2022-23 NBA MVP Discussion (Pt.1)

[LFAHFN22]

Tatum being number one is a damn shame.

I can't shake the feeling that his on court impact doesn't quite measure up to the glorified statistical analyses flooding sports media.

[CobraCommander]

Tatum being number one is a damn shame.

I can't shake the feeling that his on court impact doesn't quite measure up to the glorified statistical analyses flooding sports media.

I kinda agree - but who can’t you say that about that’s in the running? Giannis?

[PennSports]

Jokic - 68ts%
Durant - 66ts%
Curry - 66ts%
Davis 66ts%
Embiid - 65ts%
Zion - 65 ts%
Mitchell - 63ts%
Luka - 61ts%
Tatum - 61ts%
Giannis - 58ts%

Curious how the top 3 guys have the worst efficiency. Efficiency was the name of the game the last two years.

[Bob8]

Jokic - 68ts%
Durant - 66ts%
Curry - 66ts%
Davis 66ts%
Embiid - 65ts%
Zion - 65 ts%
Mitchell - 63ts%
Luka - 61ts%
Tatum - 61ts%
Giannis - 58ts%

Curious how the top 3 guys have the worst efficiency. Efficiency was the name of the game the last two years.

You might check, which position in Nba has the highest efficiency and which the lowest. Curry is of course exception.

[Exp0sed]

Jokic - 68ts%
Durant - 66ts%
Curry - 66ts%
Davis 66ts%
Embiid - 65ts%
Zion - 65 ts%
Mitchell - 63ts%
Luka - 61ts%
Tatum - 61ts%
Giannis - 58ts%

Curious how the top 3 guys have the worst efficiency. Efficiency was the name of the game the last two years.

well, the Celtics started the season incredibly strong as a group and tho I didn't (and still don't) think Tatum is even in the top 3, I think it's logical to a certain extent that when a team is far and away the best team in the league - it should def carry some serious weight in MVP conisderation (def more than a couple of ts% points)

However, with the Celtics showing that it's not a forgone conclusion them dominating the league - the race is very wide open
Durant was discounted early because of the Nets struggles but since they turned their season around, I honestly am finding a hard time finding a single argument for Tatum over Durant for instance

we'll have to see how the Nets do in the upcoming stretch of tough opponents but as of now they are only 5 games back and Durant has been better offensively and arguably they are pretty close defensively as well

a 5% gap in TS is pretty massive, Tatum is killing it in Netrtg and +- but all these stats have issues. Hauser is leading the Celtics in Netrtg for instance..

on the other hand stuff like Dbpm give a clear edge to Durant over Tatum (Obpm as well but that's not surprising), obviously also a very flawed stat
the incredible iso defense stats that were posted in this thread again say Tatum has been one of the best in the league

tbh, I don't think the MVP award was ever really about that and I doubt that's gonna change
not when the defensive gap is quite small, especially since it's complicated to assign personal credit for team defense

fwiw the Nets despite their horrid start are better defensively thus far than the Celtics and Duran't contribution on that end is quite significant

Durant has clearly been better offensively and let's be honest, if folks had to pick between these two for a playoffs series offensively - an overwhelming majority would take Durant and rightfully so and for me that carries significant weight in MVP consideration, but obviously every person has their own criteria

5 games diff is a lot but that's counting the Celtics hot start and Nash's Nets. I suspect these teams won't be that far apart by season's end and if Durant can keep this up, I think he def be ahead of Tatum

in itself it's irrelevant but doing what he's doing at his age is just incredible imo and all else being equal i'd def go with him




Jokic is taking alot less shots than most of the contenders and scoring a lot less. it's not that I think his efficiency would drop significantly if he took more shots, he already proved that he can do it, probably better than anyone in the league and he is still the league leader in offensive rating, voter fatigue is basically taking him out of the race anyway



Davis has been a legit contender but I doubt the Lakers will have the team record for him to really be a viable candidate and they certain'y don't have a sufficient record rn, even tho that's def not on Davis - he still suffers as a result (much like Luka)



Embiid has been awesome but with the help he has the Sixers need to do ALOT better for me to really consider him not to mention his usual achiles heel which is GP, which will probably rule him out again this season



Zion is probably 1st rn for me, we'll see if he can stay healthy and how far he can carry the Pels, especially in comparison to the other candidates



Mitchell - lol, just no




Luka is a victim of Kidd and Dallas, don't see a realistic path for Dallas to be high enough, he needs to really go supernova and personally create a much bigger gap from the other guys and that's unlikely



Giannis is right there...he will have the team record and the counting stats but he hasn't been his best, FT% and FG% are really hurting his efficiency. I suspect both of these improve as the season wears on and Giannis will be right there, as he always is

just like Jokic, even 85-90% of the "usual" Giannis is still a very strong MVP candidate and a 100% of the "usual" Giannis will be MVP

Jevon Carter and Lopez have both been incredible defensively and once Middelton gets back into the mix, The Bucks should be pretty formidable

smart money would be on Giannis getting his 2nd when it's all said and done imo

[Ron Swanson]

I do find it amusing that while you can argue that Giannis is having his worst "efficiency" year since 2017-18 (depending on how much you value his insane volume scoring), his numbers in points, rebounds, assists, shooting efficiency, PER, BPM, WS/48, etc. would all be career highs for Tatum. Just goes to show how big of a handicap media/fans have placed on his MVP narrative and the natural tendency to always favor the "shiny new toy". I tend to not really do lists early when there isn't a clear cut front-runner, but if there's an inner circle for me it's basically between:

Jokic
Giannis
Luka
Zion

Pick one.

[Exp0sed]

I do find it amusing that while you can argue that Giannis is having his worst "efficiency" year since 2017-18 (depending on how much you value his insane volume scoring), his numbers in points, rebounds, assists, shooting efficiency, PER, BPM, WS/48, etc. would all be career highs for Tatum. Just goes to show how big of a handicap media/fans have placed on his MVP narrative and the natural tendency to always favor the "shiny new toy". I tend to not really do lists early when there isn't a clear cut front-runner, but if there's an inner circle for me it's basically between:

Jokic
Giannis
Luka
Zion

Pick one.

I like your early picks and I think that Giannis is considerably better than Tatum as a player in general and is ahead of him in the current MVP race, however, Tatum's usage rate has never eclpised 32% until this season and he is currently on a career high 32.6%

Giannis is leading the league with 38.5% usage and was at about 35% last season as well

that is certainly a factor in counting stats, which also affects in turn all the box-score derived methods you stated
moreover, the true measure of shooting efficiency is TS% and is especially relevant for a player like Giannis whose a force inside but iffy from the line, he gets sent to the line on alot of plays that would result in high % FG attempts

because he is shooting poorly this season from both the line and the field - Tatum has higher TS% and thus is scoring more efficiently so that part is simply not true

[CharityStripe34]

I do find it amusing that while you can argue that Giannis is having his worst "efficiency" year since 2017-18 (depending on how much you value his insane volume scoring), his numbers in points, rebounds, assists, shooting efficiency, PER, BPM, WS/48, etc. would all be career highs for Tatum. Just goes to show how big of a handicap media/fans have placed on his MVP narrative and the natural tendency to always favor the "shiny new toy". I tend to not really do lists early when there isn't a clear cut front-runner, but if there's an inner circle for me it's basically between:

Jokic
Giannis
Luka
Zion

Pick one.

It's a similar thing with all multi-time MVP winners. They're handicapped by their own greatness.

[Woodsanity]

Giannis is normally much more efficient. He will probably go back to north of 60 TS% before the season ends.

[PennSports]

Jokic - 68ts%
Durant - 66ts%
Curry - 66ts%
Davis 66ts%
Embiid - 65ts%
Zion - 65 ts%
Mitchell - 63ts%
Luka - 61ts%
Tatum - 61ts%
Giannis - 58ts%

Curious how the top 3 guys have the worst efficiency. Efficiency was the name of the game the last two years.

well, the Celtics started the season incredibly strong as a group and tho I didn't (and still don't) think Tatum is even in the top 3, I think it's logical to a certain extent that when a team is far and away the best team in the league - it should def carry some serious weight in MVP conisderation (def more than a couple of ts% points)

However, with the Celtics showing that it's not a forgone conclusion them dominating the league - the race is very wide open
Durant was discounted early because of the Nets struggles but since they turned their season around, I honestly am finding a hard time finding a single argument for Tatum over Durant for instance

we'll have to see how the Nets do in the upcoming stretch of tough opponents but as of now they are only 5 games back and Durant has been better offensively and arguably they are pretty close defensively as well

a 5% gap in TS is pretty massive, Tatum is killing it in Netrtg and +- but all these stats have issues. Hauser is leading the Celtics in Netrtg for instance..

on the other hand stuff like Dbpm give a clear edge to Durant over Tatum (Obpm as well but that's not surprising), obviously also a very flawed stat
the incredible iso defense stats that were posted in this thread again say Tatum has been one of the best in the league

tbh, I don't think the MVP award was ever really about that and I doubt that's gonna change
not when the defensive gap is quite small, especially since it's complicated to assign personal credit for team defense

fwiw the Nets despite their horrid start are better defensively thus far than the Celtics and Duran't contribution on that end is quite significant

Durant has clearly been better offensively and let's be honest, if folks had to pick between these two for a playoffs series offensively - an overwhelming majority would take Durant and rightfully so and for me that carries significant weight in MVP consideration, but obviously every person has their own criteria

5 games diff is a lot but that's counting the Celtics hot start and Nash's Nets. I suspect these teams won't be that far apart by season's end and if Durant can keep this up, I think he def be ahead of Tatum

in itself it's irrelevant but doing what he's doing at his age is just incredible imo and all else being equal i'd def go with him




Jokic is taking alot less shots than most of the contenders and scoring a lot less. it's not that I think his efficiency would drop significantly if he took more shots, he already proved that he can do it, probably better than anyone in the league and he is still the league leader in offensive rating, voter fatigue is basically taking him out of the race anyway



Davis has been a legit contender but I doubt the Lakers will have the team record for him to really be a viable candidate and they certain'y don't have a sufficient record rn, even tho that's def not on Davis - he still suffers as a result (much like Luka)



Embiid has been awesome but with the help he has the Sixers need to do ALOT better for me to really consider him not to mention his usual achiles heel which is GP, which will probably rule him out again this season



Zion is probably 1st rn for me, we'll see if he can stay healthy and how far he can carry the Pels, especially in comparison to the other candidates



Mitchell - lol, just no


Giannis is right there...he will have the team record and the counting stats but he hasn't been his best, FT% and FG% are really hurting his efficiency. I suspect both of these improve as the season wears on and Giannis will be right there, as he always is

just like Jokic, even 85-90% of the "usual" Giannis is still a very strong MVP candidate and a 100% of the "usual" Giannis will be MVP

Jevon Carter and Lopez have both been incredible defensively and once Middelton gets back into the mix, The Bucks should be pretty formidable

smart money would be on Giannis getting his 2nd when it's all said and done imo

great post but thought i should point out that both Maxey and Harden have missed a month or more. Embiids been playing without his 2 and 3 guys which was a driving narrative last year that arguably decided the razor thin decision. You might think Embiid has missed a lot of time but hes 2nd on the team in total minutes behind only Tobias, that is how hurt the sixers have been and hes playing a career high in MPG at 36 per. Still only 3 games less than guys like and Giannis and Ja but havent looked at total games played. Hopefully he can stay healthy because missing 3-4 more would pretty much do him in again unfortunately like it did 2 years ago when he had the stats, the defense, and the first seed. I want the man to get his flowers in SOMETHING. No first teams, no mvps, no first team all D, no dpoy just feels wrong but im a huge embiid homer. At some point 3 straight mvp years has to count for something right? Now he is likely to not even start in the all star game, Always 2nd place But i do wish defense mattered more for MVP because i think him and Tatum have been the best on that end this season of the main candidates.

Giannis i think has been coasting on D and has a lot more help around him on defense at both guard and center with Jrue and Lopez. As for the help narrative Simmons and Kyrie have played far more than Maxey and harden. Maxey has missed half the games and will probably not return until January, Harden missed around 12 games. Kyrie and Simmons are both at about 20 games but the way people talk about the nets im not sure how much of that will be considered "help" lmao

As far as Jokic he isnt gonna win unless everyone falls off a cliff. Hes been amazing but with all his guys back i think Denver should be far better. If that was a big narrative last year then they have to run away with the first seed this year. Hes owning all the advanced stats again to the point where it feels like they were designed around him (even some of the defensive ones again) but a lot of that has to do with Denver rotations. He is rarely playing with bench units compared to his peers and Denver seems to do hockey shifts a lot with 4 or 5 guys in and 4 or 5 guys out. I joked that they signed Deandre Jordan minute 1 of free agency to make him seem even more valuable and its working lol.

[bisme37]

Read on Twitter

[DaFan334]

All this and then you get this statline:
43ppg on 17/20gf , 14rb, 8ast, 4stl, 1blk

[Cubbies2120]

It's not out of the realm of possibility that Jokic can average a 25 pt triple double on 15 shots a game...on 70% (yes, SEVENTY %) true shooting...

I think after tonight he's gonna meet all the criteria except he'll be an assist shy...

[itsxtray]

It's not out of the realm of possibility that Jokic can average a 25 pt triple double on 15 shots a game...on 70% (yes, SEVENTY %) true shooting...

I think after tonight he's gonna meet all the criteria except he'll be an assist shy...

Yep, you can calculate true shooting here: https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/stats/tsp_calc.html

After tonight Jokic is 24.6 ppg on 70.13ts% Just insane.

[Cubbies2120]

It's not out of the realm of possibility that Jokic can average a 25 pt triple double on 15 shots a game...on 70% (yes, SEVENTY %) true shooting...

I think after tonight he's gonna meet all the criteria except he'll be an assist shy...

Yep, you can calculate true shooting here: https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/stats/tsp_calc.html

After tonight Jokic is 24.6 ppg on 70.13ts% Just insane.

His TS% is over 70, and he's not even in the top 20 in total free throw attempts this year. With more freebies, he might be able to sustain that over the course of a season

[Exp0sed]

great post but thought i should point out that both Maxey and Harden have missed a month or more. Embiids been playing without his 2 and 3 guys which was a driving narrative last year that arguably decided the razor thin decision. You might think Embiid has missed a lot of time but hes 2nd on the team in total minutes behind only Tobias, that is how hurt the sixers have been and hes playing a career high in MPG at 36 per. Still only 3 games less than guys like and Giannis and Ja but havent looked at total games played. Hopefully he can stay healthy because missing 3-4 more would pretty much do him in again unfortunately like it did 2 years ago when he had the stats, the defense, and the first seed. I want the man to get his flowers in SOMETHING. No first teams, no mvps, no first team all D, no dpoy just feels wrong but im a huge embiid homer. At some point 3 straight mvp years has to count for something right? Now he is likely to not even start in the all star game, Always 2nd place But i do wish defense mattered more for MVP because i think him and Tatum have been the best on that end this season of the main candidates.

Giannis i think has been coasting on D and has a lot more help around him on defense at both guard and center with Jrue and Lopez. As for the help narrative Simmons and Kyrie have played far more than Maxey and harden. Maxey has missed half the games and will probably not return until January, Harden missed around 12 games. Kyrie and Simmons are both at about 20 games but the way people talk about the nets im not sure how much of that will be considered "help" lmao

As far as Jokic he isnt gonna win unless everyone falls off a cliff. Hes been amazing but with all his guys back i think Denver should be far better. If that was a big narrative last year then they have to run away with the first seed this year. Hes owning all the advanced stats again to the point where it feels like they were designed around him (even some of the defensive ones again) but a lot of that has to do with Denver rotations. He is rarely playing with bench units compared to his peers and Denver seems to do hockey shifts a lot with 4 or 5 guys in and 4 or 5 guys out. I joked that they signed Deandre Jordan minute 1 of free agency to make him seem even more valuable and its working lol.

i'm well aware of how much time Harden\Maxey have missed but it's not like the Sixkers were killing it when all 3 were playing

The 3 fold "help" comparison isn't all that accurate imo, I mean between the 76ers \ Nuggets \ Nets:

No disputing Harden and Maxey missed considerable time, but when they did play - they were great and the 76ers (if anything) - "should have been better" in those games than they actually were

Simmons may have played about 20 games but he was really bad (and played limited mins) for about half of those

folks (myself included) thought this isn't just injury and rust but that he's unplayable due to the mental issues (it was that bad)
so it's hard to count those 20 GP as "help", you need to only count the ones where he was actually helping the team

it's not a coincidence that his improved play has coincided with both Nash's departure and with drastically improved play from the Nets. In reality it's more like 10-12 games he's been "helping" durant out, unless ur counting games in which he was awful which doesn't really make sense :p ur right about Kyrie tho

as for the Nuggets, MPJ has only played 16 games which is pretty comparable with Maxey's 15
and Murray has been availavle but he's been sub-par on both ends. he's been out so long it makes sense for hm to take time to work himself back in, but the Nuggets absoultely should not have been "better" than they are, as Murray has not been playing well at all (that's putting it mildly)

this may change later in the season but as it stands, MPJ has missed alot of games and wasn't very good in the ones he did play and Jamal has been a negative on the court...

after tonight the Nuggets are first in the West with basically all of the heavy lifting done by Jokic again, so i don't think it's fair to say they "should have been better"

Embiid is a real force but the usual Ewing comparison makes alot of sense - he has been unlucky to share his career thus far with a peer, another player, who plays the same position and is simply better than him, period.

it's not his fault but as far as personal accolades go - there is no mystery there..

[Infinite Llamas]

Jokic touch around the basket is the prettiest thing to watch in all of basketball. He makes it all look so effortless.

It’s crazy that just when you think he can’t become more efficient he steps it up a notch.

Rings be damned, he will go down as one of the 10-15 greatest players to ever lace them up.

[Peregrine01]

Jokic touch around the basket is the prettiest thing to watch in all of basketball. He makes it all look so effortless.

17/18 from 2 tonight with the lone miss coming from a block that he put back for an and-1. I sometimes think that he should just stop passing so much cause he's nearly an automatic 2 when ever he looks to score. Often, it looks like he's even embarrassed that he's scoring so much.

[Sgt Major]

And a missed three was a half-court late-clock shot.

[DaFan334]

And a missed three was a half-court late-clock shot.

I forgot about that. It actually almost went in. Hit the front of the rim.