MVP Discussion [19/20] [part II] - voting opened

[scrabbarista]

A) Gobert/Jokic should be in the poll over Kemba/Mitchell. Embiid should probably drop out of the next one at this point as well.

B) As of now Giannis/LeBron/Harden are my only serious candidates, and in that order. Anyone else is very much on the fringes.

morning of January 10th

13.9 Antetokounmpo
13.8 Harden
(Southern lawyer voice: "We got ou'selves a game!")
13.3 James
11.1 Doncic
11.1 Butler

10.9 Gobert
10.1 Jokic
9.6 Lillard
9.4 Davis
8.9 Leonard

[Ballerhogger]

Giannis heading into the all star is clear MVP .
With AD missing some games you can put Harden up 2nd . Third place right now would be Luka

[ken6199]

17 points on 17 shots.

True shooting % though...

18 points on 27 shots on christmas day in Philly. Do we really have to do this?

I literally wrote a post above - player a had a bad game (after an insanely good stretch), guys relieved and came in attacking. You, at least I thought u were better than this.

The problem with your post is simple. Find another game except Christmas that Antetokounmpo shot this bad. Not only this season. Every season he has played. You found the worst shooting game of his entire career i guess. Harden has enough games like that(currently 2 in the row for example)
Antetokounmpo on the other hand rarely gets that low.

The problem with your post is you totally didn't understand my sarcasm. My point is NOT to pick each other's bad game and make a world out of it. MVP is based on whole season, everyone have bad games so by doing this stupid practice this discussion is not going anywhere.

I wasn't comparing Giannis and Harden at all. You are exactly the type of posters I was referring to that made this thread less interesting to read. Yes, I am making it very clear.

[ken6199]

Harden shot 49% from 3 in December, hardly see a single Bucks fan say anything positive about it (at least not those usual, frequent Bucks posters).

For me Harden is a very good no 2. Luka, LeBron and AD are 3-5.

Finals MVP is always on the winning team. In this line, best player on best team is always a strong candidate. If it’s best player by far on best team by far, only something very special can change my vote. Triple double (if it wasn’t done a few years ago), 40+ ppg, 35+ ppg and 1 seed in West. Something like that.

At the moment the Bucks have 27 more wins than losses. Lakers are +23 but don’t have one best player by far.
Houston are +13. The difference with the Bucks is just too significant. You can’t erase this with roster, coach/system or conference.
The only way Harden wins if you use a formula. But as long as people vote for this I think my argument is shared by many voters.

Not sure if I mentioned this before - my view of how much Harden has to do to eventually have a chance to win this: 35ppg, top 2 seed preferably 1st seed in West. If Harden averages 40ppg, or even 45ppg and his team is West 4 seed, he won't win. Obviously that's a very abrupt way of cutting things, but if we have to throw a number into it that would be my number. I think that explains quite clear how much weight I put into winning, and how much I agree that the Bucks dominance should be tied to Giannis' MVP case.

Re coaching/system, there seems to be a perception that if Houston don't end up in top 4 seed that's simply because Harden is not good enough that his scoring is all stats less impact, which to me is a biased view. Not saying the Houston supporting cast is Cavs level hot garbage, but my feeling is due to Harden's durability people haven't seen much of how this team play without him so lot of them who don't really follow this Houston team start to assume Harden's supporting cast play better without him and it's because of him that they are under performing. Those are the views I call BS on.

For the same reason I laugh at those who are saying Giannis is leading this because he has a great supporting cast. Look at the past MVP winners, who does NOT have a great supporting cast? Most of them either had elite teammates, some of them had GOAT systems, HOF running mates. Bucks supporting cast is actually subpar compared to most of them. But you know what? Those who bitch about Curry's historical supporting cast are the same ones who bitch about Bud/Middelton/BroLo etc right now. Same BS.

[niQ]

Right now it's easily Giannis.

[Infinite Llamas]

I still think jokic gets it if Denver takes #1 seed over the Lakers and has a comparable record to milwaukee

[Barnzy]

Luka is certainly not ahead of LeBron. It's a two man race between Giannis and LeBron.

The two best players on the clear two best teams in the league.

Doncic - 6th in the West. No.
Harden - 5th in the West. No.

[Dupp]

Lol, yeah I just realized. Why on earth is Jokic not in the poll but Kemba and Donovan Mitchell are?

Yeah pretty silly

[Dupp]

A) Gobert/Jokic should be in the poll over Kemba/Mitchell. Embiid should probably drop out of the next one at this point as well.

B) As of now Giannis/LeBron/Harden are my only serious candidates, and in that order. Anyone else is very much on the fringes.

morning of January 10th

13.9 Antetokounmpo
13.8 Harden
(Southern lawyer voice: "We got ou'selves a game!")
13.3 James
11.1 Doncic
11.1 Butler

10.9 Gobert
10.1 Jokic
9.6 Lillard
9.4 Davis
8.9 Leonard

Your formula is obviously great despite people complaining. It’s so close to what the actual vote should be and prior seasons are dead on too.

[ken6199]

Lol, yeah I just realized. Why on earth is Jokic not in the poll but Kemba and Donovan Mitchell are?

Yeah pretty silly

Bballref probability instead of Seikou's diary next month? What else is reliable?

[GSP]

I still think jokic gets it if Denver takes #1 seed over the Lakers and has a comparable record to milwaukee

LOL that is not happening. Bucks are easily gonna have the best record and the Lakers are locked in to the 1 seed. Denver and no one in the West is catching their record at this point

Maybe if Jokic wasn't a lazy fatass to start the season his name could've been in the mix but there's no chance he will be now

[freethedevil]

Harden shot 49% from 3 in December, hardly see a single Bucks fan say anything positive about it (at least not those usual, frequent Bucks posters).

For me Harden is a very good no 2. Luka, LeBron and AD are 3-5.

Finals MVP is always on the winning team. In this line, best player on best team is always a strong candidate. If it’s best player by far on best team by far, only something very special can change my vote. Triple double (if it wasn’t done a few years ago), 40+ ppg, 35+ ppg and 1 seed in West. Something like that.

At the moment the Bucks have 27 more wins than losses. Lakers are +23 but don’t have one best player by far.
Houston are +13. The difference with the Bucks is just too significant. You can’t erase this with roster, coach/system or conference.
The only way Harden wins if you use a formula. But as long as people vote for this I think my argument is shared by many voters.

Not sure if I mentioned this before - my view of how much Harden has to do to eventually have a chance to win this: 35ppg, top 2 seed preferably 1st seed in West. If Harden averages 40ppg, or even 45ppg and his team is West 4 seed, he won't win.

PPG doesn't measure overall value so it really shoudln't mean anything for mvp. if anything, Harden's ppg means he's overrated since the media eats up points per game. It's why there's this narrative "harden was robbed" last year despite giannis being more valuable per predictive metrics and leading a vastly better team.

Harden also gets the bias of the media towards win-loss record and seeding as opposed to srs which is far more predictive and would have shut up any "rockets have only won 7 less games" takes.

The notion that ther's a bias against harden as opposed to Giannis is honestly ridiculous. Harden is the one who puts up pretty slash lines, Giannis is the one who excels in analytics no one cares about. Harden plays for the big market and you bet your ass houston would get a lot more coverage than the bucks if they were nearly as good. Harden's the one who putsup arbitrary stastical milestones like "triiple double" "30 ppg streak." If Giannis was as good as harden, harden would have won. Fortunately, Giannis is better than harden, so harden being an offense based box score machine doesn't net him underserved w's.

[Freighttrain]

1. Giannis
2. LeBron
3. Harden
4. Luka
5. AD
6. Jokic

[C0bR]

easily LeBron right now

top seed in the better conference, by far the the most oncourt impact in the league, gargantuan RPM lead etc.

Bucks are just way too good without Giannis on the floor in comparison

[MrPerfect1]

easily LeBron right now

top seed in the better conference, by far the the most oncourt impact in the league, gargantuan RPM lead etc.

Bucks are just way too good without Giannis on the floor in comparison

What makes the West the Better Conference?

Also, the big difference between them last year vs this year (being out of the playoffs vs) being the #1 Seed on the West isn't Lebron.

[WHITE_HOT_HEAT]

Can't be Luka or Harden anymore. Their record isn't good enough and Doncic has faltered against LeBron even without AD.
It's
Giannis
.
LeBron
.
Harden
Doncic

[RB34]

So Luka and Harden lose points because of their team record, Giannis loses points because the Bucks are ok when he doesn’t play. LeBron is the only candidate to have a top 5-6 teammate but he doesn’t lose points for it?

[WHITE_HOT_HEAT]

easily LeBron right now

top seed in the better conference, by far the the most oncourt impact in the league, gargantuan RPM lead etc.

Bucks are just way too good without Giannis on the floor in comparison

What makes the West the Better Conference?

Also, the big difference between them last year vs this year (being out of the playoffs vs) being the #1 Seed on the West isn't Lebron.

What's the East Vs West record again? If you exclude the Bucks Top 6 teams of the West can possibly all be the 1st seed in the Eastern conference.

But.. Giannis is the MVP and I don't agree that East being worse takes away from him. His team beat the Lakers and they have the better record. So he'd MVP. He also has the better stats.

So Luka and Harden lose points because of their team record, Giannis loses points because the Bucks are ok when he doesn’t play. LeBron is the only candidate to have a top 5-6 teammate but he doesn’t lose points for it?

No. Giannis doesn't lose points. It's only Doncic and Harden who falter due the reasons listed. Also due to the H2H matchups Vs Lebron.
Giannis is still clearly the MVP. LeBron clearly no 2 again after faltering late December.

[hedo15]

lebron making a big push recently and back in the mvp conversation

it will come down to winning record. if lakers have more wins at the end of the regular season lebron will win it

Sent from my MAR-LX1A using RealGM mobile app

[KGtabake]

18 points on 27 shots on christmas day in Philly. Do we really have to do this?

I literally wrote a post above - player a had a bad game (after an insanely good stretch), guys relieved and came in attacking. You, at least I thought u were better than this.

The problem with your post is simple. Find another game except Christmas that Antetokounmpo shot this bad. Not only this season. Every season he has played. You found the worst shooting game of his entire career i guess. Harden has enough games like that(currently 2 in the row for example)
Antetokounmpo on the other hand rarely gets that low.

The problem with your post is you totally didn't understand my sarcasm. My point is NOT to pick each other's bad game and make a world out of it. MVP is based on whole season, everyone have bad games so by doing this stupid practice this discussion is not going anywhere.

I wasn't comparing Giannis and Harden at all. You are exactly the type of posters I was referring to that made this thread less interesting to read. Yes, I am making it very clear.

Personal attack? If you want it this way, it will be done.
I didn't attack you but hey if you can't explain your post in a more kind way without proceeding to insults, the problem is yours.

Everybody know that every player has bad games. But not every bad game is the same.
One player can have a bad shooting night while being good one the other side of the floor and the other player can have a bad shooting night while he's a negative on the defensive end as well.
A X player has a bad shooting night once a month. A Y player has a bad shooting night once a week.
You're going with the "every player has bad games" and generalities like that, because you're a fan of the Y player and because you got triggered.

You can't provide other examples not because that's not the point, but because you don't have other examples.
A guy who's posting on a thread while providing 0 arguemements, proceeds to personal attack because he gets triggered and then he goes with the "you're the kind of poster that makes this thread less interesting to read".

Better take a look at the mirror. You will find the reason the thread becomes more difficult to read there.

Does that sound very clear to you? If not, we can continue in the way you have chosen.