NBA MVP Discussion Thread 2022-23 (pt 2)

[Young gun 6]

It’s called the Derrick rose rule winning the mvp over lebron James. We all know rose didn’t deserve it. Voters will find any way lot to award 3 straight mvp to Jokic. As they did with James.

Similar happen to Giannis.

OK now make your best argument for Giannis over Jokic for MVP, and LeBron over Rose

There are so many variables to wining mvp

Let’s face facts. Lebron getting screwed in 2011 cause of the backlash of his decision

People want to defend Jokic winning last year despite a a so so team record (for nba mvp). You can only give nba mvp to stats for so long. They need to do something special for their third nba mvp in a row. He’s got to win. 60 games. Jokic had one of the worst winning records last year for nba mvp in history. So if voters justified giving it to him cause of his stats and dragging team to playoffs

https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/worst-record-of-an-mvp

Luka is having a statistically better year than Jokic. So if Luka can drag his team into playoffs as a 6 or higher seed. The same justification can he given to give it to Luka using last years justification for Jokic. Only sounds fair? Correct? Jokic team is completely healthy. He’s got 2 other max players. Murray (who could have played late last season) got an extra 6 months recovery so is 100% recovered. Plus Gordon who may be their second best player now.

Voters will look to do anything to not give it to Jokic this year we know this. But it’s past the point of it being a Derrick Rose style win. The guys had arguably the best 3 season stretch of any player all time.

If Nuggets take the no.1 seed that’s the requirement. There’s no arbitrary win record amount, it’s always been seeding until the last few years.

He’s got seeding (like 90% of the prior MVP), he’s got the stats (like some of the last 5 years of mvp awards).

There’s literally no argument against him. Voter fatigue is a real thing and we know that. That’s why the requirements of what you need to do means you have to play at an incredible standard.

That’s what Jokic is doing and he’s ticking every single box that can possibly be argued against him:

Best player in the league
No.1 seed in conference
Best basic stats
Best advanced stats
No 2nd star
Eye test
Consistency

There’s no argument against him at the moment.

He’s had literally 1 game under 50% FG, has the highest +/- in the league, is winning enough, leads the league in TS%, has the team in the top conference seed.

Averaging 25/11/10 on 63/37/82,

63 god damn FG%!
70% TS
32.4 PER
.324 WS/48

And passing every single bit of that with the eye test.

[mademan]

It's far from clear cut that Luka is having a better statistical season than Jokic. You can probably make a better argument for Jokic than Luka honestly

[Ron Swanson]

Don't really see any legit reasoning for not having Jokic clearly ahead of the pack right now. Even if I have issues with most of the defensive metrics that aggregate/overrate his overall/two-way impact, he's head and shoulders above everyone else in most advanced offensive stats, and unlike the last two years the team record/net-rating/SRS is finally reflecting that (we can also stop gatekeeping the "he's playing with a bunch of G-leaguers" narrative). Honestly didn't think it was possible that he could exceed what he did last year and force the writers to give him the MVP 3-peat, but here we are...

[baksuzz]

Doncic having a statistically better season then a guy averaging 25/11/10 on 62% fg, having a 2nd highest PER in history(1st one is him from last year), best +/- in the league, top seed in the West. LOL

Jokic is also playing 4min less per game then Doncic

[Duke4life831]

Luka is having a statistically better year than Jokic. So if Luka can drag his team into playoffs as a 6 or higher seed. The same justification can he given to give it to Luka using last years justification for Jokic. Only sounds fair? Correct? Jokic team is completely healthy. He’s got 2 other max players. Murray (who could have played late last season) got an extra 6 months recovery so is 100% recovered. Plus Gordon who may be their second best player now.

Im just curious, like what is this based on? Either than PPG, how is he having a better year statistically? Jokic has more rebounds and assists while having less turnovers. Jokic has a +10% advantage in eFG% and a +9% advantage in TS%. Jokic has the advantage in stats like VORP, BPM, RAPM, RPM, RAPTOR, PER, WS/48.

Also I think we can all come to a solid middle ground here when it comes to his quality of teammates. No one is making the argument pretty much anymore that Jokic has trash teammates. Ya he doesnt have a legit #2 (that has been brought up), but the quality of team is good and one of the main reasons people say he needs to get the #1 seed to win the MVP. But on the flip side, lets not just try and frame it as, "he is playing alongside 2 max players". Neither are all star caliber players, if anything those two get brought up constantly for being bad contracts. Again not saying the team is bad, I think this is a very Dirk 2011-esque team. No legit #2, but a well built team.

[kuclas]

Luka is having a statistically better year than Jokic. So if Luka can drag his team into playoffs as a 6 or higher seed. The same justification can he given to give it to Luka using last years justification for Jokic. Only sounds fair? Correct? Jokic team is completely healthy. He’s got 2 other max players. Murray (who could have played late last season) got an extra 6 months recovery so is 100% recovered. Plus Gordon who may be their second best player now.

Im just curious, like what is this based on? Either than PPG, how is he having a better year statistically? Jokic has more rebounds and assists while having less turnovers. Jokic has a +10% advantage in eFG% and a +9% advantage in TS%. Jokic has the advantage in stats like VORP, BPM, RAPM, RPM, RAPTOR, PER, WS/48.

Also I think we can all come to a solid middle ground here when it comes to his quality of teammates. No one is making the argument pretty much anymore that Jokic has trash teammates. Ya he doesnt have a legit #2 (that has been brought up), but the quality of team is good and one of the main reasons people say he needs to get the #1 seed to win the MVP. But on the flip side, lets not just try and frame it as, "he is playing alongside 2 max players". Neither are all star caliber players, if anything those two get brought up constantly for being bad contracts. Again not saying the team is bad, I think this is a very Dirk 2011-esque team. No legit #2, but a well built team.

Murray had to play like max player just to get Denver and Jokic out of the first and second round of the 2020 bubble playoffs.

Look the reality is they awarded Jokic the mvp with a subpar team with a 6 seed in playoffs last year. That’s the barrier. Same with Westbrook getting mvp with 6 seed.

Jokic is not leading the league in any eyeball test. Aka ppg assist or rebounds. It’s the narrative. He’s still a average defender as well and Gordon really helping now on defense.

So the nba narrative says Luka can still win mvp dragging Dallas to a 6 seed or higher. It’s only because Jokic has to do much better than a triple double. Much better than 10 games better wins than last year.

And we all know nba mvp isn’t awarded to the best player or else lebron would have won if 8-9 years in a row. Same with Jordan. Anyone who thinks Charles Barkley or Karl Malone had better years than Jordan when they won their mvp has a short memory. Their teams had better records. But MJ was still superior those years.

[Duke4life831]

Luka is having a statistically better year than Jokic. So if Luka can drag his team into playoffs as a 6 or higher seed. The same justification can he given to give it to Luka using last years justification for Jokic. Only sounds fair? Correct? Jokic team is completely healthy. He’s got 2 other max players. Murray (who could have played late last season) got an extra 6 months recovery so is 100% recovered. Plus Gordon who may be their second best player now.

Im just curious, like what is this based on? Either than PPG, how is he having a better year statistically? Jokic has more rebounds and assists while having less turnovers. Jokic has a +10% advantage in eFG% and a +9% advantage in TS%. Jokic has the advantage in stats like VORP, BPM, RAPM, RPM, RAPTOR, PER, WS/48.

Also I think we can all come to a solid middle ground here when it comes to his quality of teammates. No one is making the argument pretty much anymore that Jokic has trash teammates. Ya he doesnt have a legit #2 (that has been brought up), but the quality of team is good and one of the main reasons people say he needs to get the #1 seed to win the MVP. But on the flip side, lets not just try and frame it as, "he is playing alongside 2 max players". Neither are all star caliber players, if anything those two get brought up constantly for being bad contracts. Again not saying the team is bad, I think this is a very Dirk 2011-esque team. No legit #2, but a well built team.

Murray had to play like max player just to get Denver and Jokic out of the first and second round of the 2020 bubble playoffs.

Look the reality is they awarded Jokic the mvp with a subpar team with a 6 seed in playoffs last year. That’s the barrier. Same with Westbrook getting mvp with 6 seed.

Jokic is not leading the league in any eyeball test. Aka ppg assist or rebounds. It’s the narrative. He’s still a average defender as well and Gordon really helping now on defense.

So the nba narrative says Luka can still win mvp dragging Dallas to a 6 seed or higher. It’s only because Jokic has to do much better than a triple double. Much better than 10 games better wins than last year.

And we all know nba mvp isn’t awarded to the best player or else lebron would have won if 8-9 years in a row. Same with Jordan. Anyone who thinks Charles Barkley or Karl Malone had better years than Jordan when they won their mvp has a short memory. Their teams had better records. But MJ was still superior those years.

Ya and? Thats not a knock on Jokic. They lost to LA who had 2 guys playing like All NBA player with LeBron and AD. Again the reason why Dirk's championship run is still so talked about is because its super rare to see guys win it all without having a legit #2 star option. And just because Murray played like a max player for 10-15 games, doesnt mean that is the player Jokic plays with every game. Jamal is averaging 19/4/5 on slightly below league average efficiency this year. Again I want to be clear, Im not making the argument Jokic has a horrible roster around him this year either.

He's not leading the league in any eyeball test? He is 5 assists shy of being the league leader in assists, youre telling me if he makes up that gap, he all of a sudden is having a better statistical season than Luka? Because then he would be leading in a raw stat category?

Jokic winning the MVP last year is pretty simple. Basically every single advanced metric showed him having a far greater season than anyone else. Then when you factor in he was missing his 2nd and 3rd best player, then also factor in he actually won just as many games as any of the other MVP contenders

Jokic: 46 wins
Embiid: 45 wins
Giannis: 45 wins

Who was the guy on winning more games and having the better individual season than Jokic last year? Now if you want to say Luka is the Jokic in this year's race. There are some major differences. There is a player who is winning more games and putting up better stats, its Jokic.

I also havent once made the argument that the MVP is the best player of the year award. Its the most valuable player award. What stat or argument is there for Luka being more valuable than Jokic this year?

[baksuzz]

Who was the guy on winning more games and having the better individual season than Jokic last year? Now if you want to say Luka is the Jokic in this year's race. There are some major differences. There is a player who is winning more games and putting up better stats, its Jokic.

Funny to read some of the posts, some people are just coming with any reason why NOT to give him the 3rd MVP

first it was voters fatigue, then he didnt win a championship yet so he shouldnt win the MVP again(even though a lot of all time greats didnt yet win the title at his age), then he is playing with 2 other max guys even though MPJ is probably the worst contract in the league and one of the worst players paid the max(in my opinion) and Murray is not even a top10 PG. Gordon while being a nice fit and a good player, he cant create anything for himself

Guys like Gordon, KCP and even Murray and MPJ look much better playing with Jokic because he gets them so many easy shots during the game. Big percentage of MPJ shots are open 3pt after a screen and a handoff from Jokic, Gordon after Jokic drops him a pass under the rim and so on.

[iggymcfrack]

There are so many variables to wining mvp

Let’s face facts. Lebron getting screwed in 2011 cause of the backlash of his decision

People want to defend Jokic winning last year despite a a so so team record (for nba mvp). You can only give nba mvp to stats for so long. They need to do something special for their third nba mvp in a row. He’s got to win. 60 games. Jokic had one of the worst winning records last year for nba mvp in history. So if voters justified giving it to him cause of his stats and dragging team to playoffs

https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/worst-record-of-an-mvp

Luka is having a statistically better year than Jokic. So if Luka can drag his team into playoffs as a 6 or higher seed. The same justification can he given to give it to Luka using last years justification for Jokic. Only sounds fair? Correct? Jokic team is completely healthy. He’s got 2 other max players. Murray (who could have played late last season) got an extra 6 months recovery so is 100% recovered. Plus Gordon who may be their second best player now.

The only stat Luka has over Jokic is PPG. Literally every other stat goes to Jokic. Jokic is also winning more than anyone else in the league. His team has the best record in the West and they’re +12.4 with him on the floor. Even Tatum only has the Celtics at +9.3 when he’s on the floor and he has the best supporting cast in the league.

And lebron had more ppg/asg/rebounds per game over Derrick rose. And voters didn’t give him his 3rd straight mvp

The heat finished with 58 wins. Bulls finished with 62 wins.

What happens if Boston finishes with 62 wins and Denver 58 wins? Do u give it to Tatum than?

Right now Memphis and Denver are tied in losses. Essentially a dead heat

My point is Jokic has to do something special to get the third mvp in a row.
25/10/10 isn’t going to do it with 58 wins and 2bd or 3rd best overall record in the nba.

LeBron had a disappointing year in 2010. Everyone expected the Heat to be the best team of all-time and they didn’t even get the 1 seed. He had his worst PER since 2007. His worst on/off since 2007. And while Rose got hella overrated, the difference between Dwight and LeBron in 2010 was super small and both and good arguments for MVP.

Jokic has the 2nd best PER of all-time behind last years season. He has what might be the best on/off of all-time, better than any season by LeBron and Curry at least.his team has the best record in the West and has won 17 of their last 20. He has the highest TS% ever for a 20+ PPG scorer. He’s the first center to average double digit assist since Wilt. He has the highest LEBRON since the stat was invented in 2014. He has the highest WS/48 since Kareem in 1972. How much more special can you get? It literally might be the best regular season of all-time.

[Bank Shot]

LeBron being behind Rose in MVP voting in 2011 was dumb but it's not like LeBron was the clear cut MVP that year. That was one of his worst regular seasons in his prime. Dwight finished second in voting and had a very legit case (unlike Rose).

Jokic looks like he's going to separate himself from the pack more than LeBron did that year. It doesn't make sense to punish him for doing something LeBron couldn't.

[Inspektor1312]

First time I've watched Tatum in a while. Not impressed tbh.

edit: wanted to post in the game thread, but I guess it's appropriate here since JT is in the MVP convo.

[baksuzz]

First time I've watched Tatum in a while. Not impressed tbh.

I also watched him first time this year, hope he plays much better usually. He turned the ball over 4 times in last 3minutes, shooting 30% from the field

It is his 12th game this season in which he had less then 40% from the field. Not great for an MVP candidate

[Sgt Major]

Jokic is not leading the league in any eyeball test. Aka ppg assist or rebounds. It’s the narrative.

You should be watching more basketball.

[CobraCommander]

There's something about those horses guys

Read on Twitter

We are watching a guy in Jokic that is probably 2 rings away from being in the goat or at worse the top 10 all time conversation- and honestly he is the only guy in the league (not named Lebron) that is on a sure fire top 10 all time arch. Giannis and KD and Curry could have a say in the top ten argument .....but Jokic is playing at sustained ultra high level hereto unheard of-

Westbrook had a year, harden had a few years, rose had a year....Jokic quietly looking like the heir apparent to Lebron as the best guy by a mile in the league. Even if he doesn’t win mvp - there really anyone as good as him?

....the voters can say what ever but you and I know Tatum, Luka, Giannis, sga, KD, dame, ad , Embiid and Curry are not as good as Jokic...other guys have amazing games - and Jokic working on 1000 days straight of being the best basketball player on earth with out a break....

[CobraCommander]

Jokic is not leading the league in any eyeball test. Aka ppg assist or rebounds. It’s the narrative.

You should be watching more basketball.

Dude not watching ball...he reading those stat lines thinking it’s a typo...lol

For the untrained eyeball test Ja is the greatest basketball player ever....dunks on the universe then he flexes THEN he leads sports center in OMG moments ...must see tv....I get tired watching Ja dude is amazing..


and Jokic quietly shoots 90+% on a 30+ p triple double and acts like the whole game his heart rate was 60 beats per minute....and after the game you like - wait he did everything perfectly like a Boston dynamic robot....

[CobraCommander]

First time I've watched Tatum in a while. Not impressed tbh.

edit: wanted to post in the game thread, but I guess it's appropriate here since JT is in the MVP convo.

Not impressed with 34 and 19 in a win against the defending champs when he is the only starter on the Celtics with a positive plus/minus? I know that stat doesn’t tell the whole story but winning matters ... no Tatum isn’t Jokicesq efficient but he got the win...which is why they play

[Inspektor1312]

First time I've watched Tatum in a while. Not impressed tbh.

edit: wanted to post in the game thread, but I guess it's appropriate here since JT is in the MVP convo.

Not impressed with 34 and 19 in a win against the defending champs when he is the only starter on the Celtics with a positive plus/minus? I know that stat doesn’t tell the whole story but winning matters ... no Tatum isn’t Jokicesq efficient but he got the win...which is why they play

I guess Jokić spoiled me
He was really careless with the ball and 34 points on 27 shots isn't really impressive today. Not saying it was a bad game from him, it was just a reaction at the moment. Like I said in the edit, I wanted to post that in the game thread.
That being said, Boston is a really good team. Having guys like Smart and Horford next to your two star players is immense.

Conclusion: I gotta watch more non-Nuggets games.

[Statlanta]

So who's in second place is it Doncic with the raw box score stats or Tatum with the team success.

[ITYSL]

First time I've watched Tatum in a while. Not impressed tbh.

I also watched him first time this year, hope he plays much better usually. He turned the ball over 4 times in last 3minutes, shooting 30% from the field

It is his 12th game this season in which he had less then 40% from the field. Not great for an MVP candidate

Fg% eh. Before Jokic and Giannis winning it, you had ball handlers and wings like Harden, Westbrook, heck even Curry, winning MVPs, who regularly shot under 40% from the field.

Tatum had a sloppy game with the TOs for sure and had a bad shooting night, but picked it up when it mattered, and 39/18/6 in a win over the defending champs, no matter how you cut, is not a bad game. People are just spoiled by the impossibly high Jokic standard.

[RB34]

First time I've watched Tatum in a while. Not impressed tbh.

edit: wanted to post in the game thread, but I guess it's appropriate here since JT is in the MVP convo.

I too like to not watch players but then comment on random games when they don’t meet my standard.