NBA MVP Discussion Thread 2022-23 (pt 2)

[liquidswords]

MVP Race:
1. Tatum
2. Jokic
3. Luka
4. Giannis
5. Embiid

Best Player:
1. Giannis
2. Jokic
3. Luka
4. KD
5. Embiid

Feel like Tatum gets overrated and Brown gets underrated.

If that's the case, why have Tatum #1 on the MVP ranking? lol I'll keep saying it - voting for Tatum this year feels extremely lazy. He's not doing anything special (just great) and plays on the best team with arguably the best side kick. Give it to Jokic or Embiid.

And yet, the Celtics have been a bad team when Tatum sits. I posted all the lineup data a few weeks ago, but let’s take another look.

Tatum on the court, Jaylen off? +15.5 net rating.

Tatum on the court without Smart, Jaylen, Al, and Rob? +14.3 net rating.

Smart, Jaylen, and Horford on the court without Tatum? -2.7 net rating.

I’ve been on the record multiple times that I think Jokic should be MVP. But if you don’t think what Tatum’s doing is special, it’s you missing.

Those seem to be pretty picky-choosey as far as scenarios. Tatum, besides JB, plays the most minutes by far on the C's for obvious reasons. They are arguably the deepest team in the league so there are tons of lineup variations you could look at for on/off.

How about JB's on/off?

And I'm sorry what Tatum is doing is not special. Look around the league. Jokic, Giannis, Luka and Embiid are or have been dominating and putting up better numbers with much less (in terms of talent or rosters riddled by injuries)

[MartyConlonOnTheRun]

I don't know what is more wild, Mavs back at the 4th spot or this tweet..

Read on Twitter

The MVP race is literally a 2-man race at this point. Jokic and Doncic. Nobody else even belongs in the discussion seriously.

But it's literally not. The race isn't even 2/3rds over and there are a lot of runners on the track that could still win. Do they have big leads, sure.... But to say no one else can win it is asinine.
Nikola: 36-16 - 25.0 ppg, 11.1 rpg, 10.1 apg; 70%TS
Luka: 28-25 - 33.0 ppg, 8.9 rpg, 8.2 apg; 61%TS
Giannis: 35-17 - 32.3 ppg, 12.3 rpg, 5.1 apg; 59%TS (Brought down by his below average FT, which is trending upward)
Tatum: 37-15 - 31.1 ppg, 8.7 rpg, 4.4 apg; 61%TS
Embiid: 33-17 - 33.5 ppg, 10.1 rpg, 4.2 apg; 64%TS
https://www.nba.com/news/kia-mvp-ladder-feb-3-2023-edition
I think ESPNs rankings are solid. IMHO its Jokic>>>>>>>>>>>Embiid>Giannis>>>Luka>Tatum
But that could easily change over the next 20 games.

[slick_watts]

jokic 70% ts lol. just give him the award now. what the heck is this.

[LessEyeTest]

I know this has been discussed before, but it's worth repeating. Defense is HALF the game.

I love Doncic and if the award was for offensive player of the year (which it should be), then he is near the top. If you look at who is the most valuable in a total package, you can easily limit this list to one or two players.

Players spend half their time playing defense, but you can't seriously think the value of defense is equal to offense can you? Especially in today's league. You can *maybe* give it a 20% value and even that's probably overvalued because everyone's scoring 110ppg these days lol.

But let's say you narrow down this list like you wanted:

Giannis
Embiid
Tatum

Do they honestly impact the game as much as Jokic? No. Not even remotely. And if you take into account advanced metrics, Jokic is up there with all of them in regards to pretty much every advanced metric on defense.

[Feed Your Head]

If that's the case, why have Tatum #1 on the MVP ranking? lol I'll keep saying it - voting for Tatum this year feels extremely lazy. He's not doing anything special (just great) and plays on the best team with arguably the best side kick. Give it to Jokic or Embiid.

And yet, the Celtics have been a bad team when Tatum sits. I posted all the lineup data a few weeks ago, but let’s take another look.

Tatum on the court, Jaylen off? +15.5 net rating.

Tatum on the court without Smart, Jaylen, Al, and Rob? +14.3 net rating.

Smart, Jaylen, and Horford on the court without Tatum? -2.7 net rating.

I’ve been on the record multiple times that I think Jokic should be MVP. But if you don’t think what Tatum’s doing is special, it’s you missing.

Those seem to be pretty picky-choosey as far as scenarios. Tatum, besides JB, plays the most minutes by far on the C's for obvious reasons. They are arguably the deepest team in the league so there are tons of lineup variations you could look at for on/off.

How about JB's on/off?

And I'm sorry what Tatum is doing is not special. Look around the league. Jokic, Giannis, Luka and Embiid are or have been dominating and putting up better numbers with much less (in terms of talent or rosters riddled by injuries)

Jaylen has a -7.1 on/off, which is in the 18th percentile. There’s no picky choosey lol, Tatum makes the difference between this team being elite, and crappy. I posted the numbers last week, but this team has a negative net rating when he sits, 43rd percentile, and that’s with garbage time filtered out. When Jaylen sits? They have a +11.8 net rating, 97th percentile. When Smart sits? +7.5, 92nd percentile. Horford? +7.8, and so on.

Read on Twitter

?s=20&t=VXHWJ6kZoPl8JLWdhaTo2g

No matter how you spin it, they are not a good team without Tatum. Just to give an idea how extreme it is, when off the court, no Celtics player is within 5 net rating points as when Tatum is off the court. Over the 6 weeks, it’s gotten even more extreme. This is the Celtics net rating with the players OFF the court over that time period.

Spoiler:

[Feed Your Head]

Here’s some Denver lineup data, all per CTG.

Jokic on the court: +12.8, 98th percentile
Jokic off the court: -10.0, 7th percentile

Gordon/Murray/KCP on, Jokic off: -1.5, 39th percentile.
Jokic on, KCP/Murray/Gordon off: -11.3, 5th percentile. Only 147 possessions though, as Denver doesn’t really stagger their starters.

Jokic/KCP on, Murray/Gordon off: +13.6, 98th percentile.

Murray on, Jokic off: -9.2, 10th percentile.
Jokic on, Murray off: +12.1, 98th percentile.

Gordon on, Jokic off: -0.6, 44th percentile.
Jokic on, Gordon off: +3.8, 76th percentile.

KCP on, Jokic off: +0.8, 54th percentile.
Jokic on, KCP off: +3.0, 71st percentile.

MPJ on, Jokic off: -6.5, 18th percentile.
Jokic on, MPJ off: +10.3, 96th percentile.

Jokic on, Bones off: +15.1, 99th percentile, on 2422 possessions.
Bones on, Jokic of: -15.7, 2nd percentile. Bones has been a huge disappointment this season.

There’s not as much combos to look at with them, as they usually keep their starters together and same for the bench, but there’s no question that Jokic has been incredibly valuable, and they have been infinitely worse without him.

One thing the on/off showed that matches my eye test when watching them is how important KCP has been this season. I liked Monte a lot, but Pope is as perfect a fit off of Jokic that any role player could be.

I love you. Thank you for all that data. May I ask where you got it from?

Just saw this, but it’s from cleaningtheglass.com, which filters out garbage time.

I spend way too much time on the site

[BigO]

I know this has been discussed before, but it's worth repeating. Defense is HALF the game.

I love Doncic and if the award was for offensive player of the year (which it should be), then he is near the top. If you look at who is the most valuable in a total package, you can easily limit this list to one or two players.

Players spend half their time playing defense, but you can't seriously think the value of defense is equal to offense can you? Especially in today's league. You can *maybe* give it a 20% value and even that's probably overvalued because everyone's scoring 110ppg these days lol.

But let's say you narrow down this list like you wanted:

Giannis
Embiid
Tatum

Do they honestly impact the game as much as Jokic? No. Not even remotely. And if you take into account advanced metrics, Jokic is up there with all of them in regards to pretty much every advanced metric on defense.

To win championships (i.e the playoffs) defense is more important. I understand that very few have the offensive skills of a Jokic or Giannis, while the gap between their defense and other NBA players is much less. But that doesn't negate that finding a player that embodies both is really the litmus test of who is most valuable.

And I didn't eliminate Jokic from my list. But the only reason he is a front runner has nothing to do with his defense. Same with the others. I just think it should.

With a gun to my head, I'd probably give it Embiid.

[dhsilv2]

Top 75 is a joke

There are at least 20 guys I'd remove from that top 75 list before Giannis, who is clearly a top 75 guy...as is Jokic.

[dhsilv2]

Top 75 is a joke

I'll never forgive them for having AD in there and not Howard. Never.

The fact they didn't remove any of the "original" 50 was far worse. At least 15 spots for modern players were locked away from when they league had less teams. Look at the 70's knicks guys who all made it. No way in hell beyond Walt and Reed anyone else from those teams needed to be anywhere near the list. Or a guy like Tiny who I'm 99% sure was on the list. Just so many poor choices from the past.

[bisme37]

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