NBA MVP Discussion 20/21 (Fresh poll ➥ Vote)

[MisterHibachi]

#5

[_Game7_]

Lebron in the driver seat. 5 mvps babyyy

[EArl]

Why is Jokic's name being thrown around in here when his team is a 10th seed

Because he has been the best player in the NBA this season, averaging a >25 point super efficient triple-double from the center position (that narrative alone will garner him massive attention from a narrative standpoint). He leads the league in PER, WinShares (+WS/48), BPM and VORP along with a +14.5 Net Rating (they're -7 with him off the floor). The Nuggets are underperforming to start the season at .500, but that is not indicative of their level of play (already having the 6th best net rating in the NBA, I fully expect them to finish top 4 in the conference once MPJ comes back and Murray steps it up a bit). If I had to make a bet on who wins MVP this year, he is in the best position to do so.

They have to make at least top 3 seed in the West for him to have a chance at MVP or have Westbrook like numbers to win.

These are the only players that have won with a team record below 60%


1 .458 Bob Petit St. Louis Hawks 1955-56 33–39
2 .488 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Los Angeles Lakers 1975-76 40-42
3 .561 Moses Malone Houston Rockets 1981-82 46–36
4 .573 Moses Malone Houston Rockets 1978-79 47–35
4 .573 Russell Westbrook Oklahoma City Thunder 2016-17 47-35
6 .598 Bob McAdoo Buffalo Braves 1974–75 49–33

[WHITE_HOT_HEAT]

Embiid
LeBron
Paul George

Right now, but it's too early and can change every 2/3 days.. MVP discussions should only begin after 20-30 games

[zgope1]

The MVP is clearly LeBron right now. He’s lost multiple MVPs off BS and now when he rightfully deserves to be in the lead y’all don’t want to give it to him lol.

This is the obvious answer. The lakers are comfortably the best team and he’s comfortably the biggest reason why. He’s the most valuable player in the league. Give the man his due

and AD hasn't been playing well either. He carried us tonight.

1.Lebron
2.Luka
3.Giannis

As of right now.

Yep. AD is an incredible number 2 guy. But Lebron is the engine of the team and everyone knows it

[Gooner]

Kawhi.

Cant be. PG is putting up better numbers then Kawhi and they are on the same team.

Automatically cancels that out.

It's early, Kawhi is stil their best player. Numbers are similar anyway, can't really say PG's are better.

[levon]

Lebron is shooting the most 3s of his career, 7.2 per 36, and is making them at a 39.6% clip, which would be second best in his career. His best at 40% with Miami came on half the attempts, and generally wide open looks since they mostly gave up the shot since he was so crazy efficient everywhere else.

I expect it to regress, but it would be crazy if it didn't and Lebron just became an above average 3 point shooter at volume at the end of his career. I think last year he had the highest percentage on super long 3s. He's potentially getting even better.

[Gooner]

LeBron owns Giannis, he can dominate him any time he wants. Giannis is looking up to him like a fan, no competitive spirit. LeBron looks like the favorite to win MVP, but I have my doubts on his ability to sustain high enough level throughout the whole season. Clearly he has lost a lot of speed and for now he is compensating for it with career best 3 point shooting, which will drop off at some point.

[ThePersianFreak]

Dude's not even trying
I freaking love this version of LeBron, it's like he's trolling the league

[C0bR]

My man is jacking up 12 jumpers a game, not even trying to get to the rim and it's still got enough for an MVP lead.

[Homer38]

My man is jacking up 12 jumpers a game, not even trying to get to the rim and it's still got enough for an MVP lead.

And he is a good 3 points shooter now....39.6% on 6.6 attempts per game so far this year.

[Statlanta]

Jokic best player
James good player on the best team
Embiid good player on a great team
Doncic heir apparent of the league

[scrabbarista]

As of the morning of January 22nd.

These numbers are prorated (to roughly 60 games) to keep the +/- element of my formula from having an outsized impact.

1. 20.0 - Nikola Jokic, DEN
2. 18.1 - Kawhi Leonard, LAC
3. 16.6 - Kevin Durant, BKN
4. 16.2 - Mike Conley, UTA
5. 15.8 - Joel Embiid, PHI

6. 15.2 - LeBron James, LAL
7. 15.1 - Anthony Davis, LAL
8. 14.5 - Paul George, LAC
9. 14.3 - Damian Lillard, POR
10. 13.9 - C.J. McCollum, POR

I only calculated numbers for 34 players, including at least one player from every team that is .500 or better. That said, with a cushion of 24 players, this would likely be the top 10 if I'd run the numbers for the whole league. For the one person who might be curious, I selected the 34 players by eyeballing the top 20 in WS and VORP, plus whoever is on a .500+ team, plus Bradley Beal.

Note that some teams - LAL and BKN - have played 16 games, while others in the league have played 11, 12, or 13. (DEN and POR have played 14.) My formula is largely cumulative, so this is at least a small factor.

[scrabbarista]

FG% = Kawhi
3P% = Kawhi
FT% = Kawhi
Ast/TO = Kawhi
PPG = Kawhi
ORtg = Kawhi
WS = Kawhi
PER = Kawhi
TS% = Kawhi
WS/48 = Kawhi
OnCourt = Kawhi
On-Off = Kawhi
RAPTOR and RAPTOR WAR = Kawhi

But LeBron's team has a 0.5 game lead in the standings, so according to this thread, he's got it locked up.

The LeBron-stan blinders are just going to get funnier and funnier as he ages...

[Wagonband]

People saying LeBron don't understand what MVP means... Most Valuable Player. You can definite however you want. But i define it as most valuable to his team. Are the Lakers suddenly trash if LBJ doesn't play at this level? Nope, still have one of the best teams in the NBA.

How would the Nuggets do? Probably last in the West without Jokic. How about Mavs without Luka? same. Philly without Embiid? Same.

So i don't see how LeBron is that valuable the way he is playing. That doesn't mean he can't turn it on. But he's not, and smartly so. Shouldn't be awarded the MVP for it though. He hasn't coasted this much ever. So it would mean that a coasting LeBron is better than 15 seasons or so of engaged LeBron

[Texas Chuck]

People saying LeBron don't understand what MVP means... Most Valuable Player. You can definite however you want. But i define it as most valuable to his team. Are the Lakers suddenly trash if LBJ doesn't play at this level? Nope, still have one of the best teams in the NBA.

How would the Nuggets do? Probably last in the West without Jokic. How about Mavs without Luka? same. Philly without Embiid? Same.

So i don't see how LeBron is that valuable the way he is playing. That doesn't mean he can't turn it on. But he's not, and smartly so. Shouldn't be awarded the MVP for it though. He hasn't coasted this much ever. So it would mean that a coasting LeBron is better than 15 seasons or so of engaged LeBron

So just to understand your position: Jordan would have never been MVP in any of the title years, then correct? Because remember when he left to play baseball and Pippen led the team to 55 wins.

But we all understood that Mike clearly was the most valuable player in the league. The Bulls wouldn't have traded him for anything at any point. There was no price.

Just like Shaq got to play with Kobe but in the early 00's Shaq was clearly the most valuable player. Or Duncan got to play with good teammates, but he was clearly the most valuable player. Well Lebron has been that guy for a long time now. He doesn't get less valuable based on how good his teammates are or not.

[scrabbarista]

People saying LeBron don't understand what MVP means... Most Valuable Player. You can definite however you want. But i define it as most valuable to his team. Are the Lakers suddenly trash if LBJ doesn't play at this level? Nope, still have one of the best teams in the NBA.

How would the Nuggets do? Probably last in the West without Jokic. How about Mavs without Luka? same. Philly without Embiid? Same.

So i don't see how LeBron is that valuable the way he is playing. That doesn't mean he can't turn it on. But he's not, and smartly so. Shouldn't be awarded the MVP for it though. He hasn't coasted this much ever. So it would mean that a coasting LeBron is better than 15 seasons or so of engaged LeBron

So just to understand your position: Jordan would have never been MVP in any of the title years, then correct? Because remember when he left to play baseball and Pippen led the team to 55 wins.

But we all understood that Mike clearly was the most valuable player in the league. The Bulls wouldn't have traded him for anything at any point. There was no price.

Just like Shaq got to play with Kobe but in the early 00's Shaq was clearly the most valuable player. Or Duncan got to play with good teammates, but he was clearly the most valuable player. Well Lebron has been that guy for a long time now. He doesn't get less valuable based on how good his teammates are or not.

1. First off, the 92-93 bulls were the epitome of a team coasting in the regular season while preparing for a long playoff run. Recent iterations of the Warriors are another example of this. The previous two seasons, they'd won 61 and 67 games, and were by far number one in SRS. The 92-93 bulls were much better than a 57 win team and were clearly the best team in the league that year, sweeping the Cavs, who finished ahead of them in SRS, beating the number 1 seed Knicks in six and the Suns (also ahead of the bulls) in six.

2. People think the Bulls just replaced Jordan with Pete Myers and that’s it, but that’s a false narrative. They added Pete Myers, Steve Kerr (one of the best shooters in the league) and Toni Kukoc, the best player in Europe. So they had the entire championship team, minus Jordan, but added Kukoc, Kerr, Myers, and Longley, and kept Phil Jackson still as coach. Longley was an important addition, so much so that he started for three championship teams.

3. The 93-94 bulls way overachieved and were not nearly as good as their record. The expected win loss was 50-32 5 wins less than the 55 they actually won. Their SRS plummeted to 11th. In fact, there were four teams who won less games than the Bulls yet finished ahead in SRS, and several teams like the Knicks, Spurs and Hawks were only won a couple more games, yet finished far ahead in SRS. The Bulls offense also went from top 2 to bottom half of the league without Jordan.

4. In the First Round, they beat a Cavs team without Brad Daugherty, Larry Nance, or Hot Rod Williams. If healthy, that Cavs team could have beaten the Bulls. CHI lost to the Knicks in the playoffs without MJ and were undefeated against the Knicks with MJ. Derek Harper was also ejected in game 3 and missed games 4 and 5. This was the same Harper who was arguably the Knicks best player that very season in 7 games against Houston in the Finals. The Knicks were 3-1 against the Bulls in that series when Derek Harper played fully. The Knicks were clearly a better team.

5. The Bulls went from 3-peat champions to 2nd Round exit without Jordan, despite keeping every major player from the previous year, and adding Myers, Kerr, Kukoc, and Longley, and keeping Phil Jackson at coach.

----------------------------

Also, it's false equivalence to cite Jordan as the best player and LeBron as the best player in regards to the MVP race. Yes, they were both "the best," but Jordan was typically passed over for MVP when he was the best in objective measurables, whereas James has been passed over not because he wasn't "the best," but because he didn't play like the best until the playoffs. (I say "typically," because it's certainly true that both Jordan and James deserved more MVP's than they won.)

[Texas Chuck]

None of that matters mate. The point is the Bulls were a good team without Mike--as your wall of text concedes.

My whole point is that we shouldn't decide MVP based on who has the least help. Pick a different example if you don't like Mike.

[scrabbarista]

None of that matters mate. The point is the Bulls were a good team without Mike--as your wall of text concedes.

My whole point is that we shouldn't decide MVP based on who has the least help. Pick a different example if you don't like Mike.

None of that matters mate. The point is that the Bulls weren't remotely the same team in '93 as in '94 (added four major contributors), and weren't nearly as bad in '93 as the 57 wins you cited nor nearly as good in '94 as the 55 wins you cited -- as my wall of text conclusively proves.

My whole point was that the '93 and '94 Bulls have nothing to do with the point you were trying to make. Pick a different example if you want to reinforce your point.

[Texas Chuck]

Cheers mate. Trying not to get into fights with people just looking for one.

This was never about the Pippen-led Bulls. It's about my disagreement with choosing MVP based on teammates.