Special_Puppy wrote:tsherkin wrote:wafflzgod wrote:2017 - Steph, LeBron, Kawhi, Harden, Russ
Hard to justify Steph in 2017.
Lebron makes sense. Harden makes sense. Kawhi was good, though I don't know if he was quite good enough to merit an MVP that season. But that'd still be three guys who have a pretty good case that season, for sure.
Steph was still number 1 in my composite of advanced stats in 2017. LeBron number 2. Russ number 3.
There’s definitely a case for 2017 Curry
Impact metrics portray him as one of the the clear cut most valuable player that season, clearly above Westbrook and Harden and Kawhi.
-in raw plus minus: Curry had the clear cut best plus minus that season and one of the best plus minus seasons ever from a superstar. He had the second best on-off that season and was clearly better in on-off than any other MVP candidate.
-In composite plus minus metrics: He had the clear cut best Augmented Plus Minus. In regular season only, he likely had the best PIPM, and was Top 2 in full-season PIPM either way.
-He had the best RAPM in a variety of standard versions of RAPM.
-In composite adjusted plus minus metrics: He had the best season in a variety of metrics, including EPM (the most accurate metric available).
-In larger samples of WOWY data: He had the best stretch of seasons during this time.
While there's noise or limitations in any metric, with this much agreement across metrics, it's quite safe to consider Curry in the very top tier of player value that season, with a clear argument at 1st in the RS.
He also had this value on the clear cut best team.
-They won 6 more wins than Kawhi’s team (at +4.22 better SRS!)
-They won 12 more wins than Harden’s team
-They won 16 more wins than LeBron’s team
-They won 20 more wins than Westbrook’s team
… and remember, teams face strong diminishing returns when they’re that good, so the team gap is actually larger than the wins suggest.
They’re tied for 7th all time in RS record, while no other team that season was top 50(!). And they’re even higher, at 4th all time, in RS SRS. Filtering for health SRS or adding playoff SRS, they were first all time. The 2017 Warriors were many people’s choice for the very best team ever.
Yes, Curry absolutely had the best supporting cast of the MVP candidates. And of course, there were absolutely players who had better floor-raising regular seasons. But Curry also had the best ceiling raising regular season. He was the clear cut most valuable player on the clear cut best team, and that’s actually something MVP voters have looked *for*, not against, over the course of NBA history. Throughout NBA history, MVP voters have massively favored ceiling raising over floor raising, and that’s still true after 2017, albeit to a lesser extent.
Yes, the Warriors added Durant. But did MVP voters discount 96 Jordan because the Bulls added Rodman? Jordan got 109/113 first place votes. Did MVP voters discount 71 Kareem because the Bucks added Oscar? Kareem got 133/156 first place votes. Did MVP voters discount 86 Bird because the Celtics had McHale and added Walton? Bird got 73/78 first place votes. Curry got 0 first place votes in 2017, but that seems far more like a narrative-driven shift against ceiling raising and for floor-raising (which again is fairly inconsistent with the rest of MVP voting history) plus voter fatigue, rather than an actual argument that Curry wasn’t good enough to be the MVP. In terms of goodness, in the recent Realgm Peaks project, Curry was voted clearly higher than any other MVP player that season save peak 2013 LeBron (who was arguably coasting in the 2017 RS).
Even for those who feel a player needs to show more floor-raising to win MVP, Durant missed 20 games (1/4th of the season!). In that stretch, the Warriors still played at better than a 65-win pace, and Curry went right back to his 2016 form (when he was the unanimous MVP).
Now I’m not saying no one else had a case. That Westbrook season was special — one of the more exciting floor raiding seasons ever, and it certainly had the narrative advantage. Harden played great and filled the box stats like usual. That was probably Kawhi’s best chance to win RS MVP, and healthy peak Kawhi was a great player. And of course there was till prime (albeit potentially coasting) LeBron. There’s a nice series by Fiveythirtyeight, discussing the unique MVP case of each of these players, including Curry (
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-case-for-stephen-curry-mvp/). And if you end up preferring another player for MVP, that’s totally fine! But if you think Curry doesn’t have a case, then I definitely disagree!