NBA MVP Discussion Thread 2023-24 (Part 3: Son of Daughter of MVP thread)

[Jaqua92]

jokic wouldn't be winning anything if murray wasn't always playing at a high level

Post of the month.

put it as your sig and watch him avg 27 ppg on 52% shooting in the postseason.

Do you ever consider that Murray does what he does because he's able to isolate with the space Jokic creates?

[greekman]

Lillard instead of Murray would’ve won a championship.

murray was the one of the best players in the playoffs. lillard wouldn't have kept up.

lillard is a career 40% shooter in the postseason, murray has been about 50% in last 40 postseason games.
murray as 33/5/6 on 53% shooting in the series against the lakers that put them in the finals.

Giving Murray credit for Jokic's success is silly.

if murray is injured jokic wouldn't even reach the 2nd round.

[losmi]

True. Jokic was just lucky to have a team that could win conference finals without him when he got injured. Oh, wait...

[greekman]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

[Zadeh]

murray was the one of the best players in the playoffs. lillard wouldn't have kept up.

lillard is a career 40% shooter in the postseason, murray has been about 50% in last 40 postseason games.
murray as 33/5/6 on 53% shooting in the series against the lakers that put them in the finals.

There are several options, can you imagine Curry or Luka. Booker, SGA, just to point out some obvious choices.

so you admit jokic is playing with an mvp-calibre player.

How much further does this stupidity extend?

Mvp caliber player is Murray ?

I can count at least ten players better than Murray at same position that not a superstar.
Maxey, Middleton, Holiday, Lavine, Dejounte Murray, Bane, White, Brunson, Mitchell, Russell that's eleven and I can still counting.


I don't think Greekman has ever seen a Denver game. Murray is like a ticking time bomb, sometimes exploding on the right side but mostly exploding for the Nuggets.

He mostly plays for himself, rarely passes, and attempts ridiculous shots. If it hits, it seems good, but mostly it does not. And still he is not learn to give the ball to Jokic for the team's sake.

Without their top star, there are at least eight teams better than the Nuggets without Jokic.
Celtics without Tatum, Bucks without giannis, 76er without embiid, Timberwolves without Edwards, OKC without shai, Clippers without Leonard, Kings withour fox or sabonis, Phoenix without durant or Booker.

[Infinite Llamas]

Watch the games.

Murray gets to cook based on myriad, tough screens set by Jokic and Jokic commands so much attention that Murray has a lot of space to operate.

Someone posted a graphic a week ago showing how Murray’s TS% with Jokic on the court was like 61% and 49% when Jokic was off the court.

[Zadeh]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

Acquire at least two championship rings. Without "no ring" narrative, Jokic could have won his 3rd MVP award last year

[losmi]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

They would have won multiple titles by now. That's my opinion. Your opinion is different? Fine, but there's no point arguing about hypotheticals.

Either way, this is a regular season MVP thread and Murray has always been inconsistent and overall pedestrian in regular seasons, so I'm not sure what point you're trying to make. Murray wasn't even playing when Jokic won his MVPs lol.

[Exp0sed]

Jokic is back on top atm for me, SGA as 1B very closely behind
I have Luka over Giannis atm because I think he's having a tremendous season that isn't getting talked about enough (with far less "help" than say: Giannis) and I value seedings\record less than most I suppose as roster, coaching and context matter alot

Luka has been bringing it on D more than ever before and he keeps improving, he's actually shooting career highs from 3 and from the stripe, while upping his assists - he's even fouling alot less, not significant on it's own but it's another indication of the strides he's made as a defender

37.5% from 3 on huge volume with the profile of shots he's taking...that's hella impressive

[Doctor MJ]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

How I see things?

I see Luka & Jokic playing a very different style of play.

Luka plays intensely heliocentric, dominates the ball, struggles to get the most out of other on-ball talents, and doesn't give you much when he's off-ball.

Jokic plays a style that cannot easily be classified but has its roots in the pivot-passer model where he doesn't hold onto the ball long, allows other on-ball talents to shine, and moves without the ball in a way that provides all sorts of sneaky value.

In theory each team they are on is optimized around the respective star so we should expect some struggles if there was a shift...but then there's this matter that the Mavs never seem to do much better when Luka's out there compared to without him, while Jokic's teams generally show a night & day difference depending on whether Jokic is on the floor or not.

A variation on a simple stat I like to point to for perspective: Most times leading one particular franchise in +/- across the entirety of a season with the data going back to '93-94.

Nowitzki (DAL) 14
Duncan (SAS) 10
LeBron (CLE) 9
Curry (GSW) 8
Nash (PHX) 8

Other high scorers in the conversation here.

Embiid (PHI) 6
Jokic (DEN) 6 - and leading this year which would make 7
Tatum (BOS) 5
Giannis (MIL) 4 - and leading this year which would make 5

Other guys in discussion here tend to be young, but if the season were to end right now, all of Edwards, SGA, Hali & Kawhi would have non-zero tallies.

Doncic is the only one who has his own slot on this poll that would remain zero. We're now 6 years in, and we've seen basically no indicators that Doncic has massive impact as a matter of course the way we expect for MVP-level players.

Now don't get me wrong: I think the resilience of Luka-centrism is still very scary to playoff opponents, and in the end, that's the thing that truly matters to legacy. If Luka is never all that impactful in the regular season but proves more resilient than all comers in the playoffs, he can still be known as the best player of his generation.

But if you're skeptical that anyone could be making the Mavs considerably better than Luka has when you're watching them now, I'll tell you flat out that you're not actually looking at the impact, just the box score and the fact that Luka seems to be able to manufacture production in all situations with his preferred style of play. Because we're not talking about a close comparison between Jokic & Luka over the course of regular seasons.

Jokic is among the most impactful players we've ever seen, and Luka is perhaps the most surprisingly un-impactful guys we've ever seen.

I type all this and I think that if you're like most, you'll just roll your eyes. But this is something some of us have been watching unfold for years now and we're genuinely shocked by the lack of "they couldn't do anything without him" evidence Doncic continues to show. I don't think anyone expected to see this, and it's now a major 2020s phenomenon worthy of study in its own right.

[Woodsanity]

murray was the one of the best players in the playoffs. lillard wouldn't have kept up.

lillard is a career 40% shooter in the postseason, murray has been about 50% in last 40 postseason games.
murray as 33/5/6 on 53% shooting in the series against the lakers that put them in the finals.

Giving Murray credit for Jokic's success is silly.

if murray is injured jokic wouldn't even reach the 2nd round.

He already made the 2nd round without Murray....

And it was a 4-2 win against the Blazers.

And it was with a garbage roster with many players who arent even in the league anymore.

[Jaqua92]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

They'd probably be as good as Denver is now lol.

[Jaqua92]

There are several options, can you imagine Curry or Luka. Booker, SGA, just to point out some obvious choices.

so you admit jokic is playing with an mvp-calibre player.

How much further does this stupidity extend?

Mvp caliber player is Murray ?

I can count at least ten players better than Murray at same position that not a superstar.
Maxey, Middleton, Holiday, Lavine, Dejounte Murray, Bane, White, Brunson, Mitchell, Russell that's eleven and I can still counting.


I don't think Greekman has ever seen a Denver game. Murray is like a ticking time bomb, sometimes exploding on the right side but mostly exploding for the Nuggets.

He mostly plays for himself, rarely passes, and attempts ridiculous shots. If it hits, it seems good, but mostly it does not. And still he is not learn to give the ball to Jokic for the team's sake.

Without their top star, there are at least eight teams better than the Nuggets without Jokic.
Celtics without Tatum, Bucks without giannis, 76er without embiid, Timberwolves without Edwards, OKC without shai, Clippers without Leonard, Kings withour fox or sabonis, Phoenix without durant or Booker.

Murray is differently better than Holiday, White, Middleton and Dejounte lol

[Exp0sed]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

They'd probably be as good as Denver is now lol.

bingo

Jokic is turning scrubs into useful players, decent players into good ones and good ones to great ones
guys like AG and MPJ would look very differently playing next to most stars

Jokic is an all-time great in elevating teammates and Luka just isn't..

[Jaqua92]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

They'd probably be as good as Denver is now lol.

bingo

Jokic is turning scrubs into useful players, decent players into good ones and good ones to great ones
guys like AG and MPJ would look very differently playing next to most stars

Jokic is an all-time great in elevating teammates and Luka just isn't..

When did we ever consider Aaron Gordon an elite role player?

He was always just a high flying athletic bad bucket getter who was seen as a worker Zach Levine.

Now? He's one of the elite role players in the NBA playing in that system.

I've seen people argue about Doncic and Haliburton as best playmakers in the NBA because of assist numbers...

Jokic creates, deliberately, so many good shots for his teammates off the ball, using gravity, calling plays, being an on court couch, and setting screens.

He's similar to Tom Brady in that he just processes and understands the game on a different level than anyone else..how many times per game do we see Denver's opponents have defensive breakdowns? They aren't breakdowns, Jokic just sees defensive gaps so quickly and hits them before they close up.

He's a top 5 playmaker of all time, and easily a top 5 offensive player ever...

[Duke4life831]

Giving Murray credit for Jokic's success is silly.

if murray is injured jokic wouldn't even reach the 2nd round.

He already made the 2nd round without Murray....

And it was a 4-2 win against the Blazers.

And it was with a garbage roster with many players who arent even in the league anymore.

Oh come on, what star player couldnt make it out of the 1st round with a starting backcourt of Austin Rivers and Facundo Campazzo.

[Wolfgang630]

There’s no way we lost eyetoma to be replaced with greekman lol

[dygaction]

murray was the one of the best players in the playoffs. lillard wouldn't have kept up.

lillard is a career 40% shooter in the postseason, murray has been about 50% in last 40 postseason games.
murray as 33/5/6 on 53% shooting in the series against the lakers that put them in the finals.

There are several options, can you imagine Curry or Luka. Booker, SGA, just to point out some obvious choices.

so you admit jokic is playing with an mvp-calibre player.

how about Mitchell and Brunson?

[tsamo]

I think Shai deserves it this year so far, if the things continue as they are right now.

Of course Embiid is playing at an elite clip but as we all know, he's dealing with a multitude of injuries again to the point he'll probably miss the 65 mark and even if he doesn't, all his main competitors have been playing way more matches than him.

Giannis and Jokic have been great, but nothing special or new compared to some of their other seasons so far, so Shai should get the nod.

[dygaction]

if luka and jokic switched places how much better would the mavs be ?

They'd probably be as good as Denver is now lol.

That's indeed going to make the Mavs a lot more formidable by solving big problems, even though I may watch more Den games
Kyrie
Exum
Jones Jr
Jokic
Lively II
Josh Green/Hardaway Jr./Grant Williams/Maxi/Powell