I said Durant, just because how dominant he is, offensively, this young. Yes, James IS and WILL be the best player in the game for the next 3-4 years, but when Durant hits the ripe old age of 25-26, the NBA will bow down to Durant.
Which means in three to four seasons when the NBA is bowing to Durant as you claim, we should give the MVP to John Wall, because he will be so dominant at such a young age. Gotcha.
This is completely ridiculous. You're saying Mo Williams isn't a top 10 pg but he puts up nice numbers so the team will still win? How many games was that helping Milwaukee win when he was putting up good numbers on horrible teams there? And they had Andrew Bogut as well, who's about as good as Shaq at this point in his career. Without Lebron, the Cavs are a 25 win team. And don't forget that they've only had Jamison since the trade deadline, he hasn't been with the team the whole season (not that he was contributing to much winning in Washington). Also, as I mentioned in a previous post, people really need to get over this idea that the Eastern conference is some JV league. It's just not true anymore.
Mo Williams isn't a top 10 PG NOT because he isn't good but look at the league and how many incredible PGs the league has now. Williams is top 15 and an all-star in the East and please don't compare Mo Williams from Milwaukee to Cleveland, even without James they have a better team then those Buck teams and Bogut was NOWHERE near as good as he is NOW. The CAVS ARE NOT A 25 WIN TEAM without James, they have the best supporting cast in the league it is just that James does take them to another stratosphere. They have legit scorers, two old but effective centers and a great bench that most agree is the best in the league right there with Orlando so is everyone saying James is playing with a bunch of scrubs? The East 6 seed is 4 games over .500, the West 9th seed is 4 games over .500...enough said on how great the East is. I understand Boston, Orlando are great teams, Atlanta is a good team on the rise and the Bucks are getting there but besides that...???
it's not a coincidence that of all 3 methods of determining the MVP you mentioned, only 1 player is common among your lists
Mo Williams is not nearly good enough to be the best player on a good team. As for him putting up such great numbers, even in Milwaukee when he had a green light to shoot, he still never averaged 18 PPG. Antawn Jamison is a good scorer, but he's only played 16 games for the team this year. Where are these other legit scorers you're talking about? They don't have another guy averaging more than 9 points per game other than Shaq, and he's missed 20 games this year. Big Z has also been out for about 20 games because of the trade, so there goes the two legit big men argument. I was going to let it slide that you even mentioned Powe, but since you keep arguing that the Cavs are so talented without James, I'll just mention that Powe has nothing holding his knees together and has only appeared in 11 games this season. If you think it's been painful at times to watch the Rockets offense this year, I can't even imagine how bad the Cavs would be without James. Moon and Parker are both no better offensively than Shane Battier. Hickson can't make a shot unless it's a dunk off a feed from Lebron. Daniel Gibson and Delonte West can't create shots. Big Z is not a threat in the post. Anderson Varejao can only score on put backs and open shots created by Lebron. Without Lebron this team might still be decent defensively, but they would struggle to score 80 points a game. You could argue that some people said the same things about this year's Rockets team without Yao, but they have Rick Adelman for a coach. I haven't even mentioned the inept offensive schemes of Cavs' coach. I think I'd take the supporting cast of Gasol, Bynum, Odom, Artest, et al. any day for best supporting cast of a superstar player.
I agree that the Laker's cast is better No Doubt IMO on that but my argument was the Cavs would battle for 50 wins in a weak Eastern Conference, why is that so hard to believe? Jamison being their a whole season or one day makes no difference because they guy would score regardless and WHO CARES what he did on a crappy Bucks team??? I care what he does on a good Cleveland team and we've seen that. I never said the Cavs would be a great team without James but ITS THE EAST, in the West sure 30-35 wins would be reasonable to expect but the Rox lost not one, two but three legit scorers this offseason and will still probably get to 40 wins in the West. Is James' worth 40 wins a season because the will probably win 62-65 games this season with him so you're saying they will only win 25 without him? Only 3 other guys score double digits on the team because this is James' team and he will dominate the ball no doubt so where will others have shots? Oh and when did I bring up Powe besides making him a backup big??? I guess I value James' supporting cast a little higher then most...agree to disagree on that.
The guy averaging nearly 10 assist a game last month dominates the ball and prevents them from getting shots. Gotcha. Because the East isn't that much weaker than the West anymore? Yeah, it's inferior, but not by a whole lot. Pretty much your argument is the Cavs can do it because the East is a crap conference, something which really isn't all that true anymore.
i guess some people dont realize you still have to play western conference teams even if you're in the eastern conference.
Portland would be battling for home court with Atlanta and Boston, New Orleans would still have a shot at the playoffs being 5 under and I know all teams play each other but EVERY team in the West playoffs may reach 50 wins while 4 teams may do it on the East. Just ask the Rockets, Griz and Hornets if they would like to play in the East instead of the West?
Yeah, just ask the Rockets. They are 11-15 against the East and 25-20 against the West. Or ask the Hornets. They are 11-16 against the East and 23-23 against the West. Extrapolating from that means more games against the East and they'd have worse records.
Fantastic point, didn't realize they were that bad but i'll counter by showing the rest of the West conference playoff teams and Memphis vs the East... Lakers 22-7 Denver 18-10 Dallas 22-7 Utah 20-7 Phoenix 15-10 OKC 20-8 SAS 16-10 Portland 16-13 Memphis 18-9 Even the Clips had a winning record vs the East.. Clippers 14-13 I just think the East while better, not having a sub .500 team in the playoffs MAYBE, still is not even close to the level of competition the West presents night after night.
LeBron is on pace to become the first scoring champion in 21 seasons to have been in the top 10 in assist (currently 6th). Also, he's only the 6th (7th) player in NBA history, to accomplished the feat of winning a scoring title and placing in the top 10 in assist. Archibald - 1st assists per game. Bing - 4th assists per game (67-68) *Robertson - 1st assists per game (67-68). Though he did not win the scoring title or assists title, he did lead in average for 65 games. West - 5th assists per game. Iverson - 5th assists per game (04/05). MJ - 10th assists per game.
yep, but you play more times against team in your conference, than teams in the other conference. You play 52 games against teams in your conference, and you play 30 games against teams in the other conference.
i know but i'm hearing the cavs would win 50 games without lebron just because they're in the east? the cavs are 1-9 without lebron in their last 10 games. 35-9 right now in their conference. without lebron that number would not even be close to that, then factor how bad their record would be against the western conference. i could see 42-40 at best but not 50
Only 1-9 without Lebron. Thanks for bringing that up. That's probably what all of us who are saying the Cavs would suck without Lebron should have mentioned first as evidence. There aren't many 50 win teams that have 1-9 stretches during the season.
Yeah I see Lebron staying in Cleveland. More money available for more years and he was raised in Akron. There's gotta be something to be said for making a winner of your home state. I think all this talk about Lebron going to NY because of all the lights and media attention, and of course Madison Square Garden is garbage. That team is horrible and he doesn't have anything to win with. Didn't he LOL at T-Mac? Now the Nets, that is a different story. There is the Jay-Z factor, playing in Brooklyn and they've got some great young pieces already in Lopez, Harris, and even Yi. Add that to a (definite?) top 4 pick and it becomes rather interesting.
