NBA MVP Discussion '20-'21, Part 2 (Poll created 21 March '21)

[DCasey91]

Harden has a guy with him that has a statline of:

28/5/6 on basically a 50/40/90

All three can basically handball it to each other and they will cakewalk to a one seed lol.

Hardens played great after Houston no doubt (sung his praises here what felt like ages ago now and got burned for it lol)

But in no way shape or form is he carrying as much as he did in the Rocket years. 2018-19 should have been his real MVP year imo

I mean personally it’s Jokic and there’s not really an argument anymore for anybody else as far as I can tell. Most durable/Most consistent/Best numbers
What more do you want in an MVP? lol they’ll get a top 3-4 seed in the West and that is much harder to do than a top 2 seed in the East.

Jokic 1#

Then it’s up for grabs for second/third

[GSP]

Rudy shouldn't win it but he might need to be top 5. Utah has been the best team for most of the season now and they're 3-0 without Mitchell and 8-1 without Conley......

Fact that Donovan has 2x better odds than Rudy to win Mvp shows how devalued defensive players are

[leolozon]

Luka Doncic deserves better recognition.
He's been arguably playing his best basketball of his career in last few weeks.

He'll be in consideration if he can get the Mavs to the #3 seed or better.

I don't think anyone is saying he should win, but he could deserve that 4th or 5th spot by the end of the year.

Basing your vote on seeding like that and not looking at the context makes no sense. The Mavs have had an great record if you don't count the fact that they've been hit by COVID maybe the hardest. Not sure why getting hit by covid while some other teams didn't should be seen negatively.

Recently the Mavs have lost 3 games with Doncic sitting, if the Mavs won those games, they would have been right up there for the 4th seed. According to your standard, winning without him would mean that Doncic is more valuable to his team. They're 1-4 without him. They scored 87 in the games they won against OKC. The vote is about who's valuable to their team and it's important to look at the context.

Of course, I don't think he should win, but after Jokic, Giannis and Harden, I think a bunch of guys could get that 4th spot and Doncic is among them.

[BlazersBroncos]

I think there is a pretty nice sized gap between Joker and the next top guy.

He is currently leading the league in:

PER
OWS
WS
WS/48
OBPM
BPM
VORP

On a HCA playoff team, without a true elite second fiddle and while posting his best raw stats ever as well.

[SA37]

My MVP is still Lillard. Depending on how the rest of the season goes for Denver and Portland, Jokic is the only person I would consider putting in front of Lillard.

1. Lillard
2. Jokic


3. Harden
4. LeBron
5. Embiid
6. Giannis
7. Doncic
8. Leonard

[Hello Brooklyn]

Harden has a guy with him that has a statline of:

28/5/6 on basically a 50/40/90

All three can basically handball it to each other and they will cakewalk to a one seed lol.

Hardens played great after Houston no doubt (sung his praises here what felt like ages ago now and got burned for it lol)

But in no way shape or form is he carrying as much as he did in the Rocket years. 2018-19 should have been his real MVP year imo

I mean personally it’s Jokic and there’s not really an argument anymore for anybody else as far as I can tell. Most durable/Most consistent/Best numbers
What more do you want in an MVP? lol they’ll get a top 3-4 seed in the West and that is much harder to do than a top 2 seed in the East.

Jokic 1#

Then it’s up for grabs for second/third

I don't think anyone is arguing that Harden's season this year is as good as his MVP year.

This year isn't particularly strong for candidates.

Jokic's team is still not a top seed in the West. Until that happens hes not the favorite at least for me.

Meanwhile Harden has gotten the Nets to the #1 record in the East.

[Jurassic_Park]

Harden has a guy with him that has a statline of:

28/5/6 on basically a 50/40/90

All three can basically handball it to each other and they will cakewalk to a one seed lol.

Hardens played great after Houston no doubt (sung his praises here what felt like ages ago now and got burned for it lol)

But in no way shape or form is he carrying as much as he did in the Rocket years. 2018-19 should have been his real MVP year imo

I mean personally it’s Jokic and there’s not really an argument anymore for anybody else as far as I can tell. Most durable/Most consistent/Best numbers
What more do you want in an MVP? lol they’ll get a top 3-4 seed in the West and that is much harder to do than a top 2 seed in the East.

Jokic 1#

Then it’s up for grabs for second/third

I don't think anyone is arguing that Harden's season this year is as good as his MVP year.

This year isn't particularly strong for candidates.

Jokic's team is still not a top seed in the West. Until that happens hes not the favorite at least for me.

Meanwhile Harden has gotten the Nets to the #1 record in the East.

...yeah if you erase the houston losses when he was there. Add those losses in, and remove the wins from brooklyn when harden wasnt there... what is the record now?

thought so..

[Hello Brooklyn]

Harden has a guy with him that has a statline of:

28/5/6 on basically a 50/40/90

All three can basically handball it to each other and they will cakewalk to a one seed lol.

Hardens played great after Houston no doubt (sung his praises here what felt like ages ago now and got burned for it lol)

But in no way shape or form is he carrying as much as he did in the Rocket years. 2018-19 should have been his real MVP year imo

I mean personally it’s Jokic and there’s not really an argument anymore for anybody else as far as I can tell. Most durable/Most consistent/Best numbers
What more do you want in an MVP? lol they’ll get a top 3-4 seed in the West and that is much harder to do than a top 2 seed in the East.

Jokic 1#

Then it’s up for grabs for second/third

I don't think anyone is arguing that Harden's season this year is as good as his MVP year.

This year isn't particularly strong for candidates.

Jokic's team is still not a top seed in the West. Until that happens hes not the favorite at least for me.

Meanwhile Harden has gotten the Nets to the #1 record in the East.

...yeah if you erase the houston losses when he was there. Add those losses in, and remove the wins from brooklyn when harden wasnt there... what is the record now?

thought so..

Nets were not very good before Harden was there.

Houston is by far the worst team in the league. How are they doing without him?

[kazyv]

Harden has a guy with him that has a statline of:

28/5/6 on basically a 50/40/90

All three can basically handball it to each other and they will cakewalk to a one seed lol.

Hardens played great after Houston no doubt (sung his praises here what felt like ages ago now and got burned for it lol)

But in no way shape or form is he carrying as much as he did in the Rocket years. 2018-19 should have been his real MVP year imo

I mean personally it’s Jokic and there’s not really an argument anymore for anybody else as far as I can tell. Most durable/Most consistent/Best numbers
What more do you want in an MVP? lol they’ll get a top 3-4 seed in the West and that is much harder to do than a top 2 seed in the East.

Jokic 1#

Then it’s up for grabs for second/third

I don't think anyone is arguing that Harden's season this year is as good as his MVP year.

This year isn't particularly strong for candidates.

Jokic's team is still not a top seed in the West. Until that happens hes not the favorite at least for me.

Meanwhile Harden has gotten the Nets to the #1 record in the East.

...yeah if you erase the houston losses when he was there. Add those losses in, and remove the wins from brooklyn when harden wasnt there... what is the record now?

thought so..

there's really no need to overthink this. harden's games for houston simply aren't part of the mvp campaign. he's projected to miss about 20% of the regular season for the nets and i don't think we've seen an mvp play this few games in quite a while, so he looks to be out of the race.

[Hello Brooklyn]

I don't think anyone is arguing that Harden's season this year is as good as his MVP year.

This year isn't particularly strong for candidates.

Jokic's team is still not a top seed in the West. Until that happens hes not the favorite at least for me.

Meanwhile Harden has gotten the Nets to the #1 record in the East.

...yeah if you erase the houston losses when he was there. Add those losses in, and remove the wins from brooklyn when harden wasnt there... what is the record now?

thought so..

there's really no need to overthink this. harden's games for houston simply aren't part of the mvp campaign. he's projected to miss about 20% of the regular season for the nets and i don't think we've seen an mvp play this few games in quite a while, so he looks to be out of the race.

I'd personally rather give it someone who played 15 games on a bad team and then lifted another team to the #1 seed then to someone whos been on a mediocre team all season but thats just me.

I don't think the MVP should be on a #5/6 seed whose team is worse than last year.

[kuclas]

Embiid back Saturday most likely. However. I doubt he will play in the 80% games and unless Jokic Denver team finishes 5th or lower. It’s Jokic to lose. Harden is second.

The rest no one is close

Jokic
Harden

Everyone else

[JoeyLightYears]

Luka Doncic deserves better recognition.
He's been arguably playing his best basketball of his career in last few weeks.

He'll be in consideration if he can get the Mavs to the #3 seed or better.

With the teams Mavs have, already getting them to the top 5 seeds would almost automatically put him as the MVP favourite, let alone as one of the candidates.

I don't think anyone is saying he should win, but he could deserve that 4th or 5th spot by the end of the year.

Basing your vote on seeding like that and not looking at the context makes no sense. The Mavs have had an great record if you don't count the fact that they've been hit by COVID maybe the hardest. Not sure why getting hit by covid while some other teams didn't should be seen negatively.

Recently the Mavs have lost 3 games with Doncic sitting, if the Mavs won those games, they would have been right up there for the 4th seed. According to your standard, winning without him would mean that Doncic is more valuable to his team. They're 1-4 without him. They scored 87 in the games they won against OKC. The vote is about who's valuable to their team and it's important to look at the context.

Of course, I don't think he should win, but after Jokic, Giannis and Harden, I think a bunch of guys could get that 4th spot and Doncic is among them.

You guys are overthinking this. The MVP is not and never has been the "best player" award, and outside of Westbrook winning it due to what was believed then to be a once-in-a-lifetime achievement, it always follows the same criteria. It doesn't matter what hardship a player faces, how his team does without him, and all of the other stuff you can think of. It is awarded to the clear-cut best player on a top-2 team. Maybe there is wiggle room (to, say, the top-3) if the records are close enough.

Luka has no chance unless the Mavs sneak into the top-3 at least. Same reason LeBron didn't win it until 2009 even though his crappy supporting cast won 50+ plenty of times and he had the best numbers in the league. Same reason Kobe didn't win it until 2008 which wasn't close to his best season as a pro.

Even Jokic (who is unquestionably the best player by metrics) has an uphill battle this year until the Nuggets solidify themselves as a contender... he is somewhat fortunate that all of the definitive top players on contenders have been injured, and that the best two teams are balanced (no clear cut top player), like the late Duncan era Spurs.

You can argue until you're blue in the face that X player deserves MVP but if you actually look at the history of the award, the process is pretty straightforward.

[leolozon]

He'll be in consideration if he can get the Mavs to the #3 seed or better.

With the teams Mavs have, already getting them to the top 5 seeds would almost automatically put him as the MVP favourite, let alone as one of the candidates.

I don't think anyone is saying he should win, but he could deserve that 4th or 5th spot by the end of the year.

Basing your vote on seeding like that and not looking at the context makes no sense. The Mavs have had an great record if you don't count the fact that they've been hit by COVID maybe the hardest. Not sure why getting hit by covid while some other teams didn't should be seen negatively.

Recently the Mavs have lost 3 games with Doncic sitting, if the Mavs won those games, they would have been right up there for the 4th seed. According to your standard, winning without him would mean that Doncic is more valuable to his team. They're 1-4 without him. They scored 87 in the games they won against OKC. The vote is about who's valuable to their team and it's important to look at the context.

Of course, I don't think he should win, but after Jokic, Giannis and Harden, I think a bunch of guys could get that 4th spot and Doncic is among them.

You guys are overthinking this. The MVP is not and never has been the "best player" award, and outside of Westbrook winning it due to what was believed then to be a once-in-a-lifetime achievement, it always follows the same criteria. It doesn't matter what hardship a player faces, how his team does without him, and all of the other stuff you can think of. It is awarded to the clear-cut best player on a top-2 team. Maybe there is wiggle room (to, say, the top-3) if the records are close enough.

Luka has no chance unless the Mavs sneak into the top-3 at least. Same reason LeBron didn't win it until 2009 even though his crappy supporting cast won 50+ plenty of times and he had the best numbers in the league. Same reason Kobe didn't win it until 2008 which wasn't close to his best season as a pro.

Even Jokic (who is unquestionably the best player by metrics) has an uphill battle this year until the Nuggets solidify themselves as a contender... he is somewhat fortunate that all of the definitive top players on contenders have been injured, and that the best two teams are balanced (no clear cut top player), like the late Duncan era Spurs.

You can argue until you're blue in the face that X player deserves MVP but if you actually look at the history of the award, the process is pretty straightforward.

Well I disagree with Yuri. And I don't think it's the best player award. It's the most valuable player award. You can add more value to a 6th seed than a 1st seed, which is one of the reason no one on the Jazz is at the top of the conversation. People are becoming smarter about those things and criterias change. I doubt we see another Derrick Rose situation. This year is also particular because of COVID. No doubt that the Mavs would be around that 4th spot if they weren't hit by covid.

I know how the process generally works, but there have been exceptions because people know that wins isn't the only criteria. Of course, on average, the most valuable player is going to be on a high seed, but it won't always be the case.

And once again, I don't think Luka should be in the top 3. You still have to vote for 5 guys.

I'm not arguing that Luka has a chance to win MVP if his team isn't top 3. I doubt that he does. Although, I certainly think he would have a chance if his team was close or ahead of Denver and Doncic had a better year than Jokic.

[Castle Black]

Read on Twitter

[NADALalot]

I'm not arguing that Luka has a chance to win MVP if his team isn't top 3. I doubt that he does. Although, I certainly think he would have a chance if his team was close or ahead of Denver and Doncic had a better year than Jokic.

Doncic doesn't look better, and neither do his stats.

[Kurtz]

He'll be in consideration if he can get the Mavs to the #3 seed or better.

With the teams Mavs have, already getting them to the top 5 seeds would almost automatically put him as the MVP favourite, let alone as one of the candidates.

I don't think anyone is saying he should win, but he could deserve that 4th or 5th spot by the end of the year.

Basing your vote on seeding like that and not looking at the context makes no sense. The Mavs have had an great record if you don't count the fact that they've been hit by COVID maybe the hardest. Not sure why getting hit by covid while some other teams didn't should be seen negatively.

Recently the Mavs have lost 3 games with Doncic sitting, if the Mavs won those games, they would have been right up there for the 4th seed. According to your standard, winning without him would mean that Doncic is more valuable to his team. They're 1-4 without him. They scored 87 in the games they won against OKC. The vote is about who's valuable to their team and it's important to look at the context.

Of course, I don't think he should win, but after Jokic, Giannis and Harden, I think a bunch of guys could get that 4th spot and Doncic is among them.

You guys are overthinking this. The MVP is not and never has been the "best player" award, and outside of Westbrook winning it due to what was believed then to be a once-in-a-lifetime achievement, it always follows the same criteria. It doesn't matter what hardship a player faces, how his team does without him, and all of the other stuff you can think of. It is awarded to the clear-cut best player on a top-2 team. Maybe there is wiggle room (to, say, the top-3) if the records are close enough.

Luka has no chance unless the Mavs sneak into the top-3 at least. Same reason LeBron didn't win it until 2009 even though his crappy supporting cast won 50+ plenty of times and he had the best numbers in the league. Same reason Kobe didn't win it until 2008 which wasn't close to his best season as a pro.

Even Jokic (who is unquestionably the best player by metrics) has an uphill battle this year until the Nuggets solidify themselves as a contender... he is somewhat fortunate that all of the definitive top players on contenders have been injured, and that the best two teams are balanced (no clear cut top player), like the late Duncan era Spurs.

You can argue until you're blue in the face that X player deserves MVP but if you actually look at the history of the award, the process is pretty straightforward.

I don't think it's straightforward at all - and you might be conflating correlation with causation.

Yes, usually the MVP finishes on a top-2 seed in their conference. But they are not simply given the MVP because of their record, rather their team often achieves that record because they have the MVP on that team.

If we look at the MVPs over the past 20 years, most of them are amongst all-time greats: Duncan, Lebron, KG, Curry, Giannis, KD, Harden, and they all happened to be on a top team.

The outliers paint a muddier picture. Westbrook in 2017 on a 6th seed. Rose over Lebron in 2011 on a #1 seed (point for your argument). Nash in 2005 on a first seed (point for your argument) - but then again in 2006 on a #3 seed, when Duncan's Spurs had 9 more wins than him (point against your argument).

I don't think it's straightforward - clearly team record is important, but the best narrative in any given year wins the day; and with Lebron and Embiid out, and Harden tanking the first part of the year, Joker has the most compelling narrative.

[Jurassic_Park]

1. embiid - missed too many games. No way he can qualify missing 20 games (thats >25% of the season)
2. Lebron - same thing, will miss too many games
3. Giannis - no one will vote for him again, fair or not
4. Harden - the narrative of switching from hou to bkn... he may be one that overcomes it b/c he is playing so well, but things could turn sideways once kd returns and hardens role reduces a little

based on those things, you likely wont have an MVP this year with a top seed (utah/phx/phi/mil) - no player on those teams will win it.

[DCasey91]

Kyrie Irving Last 5 games played:

31/6/12
27/7/3
28/7/6
46/6/4
34/1/4

... To say Harden is carrying the Nets to a one seed is pretty farfetch’d.

Context matters

[JoeyLightYears]

I don't think it's straightforward at all - and you might be conflating correlation with causation.

Yes, usually the MVP finishes on a top-2 seed in their conference. But they are not simply given the MVP because of their record, rather their team often achieves that record because they have the MVP on that team.

If we look at the MVPs over the past 20 years, most of them are amongst all-time greats: Duncan, Lebron, KG, Curry, Giannis, KD, Harden, and they all happened to be on a top team.

The outliers paint a muddier picture. Westbrook in 2017 on a 6th seed. Rose over Lebron in 2011 on a #1 seed (point for your argument). Nash in 2005 on a first seed (point for your argument) - but then again in 2006 on a #3 seed, when Duncan's Spurs had 9 more wins than him (point against your argument).

I don't think it's straightforward - clearly team record is important, but the best narrative in any given year wins the day; and with Lebron and Embiid out, and Harden tanking the first part of the year, Joker has the most compelling narrative.

Yeah, but if you look at the modern NBA (1980-), in 30 years the MVP has gone to a seed below #3 exactly one time-- Westbrook. And even that was highly questionable despite a statline that was considered unthinkable before then. So a top-3 seed (and almost always a top-2) is probably the most important factor in voters' eyes. Maybe this year we will get an outlier because of injuries; if Embiid and LeBron hadn't gotten injured and their teams had held onto their seeding, I'm quite certain one of them would have gotten it despite Jokic clearly being the best player right now. Also, it's possible that the Nuggets move up to #3.

[ken6199]

Kyrie Irving Last 5 games played:

31/6/12
27/7/3
28/7/6
46/6/4
34/1/4

... To say Harden is carrying the Nets to a one seed is pretty farfetch’d.

Context matters

Kyrie's last 10 games:


I absolutely have no problem with you listing Kyrie's contribution to counter Harden's case, just the fact that you conveniently missed Kyrie only played 6 out of the last 10 times (and Harden averages a league best 40 mpg), is a little suspicious.

If we want to hype a player, hype straight. If we want to bring down a player, also do it straight. Selective argument makes your point disingenuous.