shot-making can scale crazy high.

I don't think Giannis is a high substance player relative to his boxscore, so when the numbers go down. It's easy to judge him as a fringe top 5 kind of guy.


Embiid's play style and gas tank is very problematic, however he played really under the radar, dominant defense as his offense waned. Common theme in his playoff career.

Embiids pick and roll defense and perimeter coverage is as bad as its ever been and only exacerbated w/o Ben Simmons

Read on Twitter

Hes a great paint defender but still heavily flawed elsewhere. We hunted his defense for damn near every win this series and played him off floor in 2 of em. Not first time bubble series was much same his offense was good that series but his defense absolutely horrific and he got dominantly swept for it w/o Ben.

His defense is dominant if hes playing joke playoff teams w/ anemic offenses like 18 Heat, 19 Nets, 21 Wizards, 22 Raptors, or 23 Nets...........but against real contenders and top playoff teams like us basically all 3 series we played him, Heat last year his defensive flaws always get picked up much like Giannis

I know ppl want to mention 19 Raptors series which is what Embiids playoff defense is clinging to but when you have Ben Simmons and Jimmy **** Butler on perimeter its hard not to have a strong defensive series specially when youre only strong defensively in paint. James Wiseman could have a good defensive series w/ those 2 out there