2023-24 RealGM All-Season Awards Voting Thread (voting completed)

[jalengreen]

Player of the Year

1. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
2. Nikola Jokic
3. Luka Doncic
4. Jayson Tatum
5. Jalen Brunson

(HM: LeBron James, Rudy Gobert, Giannis Antetokounmpo)

I had Shai as my regular season MVP. He led a Thunder squad that far exceeded expectations and obtained the one seed in a highly competitive Western Conference. While young players like Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren were immense in their own right, Shai's the clear leader and helming a young squad like that is not a small task. I greatly value his extremely consistent & efficient scoring production, coupled with clearly positive defensive value at the guard position. He was somewhat disappointing in the first round of the playoffs, but I don't really put that much weight on it given it was a sweep against a far inferior opponent. On the other hand, he was great in the second round as the best player in the series IMO. As expected, his playstyle seems to translate fine to postseason basketball. And while a second round loss is a letdown for the one seed, the other MVP contender also lost in the second round.

Jokic is the best player in the league and an all-time great. He won MVP and I think it was deserved, even if he wasn't my pick. But because he wasn't my pick, I needed something in the postseason to make me put him over Shai. While he had two good series on paper (versus Shai's one), and similarly to Shai he ended up losing in the second round in large part due to his running mates underperforming offensively. OTOH, I also view Jokic's defense as problematic, and I think this was clearly highlighted in the postseason. Denver emerged victorious with a 4-1 win over the Lakers in the first round, a series in which we saw Jokic attacked constantly on the defensive end. It's a strategy that allowed an old LeBron to score with relative ease (as it did for an injured, old LeBron last year). Of course, it wasn't enough for them to win multiple games, but it was a strategy that led to them being competitive. Then in Round 2, Anthony Edwards was individually successful as well while attacking Jokic. It's something we kinda continue to see from perimeter players against Denver in the playoffs. So while Shai also lost in the second round of the playoffs, I did not come away thinking of any glaring weaknesses of his that were exploited by opposing teams. That's ultimately what makes me prefer Shai for this year's POY.

I was not that high on Luka's regular season compared to Shai and Jokic, and I also don't think his postseason was necessarily that impressive. Obviously leading a Finals team through the Western Conference is a big deal, but in order to surpass Shai and Jokic, it would've needed to be a particularly notable postseason performance. What stands out the most is the Minnesota series, but outside of that it was nothing that really moves me enough to put him over the superior RS guys who were also good in the PS. Problematic defense that was exploited in the PS also noteworthy, similar to Jokic.

Tatum's the best player on an all-time great team and that won the championship in a dominant fashion. That's a big deal. Ultimately his RS was nowhere near the level of the players above, nor was his PS particularly noteworthy. But I do value his talent as an all-around superstar and I think he's very easy to build around (and having two easy to build around wings in JB/JT has been a significant advantage for Boston). Then I round off my ballot with Brunson, who did a fine job carrying a Knicks team absolutely battered by injury. His post-ASB run was immense, as was his PS run until injury.

Offensive Player of the Year

1. Nikola Jokic
2. Luka Doncic
3. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander

This was pretty straightforward for me; Jokic is the best offensive player in the league IMO and he had an MVP level regular season and a fine postseason. Luka is probably the second best offensive player in the league and he had a worse regular season than Jokic, but his series against Minnesota was maybe the most impressive of the season. And Shai's really good too, but not offensively at the level of those two. Which might make you think "why is he your POY?" Defense and RS excellence, primarily. But really it's a close call lol

Defensive Player of the Year

1. Rudy Gobert
2. Bam Adebayo
3. Victor Wembanyama

Gobert was the deserved regular season DPOY who had a great postseason, obvious pick. Great year for Bam, deserves a lot of credit for how he anchored a stout Miami defense. Considered a bunch of different guys for the third spot. I think a deeper playoff run from the Lakers has me taking AD, but ultimately Wemby's RS was probably the most impressive.

Rookie of the Year

1. Victor Wembanyama
2. Chet Holmgren
3. Dereck Lively

I remember that at some point in the season, Chet was playing at a level clearly above Wemby, yet Wemby was still favored in Vegas for ROTY. I was telling people that a Chet ROTY bet was probably crazy value because while Wemby projected to be the better player, Chet was clearly tracking to have the better season for a far better team. Did not age well and Wemby surpassed Chet as a player incredibly quickly. Remarkable improvement if you look at the start of the season vs the end, truly a generational talent. And Chet was also an absurdly good rookie! Just unfortunate to have to compete against Wemby. Probably give Miller #3 if it wasn't for Lively's postseason.

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Will try to add MIP and 6MOY later.

[iggymcfrack]

Player of the Year

1. Nikola Jokic- Seemed to just barely nip out SGA as player of the year in the regular season and then only stretched that lead out when the playoffs started. He beat the opposition by large margins in every statistical composite despite playing most of those games against the best defense in the NBA who was selling out to stop him while his #2 was playing injured. He had an on/off over +20 and an incredible clutch game 7 where he put up 34/19/7. He did everything you could possibly ask of a player, but was just let down by his teammates as Gordon was the only real positive out there providing any kind of impact.

2. Shai Gilgeous Alexander- Was #2 in the regular season and despite a second round exit, he acquitted himself very well in his first postseason leading a team. He had the best playoff numbers of anyone who made it out of the first round other than Jokic and was also an excellent defensive contributor to the team with the 2nd best DRtg in the playoffs. I feel like there's a sizable gap between #2 and #3 on this list as Shai was very clearly one of the best 2 players in the league.

3. Luka Doncic- Had an excellent regular season, the best of his career, as he balanced more responsibilities defensively with his typical eye popping numbers. Unfortunately when the playoffs hit, as he was battling injury he regressed. Faced with managing an injury, he went all in on trying to do everything on offense and had nothing left for the other side of the ball where he was burned repeatedly and mercilessly. Still though, he came through in big moments and made enough plays that I don't necessarily think he should be punished for his playoff performance, but it was clearly below the top 2 guys on the list.

4. Jalen Brunson- He just made my top 5 for the regular season, but moves up with the Giannis injury. Like Luka, his efficiency dipped in the playoffs while taking on an extraordinary load under difficult circumstances. In his case, before he ultimately succumbed to injury himself, it was injuries to his teammates. Looking at his on/off numbers, I think it's clear that for the Knicks that high volume, low efficiency scoring was not a strategic misstep, but rather a necessity for the Knicks to get clean looks at the basket. I think he more than held on and showed himself to be a superstar at or near the top level.

5. LeBron James- 6th in regular season EPM, 2nd in postseason BPM; LeBron carried a heavy load at an advanced age, and did it incredibly well. His TS% was the highest since 2014 and he continues to generate lots of good looks for others while still being a well above average defender when it matters. You'd think this has to be the last year for him on the list and if so, it would be a fitting goodbye, passing the torch to the new best player in the league by losing to him for the 2nd time in a row and the 2nd time in 3 series altogether.


Offensive player of the Year

1. Nikola Jokic- Who else? The guy who absolutely dominated the league statistically in both the regular season and postseason. His edge for #1 only gets larger when you focus on the side of the ball where he's already in GOAT contention.

2. Luka Doncic- Other players were better in the playoffs, but he still managed to provide enough of his normal punch to get the Mavericks to the Finals and I do think he was the clearcut second best offensive player in the regular season over any other contenders.

3. Tyrese Haliburton- Struggled with injuries for most of the year, but was so absolutely transcendent when healthy that he still makes this list. The superstar who dominated the start of the season leading to a magical run to the IST final showing up again in the playoffs was a wonderful surprise. I feel like overall cumulative numbers are the only way to analyze something like this where a player plays at such disparate levels of play and his put him a little ahead of Brunson and SGA for me.


Defensive player of the Year

1. Rudy Gobert- No doubt here. Gobert not only had a typically dominant prime season in the regular season, but for once he really showed out in the playoffs. I thought he was fantastic from start to finish. While it's been heavily discussed that Gobert led the Wolves defense in on/off during the postseason, I feel like less people know that he also led them in the regular season as well (among players with at least 1000 MP). He wasn't just the anchor for the league's best defense. He was a superstar.

2. Victor Wembanyama- His incredible wingspan and closing speed wreaked havoc on opposing offenses, both with shocking blocks and fright inducing deterrence. While the team was mostly set up for failure around him, Victor still showed incredible impact making the Spurs D 8.5 points better when he was in the game.

3. OG Anunoby- It was sad that he couldn't stay healthy for longer, but when he was the way he transformed the Knicks was unbelievable. He was everywhere at once, making the Knicks D an insane 16 points better when he was on the floor.


Coach of the Year

1. Rick Carlisle- Made all the right moves with the Pacers, taking a team that a lot of people thought would miss the playoffs and led them to the Eastern Conference Finals. One of the most impressive things for me was his flexibility. When the personnel was right at the beginning of the year to say "damn the torpedos" and go all offense, he did it. When the personnel changed after the Siakam trade, he played a different style and played to their new strengths defensively. When Haliburton got healthy in the playoffs, he let him retake primacy without compromising the defensive integrity. Just an outstanding season from an outstanding coach.

2. Joe Mazzulla- I was critical of him last year, but he was an extremely young coach who was still learning on the job. This year, all he did was lead one of the top 5 regular season teams of all-time despite not having a top 5 player on the roster and then go 16-3 in the playoffs for an all-time playoff run as well. When other coach of the year candidates faced Luka Doncic, they attacked him but not consistently and ultimately got burned in the 4th quarter. Mazzulla attacked Luka relentlessly to the point that when it was closing time, Luka had nothing left but dust. Honestly, it was a near perfect coaching season matching an incredible record with a clear tactical superiority in the postseason.

3. Ime Udoka
Added 19 wins to the Rockets' previous season total by getting the team to ratchet up the defensive intensity several notches and centering the offense around Sengun. You could really see how the team learned throughout the year, much like the Celtics did under Ime previously.


Rookie of the Year
1. Victor Wembanyama
2. Chet Holmgren
3. Dereck Lively

One of the best ROY races of all-time saw both Victor and Chet playing at an incredibly high level although ultimately Wemby pulled away down the stretch as he started setting records left and right, improving his offense while putting up cartoonish block totals.

Executive of the Year
1. Brad Stevens
2. Sam Presti
3. Chad Buchanan

The way the Celtics came together as unstoppable world beaters just by making good moves without messing with their top two or really getting any kind of leap from them is a thing of beauty. One of the most impressive accomplishments ever by a front office. OKC didn't pull the trigger on going all-in until just this week, but their patience left them in the enviable position of being the best team in the West while also maintaining cap space and an incredible amount of picks going forward. Finally, the Pacers managed to reach the conference finals very quickly from a poor position due to 2 incredible trades.

[Doctor MJ]

Personal Votes:

POY
1. Nikola Jokic (DEN)
2. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (OKC)
3. Luka Doncic (DAL)
4. Jayson Tatum (BOS)
5. Jalen Brunson (NYK)

HM: Anthony Edwards (MIN), Rudy Gobert (MIN), LeBron James (LAL), Tyrese Haliburton (IND), Jaylen Brown (BOS)

I have been debating the order of my Top 3 all the way to the wire here, but in the end I'm going to stay with the order I had them at the end of the regular season, which is what I use as my baseline for this project, and frankly what I'd expect others to often do as well. I think the playoffs were messy enough that basically whoever you had as your MVP (other than the one guy who voted for Giannis), there are good arguments to be made to keep that guy as your #1 for POY.

"Luka got to the Finals, you can't vote for a guy who only got to the 2nd Round!"
"Shai outplayed Luka when they met, and played the Mavs tougher than the the team that beat the Nuggets!"
"Jokic happened to play against a strong team that was perfectly built to give the Nuggets trouble, particularly if reliance on Murray doesn't end up justified by Murray's play."

All have a case, and all have cases against. This isn't a year with a perfect candidate, and so it's a time you hope to have compelling discussion.

Okay so, why Jokic in the regular season? I mean, it's kind of hard for me to find reasons not to go for him:

1. He leads the league in basically every all-in-one box score metric.
2. He led the league in raw +/-, had a massive +20 On-Off, and was ranked #1 in RAPM for the season by this study.
3. His game, and the effect it has on his teammates, pops to me more than any other player in the game. While I'm not someone who is comfortable saying I know who the best player is by "eye test", if you want to understand where I'm coming from when I watch the game, Jokic does the types of things I really notice.

But of course Shai was a strong candidate too, and I went back & forth on him vs Jokic during the regular season. Things about him:

1. He did lead his team to the #1 seed in the West, a considerably higher SRS than Denver, and OKC seemed to get the better of the head-to-head matchup.
2. The well-respected production/impact hybrid [ur=https://dunksandthrees.com/epml]EPM[/url] gives Shai the top spot for season Estimated Wins.
3. There's a kind of control that Shai has with his slithery body that almost feels robotic. He's a guy who was never seen as a superstar draft prospect despite being recruited by Kentucky, but he just keeps methodically, incrementally getting better on both sides of the ball.

While some of these facts allow us to diverge philosophically in what we value for the POY award, other things seem like contradictions:

How is it exactly that Shai looks better by hybrid (EPM), but Jokic looks better by both production (PER, WS, VORP) and impact (+/-, On-Off, RAPM)? And this is where we get into trouble with black box statistics, and why I'm more prone to look for simpler facts that are at least first-pass universally understood.

My simple OnWin stat leaders (games with positive +/-) for the Regular Season, for the kind of guys likely to get discussion here:

Jokic 63
Shai 56
Tatum 53
Brunson 52
George 52
Edwards 51
Gobert 51
Giannis 48
Luka 46
Haliburton 43
LeBron 41

Jokic sees a considerable lead by this metric over Shai, which makes sense when you remember that Shai missed some time, and the reason the Thunder won the #1 seed with 57 wins is because they won some without Shai.

Of course, this also makes Shai's Estimated Wins lead from EPM all the more noteworthy. That metric gives Shai the advantage despite playing less, and so if you favor that metric, really makes sense to go with him. But to me, I just think the Nuggets rode on the shoulders of Jokic more during the season.

What about Luka? Well, for me in the regular season he wasn’t really in the debate with the Top 2. As an early POY candidate I could see how he might make a run based on how well things were going in the last phase of the season, but he was always going to have to clearly outplay the other two guys to top my list.

So then, did he do that? Well, right there vs Shai we’ve got a problem because I just thought Shai was more impressive when they played. The head-to-head isn’t everything, but when you already have the lead in my assessment, it’s never going to feel great to me if you don’t end up ahead of the other guy.

By contrast, Luka was clearly more impressive against Minnesota than Jokic, and that’s of course something that can be part of a perspective where Luka was always the most capable player, and against the very best, he was better…

But of course then there’s the thing where Luka literally looked worse in all the other series than he did against Minnesota. I think we’ve reached a point where it makes sense in this discussion not to say “Luka was so good he dominated the best” but rather to say “Luka played 4 playoff series this year, and in one of those series, he looked like he was on another level compared to everyone else.”

I might even be inclined to say that each of Shai, Jokic & Luka had 2 series in which he played like the most effective player…which of course brings me back to my regular season order.

Briefly qualitatively on Luka: There’s really no doubt in my mind that Luka Being Luka involves him using a collection of GOAT-level abilities, and so it’s never struck me as odd that Luka may prove to be the best of his generation. Just a question how things play out.

There was a question before the finals as to whether Luka was close to a lock for #1 with a “decent” finals. For me it’s always a matter of a threshold that I don’t feel comfortable trying to define ahead of time. Luka leading his team past all comers would have likely led me to put him at #1, but a chip wasn’t a pre-req for him to get the nod.

I’d say what I was looking for to some degree was evidence of the Mav’s offensive resilience with Luka out there against all comers. If Luka has looked as good against Boston as he did against Minnesota, pretty sure that would have done the trick. And while in retrospect that may come across as unrealistic expectations, this is where I’d remind that if we’re going to emphasize what Luka did against “the #1 defense in the league” as if that represented what he could do against any other team, then we should expect such a performance as a matter of course.

But if we look, say, at our top 3 candidates here by their on-court ORtg in their worst series, here’s what we get:

Shai (vs Mavs) 112.2 (no alphas higher, though guys like Holiday & Gobert are higher)
Jokic (vs Wolves) 110.8 (Luka 114.7 for comparison)
Luka (vs Celtics) 107.4 (Mitchell 118.0 & Haliburton 113.9 for comparison)

I don’t see that clear cut resilience advantage.
(I shouldn’t leave it there as if this is how I expect things to go in general, because style-makes-the-fight is I think what we all really need to be grappling with here, and why the debate this year is so interesting, and also part of why it’s still so passionate.)

Now, before I leave the Top 3, I’d be remiss without mentioning how players looked by my OnWin stat in the playoffs this year, among the stars mentioned above who played in the playoffs:

Luka 16
Tatum 15
Gobert 11
Edwards 10
Haliburton 9
Jokic 7
Brunson 6
Shai 5
LeBron 3

This is definitely a feather in the cap of Luka, but I’m generally cautious about using a stat like this actually against other players. If they look worse than we’d expect given +/- totals, it makes us ask “Why?”, and in small sample, noise is an all too likely explanation.

This then to say, I like looking at these types of simple stats, but I know they are overly simple, and even if it seems like I sometimes say that raw counts are leaning directly to my conclusion, my final holistic assessment is always based on all sorts of other things too that just aren’t as easy to list in a message in a way that is as easily understood as simple stats.

Moving on to the other candidate -

Giving Tatum the 4th spot. Tatum’s the kind of guy who people don’t think of as a Top 5 guy, but when you actually focus on season achievement what you see is that a number of more spectacular guys in any given season fall short - most dramatically due to injury, and Tatum is just a reliable guy.

I do want to be clear that while I’ve never seriously entertained any other Celtic as the team’s MVP this year, it wasn’t a given he’d make my Top 5 simply because he was on the champs, but there just aren’t more guys I’m comfortable putting ahead of him.

Brunson grabs the final ballot spot. I wasn’t comfortable putting Brunson ahead of Tatum. Yes Tatum’s got more help…but I don’t have confidence that you can build as good of a team around Brunson as you can with Tatum. I do think Brunson has the more OPOY-y of years…but Tatum was also the offensive star of the highest RS ORtg in history, and the team breezed through the playoffs.

I really spent the bulk of my Brunson debate with the 2 men from Minnesota - Edwards & Gobert. To be honest, if I’d had more clarity of who to put higher between the 2 Wolves, it might have been easier for me not to side with Brunson. As it is, Minny will have to settle for 2 shout-outs to the Knicks 1, even if it means the Knicks get their man on the ballot.

From there I’ll segue to the stars of the In-Season Tourney - LeBron & Hali. I wouldn’t do this just for Tourney play, but I think LeBron pretty clearly played like a Top 10 (at least) player through the year, and Haliburton, well, I think he’s worth discussing.

Prior to his injury I thought he was absolutely a candidate for my POY ballot. The injuries messed that up, but you’re still talking about a guy who was out there being vital to the team as the fought their way to the conference finals. Presuming Hali can get fully right again next year, the Pacers might be scary.

One more spot, and that has to go to a Celtic. Giving the nod to Brown because he is the 2nd guy on the team who shoulders the biggest load, and he has been part of the 2 tentpoles the Celtics built everything around, AND while I’m not so sure about his Bird & Russell awards, he certainly played well. Also, I’ll be talking more about his teammates coming up so we’ll give Brown this spot.

Incidentally, here are the OnWin leaders for the Celtics in the playoffs:

Holiday 17
White 16
Horford 16
Tatum 15
Brown 14

Definitely not saying Holiday, White & Horford were the 3 most valuable Celtics in that run, but man, what a quintet!


OPOY:
1. Nikola Jokic (DEN)
2. Luka Doncic (DAL)
3. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (OKC)

HM: Jalen Brunson (NYK), Tyrese Haliburton (IND)

Alright so same top 3 as my POY, but I flipped Luka ahead of Shai. I think Shai frankly has a case for not only #2 but #1, but I do also think that Shai’s defense isn’t simply part of his value, but helps him lead his offense to some easy buckets with his gambling. And I think all of this is extremely well calibrated by coach Daigneault, and it’s largely giving Shai just what he needs.

Despite what I said above, I do think that Jokic & Luka are kind of on their own tier mentally as alphas right now (apologies to LeBron who has a case too) and I do have more faith in Jokic/Luka to think they’re way through to success more reliably than Shai - on the offensive end.

Brunson is the other guy I seriously considered here over Shai. I think he had a ballot-worthy year but just couldn’t quite put him there.

Mentioning Hali because oh my, when the Pacers were at their best this season, Hali had a case for #1 OPOY. His total season is too broken up to seriously fight for a ballot spot this year, but look out for next year!

DPOY:
1. Rudy Gobert (MIN)
2. Bam Adebayo (MIA)
3. Jrue Holiday (BOS)

HM: Anthony Davis (LAL), Victor Wembanyama (SAS)

So, Minnesota’s defensive performance against Dallas does hurt Gobert’s candidacy for me…but not enough that anyone else ever really stood out to me as another option at #1. In a nutshell, he had clearly the most impressive regular season of any defensive player, and aside from the fact that the Wolves’ defensive issues were about way more than Gobert, there’s also the matter that no one else really feels like they can throw stones.

Giving Bam my 2nd spot. You might just think of it as me moving him up a place above Wemby - who I’ll speak on more in a moment. But basically, Bam’s a solid not-quite-DPOY guy for me who had another solid season.

For the 3rd spot I’m going with a Celtic, and while I was tempted to consider White as my top defensive candidate for the Celtics, Jrue was full-on Jrue again in the playoffs and he’s frankly the most dominant playoff performer among perimeter defenders of anyone in this generation. Is that enough for him to get the 3rd spot? Not necessarily, but it did this time.

First honorable mention is Davis, who to me still feels like the best defender in the world in the playoffs…against basically every team but the Nuggets. I’m not dropping Davis because of that series, rather, Davis is a guy who tends to fly up my charts when he gets into playoff mode. Had the playoff bracket would up differently I might have had AD at 1, but as is, all I’ll do is emphasize how scary I think the dude is.

Finally we’re getting to Wemby. There’s just tons of uncertainty here at this point because we haven’t seen him against playoff offense. I’m cautious not just because I know that it’s common for defensive anchors to struggle against the strain of playoff offense when they first get there, but because I remember Embiid dropping 70 on Wemby.
At this point I consider Wemby the best defensive prospect I’ve ever seen - maybe best overall prospect too - but there are things I’m not looking to just assume Wemby has already mastered before I get to see him master them.

ROY:
1. Victor Wembanyama (SAS)
2. Chet Holmgren (OKC)
3. Dereck Lively (DAL)

HM: Brandon Miller (CHA), Jaime Jaquez (MIA)

Man, Chet so deserves to be a ROY, and for a good chunk of the season I still had Chet at #1 here…but Wemby was just too much for me in the end.

I think there’s a case to be made that Chet was the Most Valuable Rookie this season, between the fact that he was so good on both sides of the ball, and he didn’t have that weird opening phase where he and his team seemed confused out there.

But as I’ve said, I think that historically it’s clear that ROY isn’t just about rookie value or even rookie goodness. If someone wanted to know just one thing about the ‘23-24 season, to me that thing would be “There’s this rookie named Victor Wembanyama. You’ve never seen anything like him.” I’d mention that before I’d talk about who most deserved MVP or who won the championship, and that’s really not normal for me. Wemby is just it, and the league should be terrified.

For the 3rd spot, I’m not looking to call the ROY voting wrong for putting Miller 3rd, but it surprised me Lively didn’t make All-Rookie 1st team when I think he was such a transformative factor for a team that surprised its way to the finals. Feels right to give Lively some love.

Beyond that, my Bruin Jaquez did us proud. Hoping he has a great long career!

MIP:
1. Tyrese Maxey (PHI)
2. Derrick White (BOS)
3. Jalen Suggs (ORL)

HM: Alperen Sengun (HOU), Jalen Brunson (NYK)

So, I do tend to start my analysis of this award based on who rose up to be all-star level this year. Maxey’s the obvious guy there, and in the end I’m giving him the top spot despite the fact that I feel like it’s pretty close and debatable.

You can say it wasn’t about Maxey improving so much as being given more opportunity, but it wasn’t obvious that if you gave Maxey opportunity he’d immediately be more effective than Harden.

White is, to me, an all-star level player now. Deserved to make it this year, and I hope he actually does make it next year. Tempted to put him at the #1 spot, but I think that I’m tempted there because I’ve just seen his consistent improvement now deep into his career. The Celtics’ acquiring White frankly feels like it was their single biggest player acquisition since Tatum. Hard to overstate how essential it was to the Celtics becoming champs.

So, the reason why I tend to focus on guys achieving all-star levels is that I do think awards like this are intended to function as a “You should pay attention to this guy!” for casual fans. There are always more minor players who get passed major hurdles, and they should be celebrated, but I’m a bit lower on their MIP candidacy than others might be.

That’s hurting Suggs here who isn’t quite on THAT level for me, but man it’s awesome seeing him go from being such a disappointment as a rookie to what he’s now become. Good for him!

First HM to Sengun who had a great year and flirted with being an all-star this year. Here’s hoping the Rockets can build on what they did this year.

I’ll also tip my hat here to Brunson. 1st time all-star after all. Thing is, I think he was already an all-star level player last year, and that people really knew that by the end of the playoffs. So Brunson doesn’t quite seem to fit here, but I do understand why some would place him on their ballot.

(ftr, I don't think either Scottie or Paulo should have been named all-star this year.)

6MOY:
1. Naz Reid (MIN)
2. Bogdan Bogdanovic (ATL)
3. Trey Murphy (NOP)

HM: TJ McConnell (IND), Al Horford (BOS)

So funny thing, come playoff time, Naz wasn’t technically the 6th man of his team by minutes, that would be Nickeil Alexander-Walker, who frankly merits some consideration here.

But I concur with the assessment of the consensus view here that Naz was the most noteworthy bench player on both the Wolves and in the league this year. Minny had a challenge on their hand with how to deal with not simply how to play Gobert & KAT together, but how to adjust when one of them was out, and having a guy who could really hit 3’s (made more 3’s than KAT this year) and could really go hard on defense when the moment call for it, was just plain perfect.

The next two guys on my ballot are guys who qualify and performed the role admirably, but don’t represent the 6th Man role like I suppose I see it.
Bogdan continues to play 6th man for the Hawks, and continues - for the 3rd season in a row - to lead the team in +/-. Whenever that happens it’s interesting, but I supposed I’m more encouraged when I see it from someone like Immanuel Quickley who for the Knicks was a young guy who was always coming off the bench, as opposed to Bogdan who - as a veteran coming over from the Turkish pro league - has just always seemed like a starter-level NBA player since he arrived.

That might seem like the type of player who should get hyped as sacrificing to come off the bench for the greater good…but the Hawks are a mess having plateaued as a mediocre team. In a nutshell, when a team has a starter-level player that they keep playing off the bench while the high paid starters go out and get outscored by the competition, I don’t feel like rewarding the franchise for this.

For the 3rd spot, Murphy’s eligible and really had quite an encouraging season. He feels less like a true 6th man than a guy battling back from injuries, but again, he’s eligible and he played a lot more than teammate Jose Alvarado.

Hat tip to McConnell just because seeing what he does when he’s called upon to me really ties the room together for the Pacers. Excited to see what they can do with a full year with this new lineup together.

Last hat tip to Horford who would have been my vote had he been eligible. Thought about thinking about Pritchard or Hauser, the top Celtics who are eligible, but really, if KP had been more healthy, this award is Horford’s.

COY:
1. Mark Daigneault (OKC)
2. Joe Mazzulla (BOS)
3. Rick Carlisle (IND)

HM: Jason Kidd (DAL), Tom Thibodeau (NYK)

So this came down to Daigneault vs Mazzulla for me. Daigneault won COY in the regular season and is just effusively raved about for not only how smart his team schemes are, but how innovative he is. Mazzulla meanwhile pushed all the right buttons as the Celtics tore through the league and had all the defensive answers against the Mavs.

In the end though, I think that was more about Mazulla having better pieces available rather than him figuring something out that Daigneault didn’t.

Carlisle deserves some serious love for how good Indiana looked this year after Hali’s injury. I was not expecting the team to be as resilient as they are. Yeah Pascal Siakam’s great, but it’s not like he can do all the things Hali can do. Nice adjustment made by Carlisle’s team.

Seriously thought about Kidd for the 3rd spot. It feels weird to put Carlisle ahead of Kidd given that the Mavs went from Carlisle to Kidd and have had more success since then, but while Kidd may be the better coach for Luka for personal reasons, I do think Carlisle is the superior coach in general.

One more HM spot, will give the tip to Thibs. Continuing to do great work for New York. Impressive the way he seemed to know just what to he wanted to do with OG.

EOY:
1. Brad Stevens (BOS)
2. Nico Harrison (DAL)
3. Leon Rose (NYK)

HM: Kevin Pritchard (IND), Sam Presti (OKC)

Man, Stevens acquiring KP & Jrue just seems like it was exactly what the Celtics needed to make everything click. It’s scary how well-run the Celtics seem right now.

2nd spot to the other finalist. Approaching the award as I do does tend to make me focus on the teams who had elite success in the past year, and that’s an approach with some flaws, but it also makes it so that when a team really breaks through and I didn’t see it coming, I have a chance to give a mea culpa. Harrison’s plan, much to my surprise, really seems like it’s working both in terms of how to make the team fit, and how to make the players buy in.

3rd spot came down to the two guys who grabbed the Toronto talent that Scottie Barnes couldn’t win with. Knicks get OG. Pacers get Pascal. Which was more impressive? I’ll side with Rose and the Knicks for two main reasons:

Basically just gave up players that they’d decided weren’t in their future plans, as opposed to a collection of 1st round picks.
I was skeptical about the move and basically made a thread about it when it happened. At the time I tried to emphasize that I wasn’t saying OG wasn’t great, but I really questioned why the Knicks didn’t seem to have a place for IQ in their future when they kept doing so well whenever he was on the floor. I still don’t have all the answers, but while I never said I thought IQ was as good as OG, I was not expecting the monstrous run the Knicks went on when OG got there, and IQ’s performance in Toronto has been pretty underwhelming so far.

Finally a hat tip to Presti. People have chafed at my literal interpretation of the EOY rules, and Presti was the main guy on their mind for understandable reasons: He’s done a fabulous job re-building the Thunder into a contender, but he’s done so in a way where you can’t really be too effusive about his moves until years later.

As a result of good points made by others, I’ve given more wiggle room for people in how they approach EOY…but even if we view Presti as a ‘culmination’ candidate, it just felt to me like he wasn’t doing all he could to help the Thunder win this year. I think that was wise given how young the Thunder are, but like, he literally just now made a trade in acquiring Caruso - which will count as part of the ‘24-25 year - which I think would have been really valuable in the playoffs this year.

This then to say: The Thunder don’t feel like they’ve completed their culmination just yet.

[ardee]

Certainly been a while since I've done one of these I think.

Player of the Year

1. Nikola Jokic (I got a bit carried away after Luka's Wolves series and thought perhaps he could challenge Jokic for this spot, but that was illogical of me. Jokic is very clearly the best player in the league in a way that we haven't seen since 2009-13 LeBron. I think anyone holding the Playoff loss against him is the same kind of person who would hold the 2009 Orlando loss against LeBron. I'm not gonna blame the guy who had 34/19/7 in game 7 when the rest of his team was useless)

2. Luka Doncic

3. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (I had Luka ahead in the RS (he achieved comparable team results with so much midseason upheaval in his roster) and then his Wolves series was the best individual performance on the Playoffs. Shai is very good but you'd need something really spectacular to move up here and he didn't deliver that)

4. Jalen Brunson (now here's someone who absolutely could've moved up if he hadn't gotten hurt. Carried a ridiculous offensive load on what was actually a pretty damn good team. In a way he reminds me of a combination of Westbrook and Rose. When it comes to raw impact I don't see anyone else above him. Knicks would be a lottery team without him)

5. LeBron James (I have never thought Tatum was better than him and it continued into this season. If you switched them Boston probably becomes the GOAT team and the Lakers may lose in the play-in. On some level I might still pick a healthy LeBron over everyone besides Jokic and Luka for a Playoff run, and well, we did get a healthy version this year, but I have to give the other guys a bit more credit for their RS. Can't consider Tatum for it though, not with how his offense was in the Playoffs. Sure he found other ways to contribute, but he had that luxury playing on a stacked team. With a worse cast his shooting woes would sink them).

I will try and get to other awards down the line if possible, but just wanted to get this main vote out at least.

[Doctor MJ]

Locked for tallying.

[Colbinii]

Locked for tallying.

Doesn't it close tomorrow?

[Doctor MJ]

Locked for tallying.

Doesn't it close tomorrow?

You’re absolutely right. Got the days confused.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[ShaqAttac]

VOTE

LUKA

Carried mavs to a final and cooked the d that cooked jok on one leg. Fixed kyrie to win 50 with scraps and should have won MVP. Was also the best player in the finals tbh. I know his d is meh but his o is crazy.

EMBID
Was easy the best rs player before he got hurt and was still dropping 50 while hurt in the playoffs. He also is great at d and has crazy impact. He would def be POY if his legs werent made of tissue paper.

SGA
while
Went first in west and took luka to 6. Also could have been MVP tbh. Also plays great d unlike luka or jok.

TATUM

ppl can say whatever, but he led his team to a chip, barely lost any game leading his team in all the stats. Idrg why ppl put brown ahead. He also look great in rapms and on/off so maybe ppl care too much about his effeincy.

BRUNSON

carried knicks to 50 wins and 2 seeds averaging 30 and almost made conference finals despite super injured team averaging 34. Went crazy vs sixers and outplayed hali h2h. I think he deserves some respect on his name tbh.

[LA Bird]

Squeezing my vote in before deadline but will add more reasoning later

POY
1. Nikola Jokic
2. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
3. Giannis Antetokounmpo
4. Luka Doncic
5. LeBron James

Guess Jokic's drop in many votes is expected from the early exit and some backlash from him getting overhyped as a god-like combination of peak Magic and Shaq after the championship last year. But it's not like this postseason exposed flaws in his game which we didn't know before. Yeah, he doesn't have the handles to run an offense like on-ball points and his defense is still a problem. But none of this is new information. Jokic had the same weaknesses in 2023 and also 2022 when he was eliminated in round 1 and still got over 80% first place votes. For me, he is still more or less the same player as he was the last couple seasons and nobody else (bar the half season of healthy Embiid) has really caught up to him yet.

I don't consider a missed playoff round an automatic disqualification so Giannis is still in my top 5. Embiid on the other hand missed too much of the regular season although he still looked pretty good in the playoffs despite injury. SGA was probably 2nd in the regular season with strong two way play as clear leader of his team and I would say he outplayed Luka in their H2H series despite the loss. A large part of the Mavs' mid season improvement was from roster changes and defense, which does not really affect my rating of Doncic individually. But then again, the same could also be said for Brunson and the defensive improvement after the addition of Anunoby. LeBron is the last potential top 5 and he's hard to evaluate for me because there's the question of how much his shooting this year is just statistical fluke and whether he would have maintained his playoffs form in a larger sample if they had not faced their matchup nightmare in round 1. More or less tied with Brunson but maybe I'll give LeBron the edge because of lower variance from game to game in the playoffs.

Tatum was the best player on a strong championship team which I guess by default lands him in the top 5 for some voters. But the thing for me is that the Celtics dominated due to their top 5, not their best player alone. If we are going to credit them as the most balanced title team in NBA history, it doesn't really make sense to then single out Tatum as a top 5 player unless we are also putting White, Holiday, Brown somewhere near that level too. Edwards for me was never in this conversation. Gobert was the MVP of the Wolves the whole season and casual fans just got carried away with the MJ comparisons after a hot stretch (you can find the same Jordan son picture side by side with Butler last year).

DPOY
1. Victor Wembanyama
2. Rudy Gobert
3. Bam Adebayo

Gobert's argument is pretty easy to make - dominant rim protector with proven history anchoring the #1 defense. Normally, this would be enough for the win in this category and I would argue that if we are evaluating the season as a whole equally, I would also have Gobert #1. However, rookies can improve considerably over the course of the season and for them, it matters more how they end the season rather than how they start IMO. (FWIW, the opposite applies for old players at the end of their careers if they start a season strong but fizzle out). By the end of the season, I would have Wemby already ahead of Gobert. Unmatched length as well as the IQ and mobility to take full advantage of it. He can contest out to the 3pt line with ease while playing drop and swatting everything near the rim like a Manute Bol. Wemby's biggest problem is probably against bigger post players who can bully him but the same applies to Gobert too who needed KAT to guard Jokic instead.

[Doctor MJ]

Locked for tallying - for real this time.

[Doctor MJ]

Results spreadsheet:
Here.

Player of the Year: Nikola Jokic(DEN), 3-peat in this award.



1. Nikola Jokic (10)
2. Luka Doncic (5)
3. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (1)
4. Jayson Tatum (1)
5. Jalen Brunson

Others receiving: Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid, LeBron James, Jaylen Brown, Rudy Gobert, Anthony Edwards, Tyrese Haliburton

Offensive Player of the Year: Nikola Jokic (DEN), 4-peat in this award.



1. Nikola Jokic (10)
2. Luka Doncic (3)
3. Tyrese Haliburton

Others receiving: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jalen Brunson, LeBron James

Defensive Player of the Year: Rudy Gobert (MIN), 5-time winner in this award



1. Rudy Gobert (12)
2. Victor Wembanyama (2)
3. Bam Adebayo

Others receiving: Anthony Davis, Evan Mobley, OG Anunoby, Alex Caruso, Jrue Holiday

Rookie of the Year: Victor Wembanyama (SAS)



1. Victor Wembanyama (11)
2. Chet Holmgren (1)
3. Dereck Lively

Most Improved Player: Tyrese Maxey (PHI)



1. Tyrese Maxey (2)
2. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (1)
3. Deni Avdija (1)

Others receiving: Jalen Brunson, Isaiah Hartenstein, Coby White, Derrick White, Donte Divincenzo, Aaron Nesmith, Jalen Suggs

6th Man of the Year: Naz Reid (MIN)



1. Naz Reid (1)
2. TJ McConnell (2)
3. Trey Murphy (1)

Others receiving: Bogdan Bogdanovic, Jaime Jaquez, Obi Toppin

Coach of the Year: Mark Daigneault (OKC)



1. Mark Daigneault (4)
2. Rick Carlisle (2)
(tie) Joe Mazzulla (1)

Others receiving: Chris Finch, Jason Kidd, Michael Malone, Tom Thibodeau, Ime Udoka

Executive of the Year: Brad Stevens (BOS), unanimous, 2-time winner in this award (as well as 2-time COY winner)



1. Brad Stevens (6)
2. Nico Harrison
3. Sam Presti

Others receiving: Kevin Pritchard/Chad Buchanan, Tim Connelly, Leon Rose

Pritchard & Buchanan are both on the Pacers (Pritchard's Buchanan's boss) and not actually competing with each other. If I were keeping EOY Shares though, I'd allocate them to Pritchard because he was the one put forth in the NBA's EOY voting.

A few more general notes:

- Only listed voters were included. To make sure you're named a voter in the future, participate in that year's Discussion thread frequently and PM me your interest ideally before the end of the playoffs.

- I believe for the first time, our award winners have agreed entirely with the NBA's regular season awards.

- This was a more contentious year than in recent years for the top award, and this seemed to bring out participation but also ill-will and some major Goodhart's Law red flags. If you aren't sure what I mean by that, feel free to discuss further.

- Historical spreadsheets will be updated soon.

Please do let me know if you believe there are errors in the tallies.

Thank you for your participation and interest,
Sincerely,
Doc

[jalengreen]

Being a 2x COY and 2x EOY is crazy lol, what a remarkable career for Stevens already (the NCAA runs as well). Nice to see him finally win it all

[Special_Puppy]

some major Goodhart's Law red flags. If you aren't sure what I mean by that, feel free to discuss further.

Can you elaborate what you mean by this?

[Doctor MJ]

Historical spreadsheets updated:

RealGM All-Season Award Winners
RealGM All-Season Awards Shares through '23-24

Some things to note:

- This marks the 10 year anniversary of us adding awards other than POY to the mix. So that means we can tally other awards across the decade a give a naive "Best of Decade" thing. To this point I've only done this with POY & DPOY, as you can see yourself, Steph Curry & Rudy Gobert top those lists.

- It's been on my list awhile to do the same for coaches, so will try to do that shortly. Wasn't intending to do it for the other awards.

- LeBron got that much closer to topping Russell for the #1 POY Share spot, but didn't quite get there.

- Jokic tops Curry to become the #2 guy among active players (behind Bron).

[Colbinii]

some major Goodhart's Law red flags. If you aren't sure what I mean by that, feel free to discuss further.

Can you elaborate what you mean by this?

...He discusses how systems in general can be gamed, focuses on cases where the goals of a task are complex, sophisticated, or subtle. In such cases, the persons possessing the skills to execute the tasks properly seek their own goals to the detriment of the assigned tasks.

And for an example:

...As applied in economics, the law is also implicit in the idea of rational expectations, a theory in economics that states that those who are aware of a system of rewards and punishments will optimize their actions within that system to achieve their desired results. For example, if an employee is rewarded by the number of cars sold each month, they will try to sell more cars, even at a loss.

[Special_Puppy]

some major Goodhart's Law red flags. If you aren't sure what I mean by that, feel free to discuss further.

Can you elaborate what you mean by this?

...He discusses how systems in general can be gamed, focuses on cases where the goals of a task are complex, sophisticated, or subtle. In such cases, the persons possessing the skills to execute the tasks properly seek their own goals to the detriment of the assigned tasks.

And for an example:

...As applied in economics, the law is also implicit in the idea of rational expectations, a theory in economics that states that those who are aware of a system of rewards and punishments will optimize their actions within that system to achieve their desired results. For example, if an employee is rewarded by the number of cars sold each month, they will try to sell more cars, even at a loss.

Oh I know what Goodhart's law is. I was just wondering how it applied to voting this year

[Colbinii]

Can you elaborate what you mean by this?

...He discusses how systems in general can be gamed, focuses on cases where the goals of a task are complex, sophisticated, or subtle. In such cases, the persons possessing the skills to execute the tasks properly seek their own goals to the detriment of the assigned tasks.

And for an example:

...As applied in economics, the law is also implicit in the idea of rational expectations, a theory in economics that states that those who are aware of a system of rewards and punishments will optimize their actions within that system to achieve their desired results. For example, if an employee is rewarded by the number of cars sold each month, they will try to sell more cars, even at a loss.

Oh I know what Goodhart's law is. I was just wondering how it applied to voting this year

I think some of the Jokic/Luka discourse certainly could be viewed as such.

[Doctor MJ]

some major Goodhart's Law red flags. If you aren't sure what I mean by that, feel free to discuss further.

Can you elaborate what you mean by this?

Sure. So, Goodhart's Law is often summarized as "When the measure becomes the target, it ceases to be a good measure". This is oversimplistic, and doesn't mention the key bit:

That when people become aware of a measure of something they provide data for, they then have the ability to manipulate that data to make the measure tell the story they want told. The voting schemes we used (10-7-5-3-1 & 5-3-1) mean that you can help your "10" guy by lowering what you give to others.

It should be noted that I use these voting schemes to keep things closer to the NBA's official award structure, and that these Goodhart concerns have always been there in the NBA votes, so there's no reason to expect we would be immune to them here.

And when we see people talking about how many awards a particular guy has already won as part of an argument pertaining to the current not-yet-done vote, this is proof that the loop has closed and people are thinking about this stuff.

None of this means necessarily that anyone is doing anything explicitly in bad faith to be clear: Stuff like this tends to happen when passionate disagreement leads to polarization, and that polarization burns deep into the intellectual process of us humans.

But I do think it make all of us really think about why we voted as we did. And to be clear, I do this reflection as part of this process myself - I'm not saying I'm immune to it. The fact that I have a sense of more extreme voting patterns doesn't mean those on the extreme end from me are wrong, and in fact we might both be equally, egregiously wrong.

Does this make sense? Feel free to query further, I appreciate us being able to ponder process and epistemology as a group.

[Texas Chuck]

Pretending like there was no strategic voting, attempts to manipulate through the "discussion" serves none of us. We need to always call that nonsense out or it just emboldens them further. I mean how many projects did we have warped by multiple posters with a singular measure to have Kobe finish above KG? It's always been a problem on this board unfortunately, but this year was particularly egregious. Some posters are too attached to specific players and a need to manipulate results. Beyond pointless and yet....

Its why I participate in the discussion but never the voting.

[AEnigma]

Pretending like there was no strategic voting, attempts to manipulate through the "discussion" serves none of us. We need to always call that nonsense out. It's always been a problem on this board unfortunately, but this year was particularly egregious. Some posters are too attached to specific players and a need to manipulate results. Beyond pointless and yet....

Its why I participate in the discussion but never the voting.

I saw all of one “egregious” voting post… and I am positive that vote was not counted.

Talk about player attachment when, as it has been for months, almost all the whining is from people evidently too attached to a player to tolerate others criticising him.