2024-25 NBA MVP Discussion Thread (Pt. 4: Who is the MVP?)

[RB34]

Shameless stad pad by the MVP leader to get his 30 ball.

[Big J]

So Jokic sucks so much on defense maybe Denver should trade him for Gobert. A great defensive player.

Murray
Braun
MPJ
Gordon
Gobert

What a team of world builders.

Jokic defense hasn’t been great but his offense is the only reason they have been in games recently. It’s why they live with his defensive warts. Because they don’t have a chance in hell to win without him.

They just lost to the 14-51 wizards. You don’t need a great offense to beat them. All you need is to play with a little effort and show some pride. Contest layups and run out on open shooters. It’s easy to play hard on offense. Playing hard on defense takes more effort. Just because Jokic is great offensively doesn’t mean that his lackluster defense doesn’t rub off on his teammates. He’s the star, the rest of the team follows his lead.

I'm an SGA fan and hate the Jokic fans, but it's just one game. In the NBA any team is capable of beating another one, it happens all the time.

It’s not just who they lost to, but how they lost to them. They also lost twice to the Wizards. OKC ain’t doing that.

[AmIWrongDude]

Shai has it locked up at this point unless you don’t care about winning

[MavsDirk41]

Shai has it locked up at this point unless you don’t care about winning

Couldnt agree more. Time to call it.

[MavsDirk41]

Shameless stad pad by the MVP leader to get his 30 ball.

A lot of players pad their stats, win or lose

[EmpireFalls]

I count 7 undeniably poor defensive possessions from Jokic in Sarr’s highlight reel. Feel free to debate me guys! We can go possession for possession and I’ll point out what he did wrong.

https://youtu.be/0Ps7hkAhJHE?si=vkvna0Fd1nEJ79gG

Again, this was a rookie with a career high of 22. He broke that career high in the FIRST HALF. Vast majority of his buckets are on Joker.

Jokic is not a horrible defender but he sure as hell was on Saturday night. This is the issue with box score watchers. Scoring 30 giving up 30 very much is the Nikola Jokic Experience when he’s not fully locked in.

[Triple7]

SGA should get it this year. You just can’t give Jokic 4 mvp’s right? If SGA won it last year, then Jokic probably would win it this year averaging a triple double. Denver needs to solidify their 2nd place standing, and for Okc to flop this final 15 games for Jokic to win it.

You can, he already should be at four. But you can't give it to him if the other player is also having a historic season like that. If Shai wins, he deserves it.

What’s more deserving than a big man to average a triple double, while still being one of the best team in their conference carrying his team with all those injuries. If both have zero mvp’s, Jokic will get it. Better overall stats across the board. At this point SGA will get it. Voters fatigue.

[Special_Puppy]

I count 7 undeniably poor defensive possessions from Jokic in Sarr’s highlight reel. Feel free to debate me guys! We can go possession for possession and I’ll point out what he did wrong.

https://youtu.be/0Ps7hkAhJHE?si=vkvna0Fd1nEJ79gG

Again, this was a rookie with a career high of 22. He broke that career high in the FIRST HALF. Vast majority of his buckets are on Joker.

Jokic is not a horrible defender but he sure as hell was on Saturday night. This is the issue with box score watchers. Scoring 30 giving up 30 very much is the Nikola Jokic Experience when he’s not fully locked in.

Do you generally feel like the advanced stats are overrating Jokic’s defense overall this season? Generally they have Jokic in the +1 to +1.5 range overall this season.

[Special_Puppy]

SGA should get it this year. You just can’t give Jokic 4 mvp’s right? If SGA won it last year, then Jokic probably would win it this year averaging a triple double. Denver needs to solidify their 2nd place standing, and for Okc to flop this final 15 games for Jokic to win it.

You can, he already should be at four. But you can't give it to him if the other player is also having a historic season like that. If Shai wins, he deserves it.

What’s more deserving than a big man to average a triple double, while still being one of the best team in their conference carrying his team with all those injuries. If both have zero mvp’s, Jokic will get it. Better overall stats across the board. At this point SGA will get it. Voters fatigue.

Generally the advanced stats are deadlocked between Jokic and SGA. He does not have a decisive advantage this year

[Infinite Llamas]

I count 7 undeniably poor defensive possessions from Jokic in Sarr’s highlight reel. Feel free to debate me guys! We can go possession for possession and I’ll point out what he did wrong.

https://youtu.be/0Ps7hkAhJHE?si=vkvna0Fd1nEJ79gG

Again, this was a rookie with a career high of 22. He broke that career high in the FIRST HALF. Vast majority of his buckets are on Joker.

Jokic is not a horrible defender but he sure as hell was on Saturday night. This is the issue with box score watchers. Scoring 30 giving up 30 very much is the Nikola Jokic Experience when he’s not fully locked in.

So where’s the footage of the 16 shots that Sarr missed?

Look, no one is saying Jokic had a good game defensively but this seems like an odd one to nitpick. A 30% 3pt shooter gunning away is a pretty decent game plan for any defense. Just so happened that the shots went down that night. Maybe they could have tried closing out a bit better after he makes 2-3 of them but you don’t really overreact.

[Special_Puppy]

Seriously though Jokic has no leg to stand on.

Swept by the Wizards all because of your embarrassing defense. You let a rookie put 34 on your head. Not an MVP.

Generally the traditional and advanced stats have SGA and Jokic basically tied this season. Do you think that's basically accurate or do you think that SGA has a more decisive advantage in terms of individual value than the advanced stats show?

[slick_watts]

it was pretty obvious watching sarr that the nuggets gameplan was to let him shoot jump shots. sarr was 5-9 from three, he was 2-9 on 2pt fg's defended by jokic according to stats.nba.com, and 7-19 inside the arc overall. of course the usual suspects have to get their hot takes off in this thread. "how can an mvp lose to the wizards and let alex sarr score 30+"? at least on twitter there's money at stake for lame engagement bait.

[EmpireFalls]

Seriously though Jokic has no leg to stand on.

Swept by the Wizards all because of your embarrassing defense. You let a rookie put 34 on your head. Not an MVP.

Generally the traditional and advanced stats have SGA and Jokic basically tied this season. Do you think that's basically accurate or do you think that SGA has a more decisive advantage in terms of individual value than the advanced stats show?

I think Jokic’s defense is highly overrated yes.

[EmpireFalls]

I count 7 undeniably poor defensive possessions from Jokic in Sarr’s highlight reel. Feel free to debate me guys! We can go possession for possession and I’ll point out what he did wrong.

https://youtu.be/0Ps7hkAhJHE?si=vkvna0Fd1nEJ79gG

Again, this was a rookie with a career high of 22. He broke that career high in the FIRST HALF. Vast majority of his buckets are on Joker.

Jokic is not a horrible defender but he sure as hell was on Saturday night. This is the issue with box score watchers. Scoring 30 giving up 30 very much is the Nikola Jokic Experience when he’s not fully locked in.

So where’s the footage of the 16 shots that Sarr missed?

Look, no one is saying Jokic had a good game defensively but this seems like an odd one to nitpick. A 30% 3pt shooter gunning away is a pretty decent game plan for any defense. Just so happened that the shots went down that night. Maybe they could have tried closing out a bit better after he makes 2-3 of them but you don’t really overreact.

The issue in that video is not the closeouts my friend.

The issue is the hilarious ball screen defense.

[Special_Puppy]

Seriously though Jokic has no leg to stand on.

Swept by the Wizards all because of your embarrassing defense. You let a rookie put 34 on your head. Not an MVP.

Generally the traditional and advanced stats have SGA and Jokic basically tied this season. Do you think that's basically accurate or do you think that SGA has a more decisive advantage in terms of individual value than the advanced stats show?

I think Jokic’s defense is highly overrated yes.

Do you think the advanced stats have highly overrated Jokic's defense his entire career?

[EmpireFalls]

Generally the traditional and advanced stats have SGA and Jokic basically tied this season. Do you think that's basically accurate or do you think that SGA has a more decisive advantage in terms of individual value than the advanced stats show?

I think Jokic’s defense is highly overrated yes.

Do you think the advanced stats have highly overrated Jokic's defense his entire career?

Considering he has the 2nd best DBPM of all time, and is top 5 in Defensive Win Shares/48 yes. Perhaps not every advanced stat, but certainly some of them.

I think his offense is so good that it bleeds into his defensive impact. Which is absolutely a compliment to him, but I’ve always been lower than consensus on his defense.

[Special_Puppy]

I think Jokic’s defense is highly overrated yes.

Do you think the advanced stats have highly overrated Jokic's defense his entire career?

Considering he has the 2nd best DBPM of all time, and is top 5 in Defensive Win Shares/48 yes. Perhaps not every advanced stat, but certainly some of them.

I think his offense is so good that it bleeds into his defensive impact. Which is absolutely a compliment to him, but I’ve always been lower than consensus on his defense.

I mean he's -2.1 in 29 year defensive RAPM which totally ignores the box score (so the usual criticism about how defensive stats overweight stocks, rebounds, and assists in DBPM's case doesn't really apply here) https://xrapm.com/table_pages/RAPM_29y.html.

[slick_watts]

I think Jokic’s defense is highly overrated yes.

Do you think the advanced stats have highly overrated Jokic's defense his entire career?

Considering he has the 2nd best DBPM of all time, and is top 5 in Defensive Win Shares/48 yes. Perhaps not every advanced stat, but certainly some of them.

I think his offense is so good that it bleeds into his defensive impact. Which is absolutely a compliment to him, but I’ve always been lower than consensus on his defense.

when people say 'advanced defensive stats', nobody means boxscore metrics like dbpm or defensive win shares, which are both useless. they mean apm based defensive metrics, usually.

[EmpireFalls]

Do you think the advanced stats have highly overrated Jokic's defense his entire career?

Considering he has the 2nd best DBPM of all time, and is top 5 in Defensive Win Shares/48 yes. Perhaps not every advanced stat, but certainly some of them.

I think his offense is so good that it bleeds into his defensive impact. Which is absolutely a compliment to him, but I’ve always been lower than consensus on his defense.

when people say 'advanced defensive stats', nobody means boxscore metrics like dbpm or defensive win shares, which are both useless. they mean apm based defensive metrics, usually.

That’s news to me. For the vast majority of Jokic fans, PER, BPM, and WS are the only statistics available. Oh, and of course net on-off (thanks DeAndre!) The box score derivative GOAT.

[Special_Puppy]

Considering he has the 2nd best DBPM of all time, and is top 5 in Defensive Win Shares/48 yes. Perhaps not every advanced stat, but certainly some of them.

I think his offense is so good that it bleeds into his defensive impact. Which is absolutely a compliment to him, but I’ve always been lower than consensus on his defense.

when people say 'advanced defensive stats', nobody means boxscore metrics like dbpm or defensive win shares, which are both useless. they mean apm based defensive metrics, usually.

That’s news to me. For the vast majority of Jokic fans, PER, BPM, and WS are the only statistics available. Oh, and of course net on-off (thanks DeAndre!) The box score derivative GOAT.

I am sensing that in general some of your more "hostile" comments towards Jokic are due to annoyance at his stans