Did Nash deserve his two MVPs?

[bastillon]

some facts:

Joe Johnson, Amare and Quentin were regarded as great supporting players and the reason why Suns were so succesful. but consider this: in the last 31 games of 2004, JJ-Amare-Marion-Barbosa core played all the games during which they went 11-20. in 2006 JJ, Quentin and Amare were replaced by 3 bench players with no star reputation (Bell was a solid role player prior to that, Diaw was a bust pick who was drafted as guard and sucked, Kurt Thomas was a nice veteran to provide some defense). Suns were playing just as well (pts differential stayed on the same level) in the first 53 games, before Thomas went down with a season ending injury. you really have to wonder how much JJ/Amare/Q meant to that team if they were unsuccesful without Nash and Nash did great without them.

Shaq in 2005 was regarded as the reason why they improved so much and got nearly all the credit. there are several problems with this line of thought. 1) 2004 and 2005 Heat are two different teams. only Haslem, Wade and Eddie Jones stayed there. Odom was gone, so was Grant, Alston and Butler. it's hard to give Shaq credit for improvement when there are two seperate teams, with little in common. 2) even if you used that logic, Heat were bothered by injuries in 04: Wade played 61 games, Butler 68. 3) Shaq missed 9 games during which Heat went 6-3.

meanwhile Phoenix was pretty much the same team. personel changed a little but the core was already in place the year before. as I said, Amare-Marion-JJ-Barbosa finished the season together with a 11-20 record, during which only Marion missed one game. we do have an idea of how they performed without Nash - they weren't very good. matter of fact, Nash missed also 7 games... but Suns went 2-5 (Heat 6-3 in Shaq's absence).

this is hugely important circumstantial context.

in 2006 people were expecting Suns to miss the playoffs, like the year before when Nash came there. they went to WCFs despite several significant injuries (season ending Thomas, whole team was injured later in the playoffs after playing 15 games in 30 days in the 1st month of the playoffs). before Thomas went down they were playing with the same point differential as the year before.

low expectations + excellent record, especially in the first half of the season + team going 0-3 in Nash's absence + voters divided between lots of candidates - Nash wins his 2nd MVP. it wasn't really close like in 05. Shaq missed 23 games. Kobe's Lakers won only 45 games. Billups was the best player on the best team, but he wasn't MVP-caliber player. James led Cavs to 50 wins, but in an inferior conference and he wasn't proven yet and Cavs went 3-0 in his absence. to me only legit candidates besides Nash were Duncan and Dirk. Duncan's offense was not quite as good as usually (only 52% TS, 18.6 PPG, lower BPG, clearly he wasn't himself that year). Dirk was a great candidate, but it probably affected people that Nash torched the Mavs in 05 playoffs (30/12/6 on great TS%), IMO 2nd best player that year.

[TAI8]

I don't understand why some people thought Shaq deserved the MVP in '05. Wade went from a 16 ppg scorer to a 24 ppg scorer that season and was actually the leading scorer on that team. And in the playoffs he only further distinguished himself with a team high PER of 24.3, 6 points higher than Shaq's.

[Doctor MJ]

I'm a pretty Nash fan

[NYK 455]

I'm a pretty Nash fan

LOL. Just noticed that. I meant pretty big.

[bastillon]

I don't understand why some people thought Shaq deserved the MVP in '05. Wade went from a 16 ppg scorer to a 24 ppg scorer that season and was actually the leading scorer on that team. And in the playoffs he only further distinguished himself with a team high PER of 24.3, 6 points higher than Shaq's.

and they went 2-3 in Wade's absence. without Shaq... 6-3. Wade also played 500 total mins more (that's 6 MPG over a whole season). #3 was pretty clearly the MVP of that team... and then again it wasn't even remotely close in the playoffs. Wade was by far the best player in the PS.

[ISB]

At the time I thought he deserved each of them. Remember that MVP is a regular season award.

In 2005 he completely turned around Phoenix from a non factor to the league's best team. In 2006 he had an even better year and kept the team elite even after losing a 26 ppg scorer to injury.

[Doctor MJ]

Nash is not MVP in '06. and his team is NOT a contender in '06.

Don't know how much people remember about that year so I'm going to go into it a bit. That Suns team's season can be broken into 3 parts:

Early season - 4-5
Mid season - 38-12
Late season - 12-11

The early season was them figuring out how to play together after tremendous changes in the off-season. The last season was an extremely beat up team without a competent big man left on the roster.

So, were they a real contender with the way they played entering the post-season? No.

Were they playing like a contender for the meat of the season? Absolutely, and this was a big part of why Nash got the award. Literally for the majority of the year, people were marveling at a team playing just as well as they had when Amare, Johnson & co were there.

If you take issue with that way of thinking, that's understandable - just make sure you understand how it all went down. Nash didn't get the award because the Suns only got 8 games worse than the previous year, it was because people realized that Nash could a marginally talented supporting cast and still have them perform at an absolute elite level as long as the team still had a reasonable balance to it.

[Roger Murdock]

In 2006 there was a player on the Suns that wasn't named Nash that led the team in points, rebounds, steals, blocks, and minutes played while shooting over 50% from the floor and being the teams best defensive player.

If there is someone playing such a significant role on your team besides you and your team only wins 54 games then you don't deserve to be MVP. Period.

[NYK 455]

In 2006 there was a player on the Suns that wasn't named Nash that led the team in points, rebounds, steals, blocks, and minutes played while shooting over 50% from the floor and being the teams best defensive player.

If there is someone playing such a significant role on your team besides you and your team only wins 54 games then you don't deserve to be MVP. Period.

Yeah, and if Marion left, the Suns still would have made the playoffs. But if Nash wasn't there, they would have won 24 games at best. So his MVP was totally justified.

[bastillon]

lol@bringing up Marion as game-changing impact. he's a 18 pts/45% FG player without Nash. no question Steve made him look a lot better than he was. the guy couldn't create for himself to save his life. he was awful under pressure.

[Kabookalu]

Also the Suns in 06 had the second worst record in games decided by 3 points. Something like 1-8. They had a difficult time closing out games because other than Nash, no one on that team was capable of creating their own shot. And they still managed to win 54 games.

[Volcano]

Shaq in 2005 was regarded as the reason why they improved so much and got nearly all the credit. there are several problems with this line of thought. 1) 2004 and 2005 Heat are two different teams. only Haslem, Wade and Eddie Jones stayed there. Odom was gone, so was Grant, Alston and Butler. it's hard to give Shaq credit for improvement when there are two seperate teams, with little in common. 2) even if you used that logic, Heat were bothered by injuries in 04: Wade played 61 games, Butler 68. 3) Shaq missed 9 games during which Heat went 6-3.

meanwhile Phoenix was pretty much the same team. personel changed a little but the core was already in place the year before. as I said, Amare-Marion-JJ-Barbosa finished the season together with a 11-20 record, during which only Marion missed one game. we do have an idea of how they performed without Nash - they weren't very good. matter of fact, Nash missed also 7 games... but Suns went 2-5 (Heat 6-3 in Shaq's absence).

You mean Miami loses three starters with no major additions aside from Shaq? That's pretty impressive.

Miami beats Orlando twice (36-46), Chicago (Curry out, Deng out, with players starting and getting major minutes who never made it off the bench during the season - Reiner, Pargo, Griffin) and Boston (without Walker yet, starting Welsch/Blount/LaFrenzt) and we're supposed to be impressed? Not to mention you missed out a loss against Chicago where Shaq only played two minutes.

[raptorforlife88]

Yeah lets rehash the exact same talking points we've all made in defense of Nash for the past month in about 10 threads, which Laimbeer has already partaken in.

If this was some other person posting the thread sure. But holy crap dude, we've had the discussion already, in multiple threads. Move on.

[Rapcity_11]

Shaq in 2005 was regarded as the reason why they improved so much and got nearly all the credit. there are several problems with this line of thought. 1) 2004 and 2005 Heat are two different teams. only Haslem, Wade and Eddie Jones stayed there. Odom was gone, so was Grant, Alston and Butler. it's hard to give Shaq credit for improvement when there are two seperate teams, with little in common. 2) even if you used that logic, Heat were bothered by injuries in 04: Wade played 61 games, Butler 68. 3) Shaq missed 9 games during which Heat went 6-3.

meanwhile Phoenix was pretty much the same team. personel changed a little but the core was already in place the year before. as I said, Amare-Marion-JJ-Barbosa finished the season together with a 11-20 record, during which only Marion missed one game. we do have an idea of how they performed without Nash - they weren't very good. matter of fact, Nash missed also 7 games... but Suns went 2-5 (Heat 6-3 in Shaq's absence).

You mean Miami loses three starters with no major additions aside from Shaq? That's pretty impressive.

Miami beats Orlando twice (36-46), Chicago (Curry out, Deng out, with players starting and getting major minutes who never made it off the bench during the season - Reiner, Pargo, Griffin) and Boston (without Walker yet, starting Welsch/Blount/LaFrenzt) and we're supposed to be impressed? Not to mention you missed out a loss against Chicago where Shaq only played two minutes.

Some guy D-Wade got pretty good that season.

[Doctor MJ]

In 2006 there was a player on the Suns that wasn't named Nash that led the team in points, rebounds, steals, blocks, and minutes played while shooting over 50% from the floor and being the teams best defensive player.

If there is someone playing such a significant role on your team besides you and your team only wins 54 games then you don't deserve to be MVP. Period.

An important fact, and a valid point of view.

I think in general Marion got pretty clearly overrated because of this year, but there's some fundamental truths about Nash here:

- When a team isn't totally dominating, having your star play less than typical star minutes is a disadvantage.

- When a team keeps losing its big men, that last big-ish guys left become more crucial to them.

Personally for this year, I think Nash was having MVP level impact when he was on the court before the last big men went down, but all things considered, he didn't get my #1 vote.

[LascelleL]

Im a pretty big Shaq fan and I'm Canadian and to me it could have gone either and I didn't give two ****....but I think Nash deserved it in 05 moreso than 06.

[Andrewchos]

2006 yes, but 2005 hell no.

This^

/Thread

Shaq was absolutely robbed in 05.

Not to say Nash wasnt great that season and deserved the runner up.

[Doctor MJ]

Shaq was absolutely robbed in 05.

I doubt I'll see anything on this thread I disagree with more than this.

No, Shaq did not get robbed. He wasn't even the best player on his own team.

[Rapcity_11]

2006 yes, but 2005 hell no.

This^

/Thread

Shaq was absolutely robbed in 05.

Not to say Nash wasnt great that season and deserved the runner up.

Wasn't D-Wade arguably better than Shaq that year?

[Kabookalu]

It's really close and sometimes it bewilders me how people underrate Wade that year. Wade was giving you 24pts/7asts/5rbs while Shaq was 22pts/10rbs/2blks on much higher efficiency. I'd probably give the edge to Shaq cause of his efficiency and he was still giving you some shotblocking inside.