HeartBreakKid wrote:My votes are at the bottom for the poor soul who has to tally this. (ie, you can skip the text and just see my results)
Player of the Year
1) LeBron James - This was a two man race between Curry and James. I had James as the 2nd best player in the league at the end of the regular season. His combination of playmaking and elite scoring (he scored more points in the paint than any other season I think) was an improvement over last season, and more importantly he played amazing defense for a large part of the season. James stepped his game up in the playoffs, and his defense was a thing to behold.
To me, this is pretty much a prime season for LBJ, a clear improvement over last year - and prime James > Stephen Curry
2) Stephen Curry - The gap in offense between him and everyone else is still too large. He lead the league in PPG and TS, which is like finding El Dorado. His off ball play was magnificent, and between him and the Warriors they broke more records than I can count on two hands. Even with his relatively subpar playoffs, he was still a solid 25 point scorer. I do feel like his playmaking took a step backwards, perhaps because he played so much offball this season his decision making regressed. I trust him more as a scorer than the Thunder duo, and his RS was a lot better than Chris Paul's.
3) Chris Paul - Without Blake Griffin he still carried the Clippers to over 50 wins, a team that was shallow even with Griffin. His combination of generalship makes his impact really high and highly portable to playoff play. He was destroying the Blazers putting up 23 points on 7 assist with 1 turnover, it's too bad he broke his hand in game 4. Considering he had a relatively healthy season otherwise and played a buttload of minutes, I don't see the point in penalizing him, especially if I am not going to penalize Curry for missed games.
4) Kevin Durant - As I am writing this post, I am still going back and forth between Durant and Westbrook. I like both over Leonard, because I feel like their offensive abilities are more proven and consistent.
Durant had a rough post season, he just did not shot well, and that's a major difference between him and Westbrook. If Durant is going cold, which he relatively has for a few post seasons, his impact falls off a lot more than if Westbrook isn't making shots. With that being said, Durant DID make up a lot of his lost of offensive impact with defense this year. I'm going to side with the big time scorer here, and put Durant over Westbrook because of two way play, but I can likely be convinced to take Westbrook.
5) Russell Westbrook - A better offensive player than Durant, but much weaker on the defensive side. Westbrook really stepped up his playmaking this season, his ability to read what the defense gives him and make a pass has improved, and Westbrook-Kanter combination is really deadly. Westbrook's ability to control pace, pass and finish in the paint makes him a better offensive threat than Durant, but despite an improvement on defense, he still doesn't bring enough impact for me to put him over KD.
Offensive Player of the Year
1) Stephen Curry - Curry was the GOAT shooter last year, and his shooting this year blew all of that stuff away. Truly magnificent scoring ability, the guy beat his own 3 point shooting record by like a 100 3s or something.
2) Lebron James - Consistent scoring in the post season, he played more inside than last year. His post game and slashing is as aggressive as his prime seasons, and he still has amazing passing ability that makes his half court offense perfect for the playoffs.
3) Chris Paul - A lot like James in that he has a good combination of scoring and game managing, but trade dominant paint play with amazing mid range shooting. Paul's ball handling and ability to not turn the ball over might put him over James offensively, but I feel more confident with James scoring ability.
Defensive Player of the Year
1) Kawhi Leonard - A race that is neck to neck between him and Green, I am going to go with my brain and say Leonard, though with the eye test it seems like Green might be better. Leonard anchored an all time great defense, a better one than the 2016 and 2015 Warriors, despite him having overall less defensive talent. Leonard can guard multiple positions if asked and he can lock up perimeter players, which tells me that his defense might have more utility than Green's.
2) Draymond Green - His ability to blow up offensive sets is a thing to be hold, and I feel like his shot blocking was taken up a notch this season. Not much to say here, he was a force in the RS and most of the playoffs other than the Thunder series.
3) Rudy Gobert - Underrated because he missed 20 games and played on a team that barely missed the playoffs (due to the entire team having injury problems), but his rim protection was still as elite as ever. I think overall, I would rather have him anchoring my defense than more perimeter oriented defenders like Millsap and James - those two are good, but they're not Green/Leonard good.
Rookie of the Year
Nikola Jokic - Jokic has the best advance stats by far among the three rookie bigs. Nikola has defensive ratings, and his ORTG is insanely high. Jokic is a very talented passer, and probably a large reason why he was such a good offensive player in his rookie season. If I saw more of Jokic, I might be more comfortable giving him the leg up. This might be a case of Towns and Porzingis hype over shadowing objective analysis.
EDIT: On further look, I think Jokic is clearly the best rookie this season. Really, the only thing Towns has over him other than being the #1 draft pick is a "better" statline, which really has to do with him playing more minutes. Per 36, Jokic has a slightly better statline, impact stats suggest he is much better, he is clearly better defensively, using splits he kinda kills Towns and Zingis as well.
Karl Anthony-Towns - 18 points on 60 TS%, great ability to stretch the floor, double digit rebounding, amazing shot blocking ability. Towns has just had the GOAT one and done rookie season. The only thing that is shaky is that his pick and roll defense is very bad, but it's hard to vote against him given how dominant all his other stats are.
Kristaps Porzingis - People were dead wrong about Porzingis' body not being NBA ready. This guy is a defensive force, his ability to shut down the paint is already amazing. His defensive prowess might make him a better player for a contending team than Towns, but his offensive stats took a big dip in the 2nd half. Porzingis has shown great shooting potential, but he still needs more experience in order to drill those shots.
Most Improved Player
CJ McCollum - He was a 7 point scorer last year, and now he is among the lead leaders at 20.8 PPG per game. His ability to play without the ball, isolate and shoot from a far is insanely valuable.
Jae Crowder - His scoring and shooting made a big spike, and defensively he improved to nearly all-nba defense level. He is now among the best 3 and D guys in the league, where as last year he was more of a rotation player.
Kemba Walker - Walker is now a legitimate scoring threat, when prior years he was just a guy getting a lot of points on a lot of shots. Walker's ability to now isolate and now hit shots makes him a borderline top ten PG, where as before he seemed more like a bench player who got starter minutes.
Sixth Man of the Year
Andre Iguodala - An All-NBA defensive caliber player coming off the bench is hard to ignore. He is still a low tier all-star to me, and even with the decline in his athleticism he is still more athletic than most perimeter players. We saw how much GSW suffers when Iggy is hurting.
Dennis Schroder - Essentially played himself up into being the new starter, replacing an all-star in Jeff Teague. If Schroeder had more minutes, he would probably be an 18/7 type of player with good defense. He also did a pretty decent job in the playoffs considering the competition he faced.
Bismack Biyombo - Biyombo looked like he didn't even belong in the league when he was on the Bobcats/Hornets. He played much improved ball through out the RS and helped contribute to the Raptors 2nd seed berth. Biyombo's rebounding and defensive ability really got noticed when Jonas got injured and he totally destroyed the Heat, and absolutely dominated Love on glass in the Cavs series.
Coach of the Year
Brad Stevens - Stevens got 48 wins with only one low tier all-star and a rag tag bunch of NBA rejects. Guys like Evan Turner are now getting 6th man of the year votes. The Celtics are among the best defenses in the league despite being one of the worst teams in protecting the paint, and they're not near the worst offensive teams despite not little 3 point shooting and no legitimate star - if the Celtics did not play amazing team ball, they would be as bad as the Sacramento Kings.
Stan Van Gundy - The Pistons are one of the strongest 8th seeds the East has had in an incredibly long time. He's essentially restructured his offense in Orlando which perfectly tailors his center star in Drummond. Despite Drummond shooting a low TS, you can still feel his impact given the Piston's spacing. I also thought SVG used his rookie, Stanley Johnson very well, and Johnson is going to get developed into a legitimate weapon. The Pistons swept the Cavs in the RS, and even though they got swept played them hard in every game. SVG is the best thing to happen to the Pistons in a very long time.
Rick Carslile - This is kinda the "ol faithful" vote. I feel like he did well with what he had, if he had more talent, he likely would have gotten way more press. I am starting to believe that he is a better coach overall than Greg Popovich, I feel like his playoff hiccups are noticeably lower.
Executive of the Year (I put franchises instead of executives, since it can be confusing on who is calling the shots for certain teams)
Spurs - They re-signed Leonard and Green if I can recall, and got the biggest free agent in LaMarcus Aldridge. They also signed a solid starting PF in David West to the vet minimum. Add on to that, they got guys like Martin, Miller and Boban at the end of their bench. They brought over an athletic rookie in Jonathan Simmons in his mid 20s, who played meaningful minutes for them in the first half of the season. They stacked their team incredibly well, and pretty much did everything a team could want in the offseason.
Pistons - They made a great draft pick in Stanley Johnson, who has immediately helped them. The Pistons also managed to land Tobias Harris in a trade, as well as a Marcus Morris for a 2020 2nd round pick.
Knicks - This might be a little controversial, but I thought they had a very good free agency. They got a franchise changing pick in Kristaps Porzingis with the 4th pick in the draft (I think he will be the best player in his draft class). They also got solid signings in Robin Lopez for cheap and Affalo who is pretty decent, all and all, considering the Knicks had little to work with, they went in a pretty good direction this season.
---------------------------------------My Vote---------------------------------------
POY:
Lebron James
Stephen Curry
Chris Paul
Kevin Durant
Russell Westbrook
OPOY:
Stephen Curry
Lebron James
Chris Paul
DPOY:
Kawhi Leonard
Draymond Green
Rudy Gobert
ROY:
Nikola Jokić
Kristaps Porzingis
Karl Towns
MIP:
CJ McCollum
Jae Crowder
Kemba Walker
6MOY:
Andre Iguodala
Dennis Schroeder
Bismack Biyombo
COY:
Brad Stevens
Stan Van Gundy
Rick Carslile
EOY:
Spurs
Detroit
Knicks
