Magic are 7-3, 3rd in the East and Howard is averaging 21/14/4 .. some amazing numbers. He slipped my mind for MVP candidate, but maybe..
Hard to argue against the numbers Howard has put up, but I must reluctantly go with LeBron. He's put up some gaudy numbers and is the main reason why the Cavs are 9-2 and playing like their a top five team in the NBA.
Dwight, CP3 and LeBron are the front runners right now.. there's a lot of season left though to see who can keep up the excellent play and decide
whoops almost forgot D-Wade too, his numbers are very good... of course since most voters look at team record too he's screwed
Basically every voter looks at team records. That's why no one on a sub-50 win team has ever won the award. That alone will kill D-Wade, because there's no way the heat crack the 50 win plateau.
yeah and it pisses me off, because team record is achieved by your team. You can't make muffins from cow dung and some great players have had to work with cow dung.
I couldn't agree more. I think it's total bullshit that record is brought in to the equation. I realize that it should have something to do with it, but as you said, greats sometimes only have so much to work with. Take a look at the Lakers from 3 years ago. Kobe Bryant put up the best individual season since MJ...and didn't win the MVP. Despite the fact that he led a team full of SCRUBS (c'mon, he had Kwame AND Smush starting alongside him) to 45 wins...he didn't get it. Instead, it went to Steve Nash, who led a much, much more talented Phoenix team to 62 wins.
I don't really think LeBron was the MVP last season. Kobe definitely deserved it. He finally matured last season and played great team ball and still put up fantastic individual numbers. It was Kobe's maturation that helped them to one of the best records in the NBA before Bynum got hurt and was a big reason why the addition of Gasol was seamless. He started to trust his teammates more last year, and it showed, and that's why he absolutely deserved the MVP.
IMO it's a tough call between LeBron and Kobe last year. LeBron put up better numbers and was more valueable to his team. Yeah they won less games but again that's a team accomplishment and he had way shittier team mates than Kobe did. Kinda like early MJ vs Bird, Isiah and Magic. Bron had to do more in order for his team to be successful at all and therefore put up better numbers because of it. He's doing the same thing this year too. It's kinda like the year Kobe scored 35 ppg because it was just him and Odom who were any damn good on the team. Of course he lost out to Steve Nash and the winning Suns for MVP that year so I guess the MVP voting is consistent in that sense.
Using the team criteria and record, then Kobe won it last year....individual seasons? It's CP3 and LeBron last year. But again, Nash won it for the team record he had that year, and Kobe didn't win it. But Kobe would've if they judged by individual season. I'm tired, but I think some of you get my point.
yeah that's basically what Moo and I were discussing. It's a rotten criteria to use as justification, but if they're going to do it one year (Nash over Kobe) then they were right to do it last Year (Kobe over LeBron)
Statistically, Kobe might not have been better, but it's really hard to doubt his value. His maturation last year was the biggest reason why the Lakers were legit. And no slight to LeBron, but he was playing in a FAR inferior conference last season. Kobe led his team to 57 wins in what was arguably the best overall conference in the history of the league. 10 teams finished above .500 in the West last year...6 in the East. The top 9 teams could have all had at least a four seed in the East last year...yet, a 48 win Warriors team missed out on the playoffs, while a 50 win Nugget team barely scratched their way in. I think you get the point...the West was absolutely stacked, and for Kobe to lead the Lakers to 57 wins in that conference, at least in my book, was greater than LeBron leading his team to what, 47 wins(?) in a very, very weak conference.
It's really a yearly thing, not just a couple occasions. How else can you explain Shaq only having one MVP? Also, for Kidd to NOT have an MVP after what he did his first two seasons in Jersey was pathetic. He deserved one of those that Duncan took home, and he got nothing.
I'm not saying the MVP goes to the best player on the best team every year (otherwise PP would be the regular Season MVP for the C's 66 wins) but it does go to one of the winnigest teams that year. Shaq with one MVP is Silly, but I'm just not sure what other year he should have won it. He's not beating Karl Malone or Jordan in the previous years, and AI winning it the year after him is deservedly so because that really was a team of role players who wouldn't win 30 games with an average player taking AI's spot IMO.
