Who do you think wins MVP this season? (2025-26 NBA MVP Discussion Thread)

[JMaster5K]

Jalen Brunson and Cade Cunningham are my darkhorse candidates. If Paolo and Franz don't tear their obliques again, then I believe Banchero will be ready to have a top-7 MVP caliber season.

Wouldn't shock me to see all three guys make first team All-NBA.

As for my pick: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (and this will be his last MVP as J-Dub and Chet form an official big 3 with him moving forward).

I like the Brunson pick also especially if the Knicks are the best team in the east and win 60 games. He's going to have a ton of hype if he has a big season. Odds are 10000-1 also you are getting great value.

I don't see a path for Cade they won't win enough games.

$100 on Brunson though...nets $10k. I may do that

Damn. The guy is arguably a top-5 valuable player in this league and those are his odds? Ridiculous. You know some lunatic is going to put a million on it and possibly make a fortune. If I was a gambler, I might be that lunatic.

With good health, Pistons will punch around 48-53 wins. They win 54+, he should be in the conversation, without question. It really depends on Ausar, Duren and Ivey continuing to show their growth. As a reformed Cade-detractor, he has turned me into a believer. He has arrived.

Considering how the Pistons are playing at the moment,... and their growth from a bottom 5 team 2 years ago, the 12th place team last year, and now (at the time I type this) the number 2 team in the league. Primarily, because of Cade's growth over that time, and how it has impacted the growth of the whole team. If they can hang around number 2 for the rest of the season & get to the ECF, I have to think Cade has a shot?

[_NoMas]

Luka’s just not consistent enough. He has games like tonight where he can hit the ceiling of the top 2 players but his average game is still well below the level of an average Jokic/SGA game. At the end of the season you can take the 20 worst games from Jokic/sga/Luka and about 15 of them would belong to Luka.

I don’t think the voters look that deeply into it tbh. He’s going to be on a top 3 seed, in the lakers jersey, averaging 35-9-9. If they can stay within 10 games of OKC I can very easily see him getting MVP, especially after some feel he deserved it in 2024.

Look into what? No one can be the best scorer in the league, if he isn't foremost consistent. Luka has played 92 games in 23/24, RS+playoffs, and has scored only 6x under 20 points. The worst scoring game was 16 points.

My comment was in relation to another poster highlighting that Luka has the lowest floor, so probably has a handful of the worst games between the three candidates. Ultimately voters are going to look at the raw box score numbers imo… Luka has a real shot

[Gregoire]

SGA
Joker
Wemby
Luka
Curry

[kazyv]

If I'm right, I fully expect Jokic on/off to take a massive nosedive now with Gordon and Braun out, not just his net rating, but his on/off, because this is the 1st time he has a truly imbalanced roster, since Gordon was next to him most of the way and he always had elite perimeter defender in addition, this is the 1st time he is missing his defensive anchor and the perimeter defender on the team.

While I don't think that's likely, I would like to commend you for staking out a strong position ahead of the time. While we're at predictions, I'd like to predict that SGA's advanced stats will obviously go down as the season progresses. So even if Jokic should go down with his stats a bit, it's likely that he will remain ahead of SGA

[bbms]

before luka is mentioned here with the top dogs i'd like the offense he anchors be closet to top 5 than to league average.

of course he can carry a big offensive load, everybody knows that. he's just not doing it in a very good level to the benefit of his team.

the lakers are top 5 in 3/4 of the offensive four factors. problem is they're that least in tov% and that's dragging them down. and he has responsability on that.

[Exp0sed]

There is a repeated fallacy going on for 5 years now, that Jokic on/off means he is the driver of DEN success, and his extremely high on/off means he is carrying that team, this is why he should be favoured over others (Embiid in 22 and 23, Luka in 24, and SGA in 25 and this year).
While Jokic is indeed the offensive engine, and the driver of team success as the franchise player, his on/off is a product of his supporting cast that is being constantly maligned.
The Nuggets are tightly knit unit to supplement Jokic with the necessary defense, 2 man game partner and spacing.
This reflects heavily on stats like EPM, and RAPM.
This isn't something new, Curry had +20 on/off with the elite Ws dynasty, and +8 in the 20/21 season, the 20/21 season was arguably bigger carry job.
Luka had +4 on/off pre deadline in 23/24 (while putting up 50/15 on Christmas and 73 on the Hawks) next to terrible and injury riddled supporting cast, and +20 post deadline with elite supporting cast that went to the finals.
A good supporting cast drives up the on/off not down as is being constantly portrayed.

If I'm right, I fully expect Jokic on/off to take a massive nosedive now with Gordon and Braun out, not just his net rating, but his on/off, because this is the 1st time he has a truly imbalanced roster, since Gordon was next to him most of the way and he always had elite perimeter defender in addition, this is the 1st time he is missing his defensive anchor and the perimeter defender on the team.

about your assumptions, AG played 51 games last season. how did Jokic fare in those games that AG didn't play?

secondly, AG is the 2nd best and 2nd most important player for the Nuggets (especially in the rs), however while being overall a very good and very versatile defender, Watson is argubaly a better perimeter defender and a better defender. AG is a better rebounder and much smarter and better offensive player but strictly talking defense - Watson isn't much of a drop, if at all

as for "elite perimeter defender", Jokic sometimes had a decent one in addition (KCP and others) but he literally never had any "elite perimeter defender" next to him. losing both Braun and AG for a prolonged period is indeed a hard blow to Denver's defense, as those guys are the starting unit's two best perimeter defenders. there's also a cascading effect whereas normally Watson can be a big contributor to the 2nd unit's defense, so him in the lineup creates a drop-off for the bench

for that reason we saw Adelman expeiment with starting Spencer Jones (a recently signed, originally two-way undrafted player from the G-league), to provide some defense, toughness etc. on the perimeter. so far it hasn't worked as Jones has been atrocious as a starter but in very few mins and just two games. we'll have to see if Adelman continues with him or goes another direction. Adelman tried a more balanced roster with starting Jones, otherwise he'd not go for the undrafted two way but rather have started THJ, a seasonsed NBA vet whose also a much better offensive player

the Nuggets are obviously worse off with two important starters out so their net rating and "ceiling" will suffer but I doubt Jokic's on\off will take much of a hit. Jokic is Jokic, he finds and creates ways for his teammates to be effective

[Mavrelous]

about your assumptions, AG played 51 games last season. how did Jokic fare in those games that AG didn't play?

17-14 including 2 infamous losses to the Wizards, 45 wins pace w/o him, 53 wins pace with him, and that was with Braun available.

the Nuggets are obviously worse off with two important starters out so their net rating and "ceiling" will suffer but I doubt Jokic's on\off will take much of a hit. Jokic is Jokic, he finds and creates ways for his teammates to be effective

I'll gladly, really, I'd be happy to, eat a crow if that happens.
I think Jokic had legit case for MVP every year in the last 4 and in this one, but I think the on/off is being too relied on and used to discredit others, and the statistical precedent points strongly this way.

[Archx]

before luka is mentioned here with the top dogs i'd like the offense he anchors be closet to top 5 than to league average.

of course he can carry a big offensive load, everybody knows that. he's just not doing it in a very good level to the benefit of his team.

the lakers are top 5 in 3/4 of the offensive four factors. problem is they're that least in tov% and that's dragging them down. and he has responsability on that.

Meh... When Luka is on the floor, Lakers have the 3rd best offense right behind Nuggets and Rockets and they are shooting 5% better when he is on on the floor as a team. That's even higher than OKC with Shai.
His 2pt%'s are good and he is shooting now almost 9% better around the rim than Jokic and only 2% worse in mid range than SGA, it's the 3pt% that drags him down a bit but he jumped 2% after the LAC game. It's still relatively a small sample size.

People shouldn't be concerned with TOV% because he always does that with his over the top flashy passes. That's his fault sure but it's not as terrible as it looks.

TLDR; i wouldn't be worried, they're doing just fine and will also take a moment to fully integrate Lebron in all of this.

[Chuck Everett]

Considering how the Pistons are playing at the moment,... and their growth from a bottom 5 team 2 years ago, the 12th place team last year, and now (at the time I type this) the number 2 team in the league. Primarily, because of Cade's growth over that time, and how it has impacted the growth of the whole team. If they can hang around number 2 for the rest of the season & get to the ECF, I have to think Cade has a shot?

So this is pretty interesting. With the video game stats, Jokic, SGA, Luka, Wemby and Giannis are putting up, I ultimately feel the advanced stats are going to relegate him to 2nd team all-NBA.

However, if the Pistons win 60+ games (and this is no longer a strange thought), only a biased fool would not have to weigh it considerably that Cade is a legit contender to be MVP of the league.

SGA or Jokic probably win because they are MVP's and their play thus far warrants it, but a 60 win team led by Cade to me, means he should finish no worse than 3rd in the voting and first team all-NBA.

Let's re-visit this at the all-star break. It doesn't look so outlandish now, does it?

[Exp0sed]

about your assumptions, AG played 51 games last season. how did Jokic fare in those games that AG didn't play?

17-14 including 2 infamous losses to the Wizards, 45 wins pace w/o him, 53 wins pace with him, and that was with Braun available.

the Nuggets are obviously worse off with two important starters out so their net rating and "ceiling" will suffer but I doubt Jokic's on\off will take much of a hit. Jokic is Jokic, he finds and creates ways for his teammates to be effective

I'll gladly, really, I'd be happy to, eat a crow if that happens.
I think Jokic had legit case for MVP every year in the last 4 and in this one, but I think the on/off is being too relied on and used to discredit others, and the statistical precedent points strongly this way.

17-14 is how the Nuggets fared, not how Jokic fared - i meant his on\off in that stretch, not the Nuggets w\l

with that said, i'm not big on on\off or advanced stats in general. i'm too old for that, haha, so I have never used those metrics as the primary reasoning for why one should or shouldn't get an MVP vote

I thought that Jokic should have won four, the three he did win + the Joel farce
last season SGA deserved it and thus far this year, it's still up for grabs and both are neck to neck

that Nuggets were very thin last season, besides their starters that had zero consistent bench guys. WB was their 6th man and spot starter and Murray also missed some of the games AG missed and played badly when he did play so...I wouldn't read much into it

for example last season in the infamous Jokic 56 points career high in a loss to the Wizards (one of the losses you mentioned). WB started over an injured Murray, so the Nuggets were without their 2nd AND 3rd best player and they played guys like Tyson and Pickett who G-League level basically, with 33 mins of the mighty Strawtether and 9 more mins from DAJ. btw, Jokic still had the "highest" +- on the Nuggets in that game, posting -1, while other starters like MPJ and WB were -10 and Watson was -17

I feel like they have enough capable NBA rotation players now, I don't expect a repeat of last season in that regard

[hagredionis]

Luka 35.2 ppg / 8.8 rpg / 9.2 apg / 1.9 spg
SGA 32.2 ppg / 4.9 rpg / 6.6 apg / 1.5 spg

Luka is clearly ahead by now.

[Optms]

Luka is inching closer.

Lakers are the 2nd best team in the West despite the preseason expectations. This was almost entirely without Lebron. Only Shai can carry a team like this, unfortunately for Luka. But I expect Luka's efficiency to improve now with Lebron on the court and this to become a closer debate.

[jg77]

Luka is inching closer.

Lakers are the 2nd best team in the West despite the preseason expectations. This was almost entirely without Lebron. Only Shai can carry a team like this, unfortunately for Luka. But I expect Luka's efficiency to improve now with Lebron on the court and this to become a closer debate.

Yeah...he's not sniffing the MVP with another teammate averaging 28.

[_NoMas]

Luka 35.2 ppg / 8.8 rpg / 9.2 apg / 1.9 spg
SGA 32.2 ppg / 4.9 rpg / 6.6 apg / 1.5 spg

Luka is clearly ahead by now.

Because who needs stats on efficiency, turnovers, availability, wins?

[Bob8]

Luka 35.2 ppg / 8.8 rpg / 9.2 apg / 1.9 spg
SGA 32.2 ppg / 4.9 rpg / 6.6 apg / 1.5 spg

Luka is clearly ahead by now.

Because who needs stats on efficiency, turnovers, availability, wins?

And it looks nobody needs rebounds, assists and steals. I have nothing against Shai being in front, but man, talking about difference in turnovers, while they play totally different game is laughable. Interesting enough nobody is mentioning rebounding, where difference is huge.

Maybe someone can explain to me how Luka, who's much worse than Shai in on/off in RS. Has much better on/off in playoffs? Where Shai's dominance suddenly disappears?

[_NoMas]

Luka 35.2 ppg / 8.8 rpg / 9.2 apg / 1.9 spg
SGA 32.2 ppg / 4.9 rpg / 6.6 apg / 1.5 spg

Luka is clearly ahead by now.

Because who needs stats on efficiency, turnovers, availability, wins?

And it looks nobody needs rebounds, assists and steals. I have nothing against Shai being in front, but man, talking about difference in turnovers, while they play totally different game is laughable. Interesting enough nobody is mentioning rebounding, where difference is huge.

Maybe someone can explain to me how Luka, who's much worse than Shai in on/off in RS. Has much better on/off in playoffs? Where Shai's dominance suddenly disappears?

Maybe it all matters? So we should consider/ discuss all of the stats? Not just cherry pick the ones that suit our agendas…

What on earth does play off on/off numbers have to do with the 2025-26 REGULAR SEASON mvp race?

[Exp0sed]

before luka is mentioned here with the top dogs i'd like the offense he anchors be closet to top 5 than to league average.

of course he can carry a big offensive load, everybody knows that. he's just not doing it in a very good level to the benefit of his team.

the lakers are top 5 in 3/4 of the offensive four factors. problem is they're that least in tov% and that's dragging them down. and he has responsability on that.

stop it, lol

Luka is most def in this. the only reason he's not mentioned in the same breath of Jokic and SGA is because of the games he missed and the general expectation, that he'll miss more games down the line, while his rivals are more likely to stay healthy

[Bob8]

Because who needs stats on efficiency, turnovers, availability, wins?

And it looks nobody needs rebounds, assists and steals. I have nothing against Shai being in front, but man, talking about difference in turnovers, while they play totally different game is laughable. Interesting enough nobody is mentioning rebounding, where difference is huge.

Maybe someone can explain to me how Luka, who's much worse than Shai in on/off in RS. Has much better on/off in playoffs? Where Shai's dominance suddenly disappears?

Maybe it all matters? So we should consider/ discuss all of the stats? Not just cherry pick the ones that suit our agendas…

What on earth does play off on/off numbers have to do with the 2025-26 REGULAR SEASON mvp race?

Sure, but Shai fans are allergic to counting stats , because he's nowhere near to Luka/Jokic in those.

I just wanted to show how those +/- on/off are over the place. Or we maybe believe that Shai is incredibly valuable in RS but not really in playoffs?

[hagredionis]

Luka 35.2 ppg / 8.8 rpg / 9.2 apg / 1.9 spg
SGA 32.2 ppg / 4.9 rpg / 6.6 apg / 1.5 spg

Luka is clearly ahead by now.

Because who needs stats on efficiency, turnovers, availability, wins?

Sure let's not talking about the 3 ppg more, about 4 rpg more and 2.5 apg and the steals. That's probably at least 15 point more generated. But sure let's talk about that one turnover because that's the real difference. lol.

[_NoMas]

Luka 35.2 ppg / 8.8 rpg / 9.2 apg / 1.9 spg
SGA 32.2 ppg / 4.9 rpg / 6.6 apg / 1.5 spg

Luka is clearly ahead by now.

Because who needs stats on efficiency, turnovers, availability, wins?

Sure let's not talking about the 3 ppg more, about 4 rpg more and 2.5 apg and the steals. That's probably at least 15 point more generated. But sure let's talk about that one turnover because that's the real difference. lol.

I’m thinking more:

54 v 47 FG%
41 v 33 3P%
90 v 79 FT %
1.8 v 4.2 turnovers (sure, ‘one turnover).
33 vs 37mpg
Oh and 17 wins v 10 wins.