James Harden is gonna get screwed over again in MVP Voting

You said he doesn't make their team better. How is this even possible? An all star, all NBA player not making the team better SMH

 

His team....aka his teammates.

 

MVP type performance from Harden tonight...he made his shots, got others involved, and had a respectable amount of turnovers as the Rockets beat another playoff team in the West

let Westbrook get his 40+ points in a loss while his team hangs around the 7th seed...more of this stuff from Harden and the Rockets will solidify Harden's MVP award

 

Just stop it fool

 

Yeah if we wipe OKC final time we play and collect a couple of other wins against legit teams Harden will win. Westbrick is also dangerously close to falling below 10apg, I'm not sure he's going to maintain the triple double.

 

Responsible for 28 of the 38 points in the 2rd quarter

Rocket River

 

Kawhi Leonard is inching closer to the top 2 and might overtake Westbrook soon. If the Spurs make it to the 1st seed he's gonna have a credible case.

 

Harden is MVP... what a game tonight.

Westbrook is down to 10.1 assists per game. As soon as that hits 9.9 assists, the narrative is gone and he won't have a chance of winning... His team has also played poorly against 2 bad teams the last 2 games. I can't see them winning enough to get up to the 5th seed neither. It'll be down to April though. OKC plays a pretty easy schedule.

 

Kawhi Leonard is becoming the bigger threat down the stretch. If Warriors maintain their first seed and OKC finishes at 7 then Harden will probably win.

 

I'm okay with this, surprisingly.

 

Harden & Westbrook share MVP spotlight with Kawhi on Stein ballot

Spoiler

Harden has the slight edge with us here entering the season's final 20 (or so) regular-season games, undoubtedly helped by Oklahoma City's slip to seventh in the West despite all of trimester 1 MVP Westbrook's triple-double brilliance. But the time to truly put their respective cases under the microscope is about a month from now.

We're here today to pay tribute to the perennially overlooked excellence that emanates from San Antonio's Kawhi Leonard, whose résumé for the season's middle third can live up to anyone's you wish to submit.

West or East.

Across the season's second trimester, Leonard averaged 27.3 points on 50 percent shooting from the field, while also chipping in 5.7 rebounds, 3.7 assists, 1.5 steals and 1 block per game.

He also happened to string together the four highest-scoring games of his career during that slice of schedule: 41 points, 38 points and two 36-point outings. Prior to trimester 2, Leonard had never scored more than 35 points in an NBA game.

Dig even deeper and you'll find that Leonard, over a 16-game stretch starting Jan. 10 and leading into All-Star Weekend, reached the 30-point plateau 11 times. He had registered only 12 30-point games in his career before that hot streak.

The NBA's two-time reigning Defensive Player of the Year, in other words, has officially transformed himself into an elite scorer.

Instinct nonetheless tells me Leonard shouldn't expect to finish higher than fourth in real-life MVP balloting. Not with the seasons Harden, Westbrook and James are having.

Interesting question to ponder: What happens if San Antonio takes advantage of Durant's knee injuries to swipe the No. 1 seed in the West from the mighty Warriors?

While you let that one marinate, please join us in anointing Leonard as the West's best for the trimester that just finished. The Spurs, after all, are suddenly just two games behind Golden State in the race for the top seed in the conference after Saturday night's overtime win over Minnesota, even though LaMarcus Aldridge is carrying his lowest scoring average (17.3 PPG) since his rookie season ... and despite the fact Pau Gasol really hasn't come close to filling the Tim Duncan void ... and with Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili, like it or not, making less of a mark than they ever have.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Kawhi is one of only three players leaguewide who has managed to increase his scoring average for five successive seasons, alongside fellow All-Stars Gordon Hayward and Jimmy Butler. But in Leonard's case, that jump is from 21.2 points per game last season to a heady 25.9 PPG this season, good for No. 8 overall when you click to the league leaders.

A season that was supposed to be a shock to everyone's system in the Alamo City looks as Spurs-y as usual. Franchise patriarch Gregg Popovich and general manager R.C. Buford certainly deserve their slice of the credit for that, but they'd surely also be the first to say that no one is more responsible than Kawhi.

Getting the trimester 2 hardware here, then, seems like the least Leonard deserves.

 

Marc "Anyone but Harden" Stein with another dissertation on why he's a toolbag.

 

I saw Zach Lowe and Howard Beck setting up the okie doke a few weeks back in real time...

Started driving the Durant/Kawhi narrative, now that Durant went down Kawhi will be the new "purist" movement. Most of these lower level media people regurgitate what the top few guys say and this will be the move.

Russ slipping closer and closer to 9.9 assists, Kawhi's stats aren't dependent on 0.01 ruining his case. With him being a low seed, his case is so invariably linked to maintaining 10 it could slip away at any minute.

Despite Kawhi watching extensive tape on Harden and modeling parts of his offensive game after him, Harden was never gonna get that same elitist hype. The media had spent too much of the last two years bashing him excessively to do that fast of a 180 on him; even though most have mellowed their unobjectivity by now. They know they will look like assholes propping up a guy they themselves didn't even give an All-NBA team they previous year.

 

I think if Harden gets 60 wins, then the Rockets win the MVP.

 

Right now they look capable of doing it.

 

60 wins seems unlikely

 

Man its such a tight race between Harden and Westbrook. I wouldn't be surprised if they give it to both of them. Both players are having a historical season.

Now what's crazy to me is some people are saying LeBron should win it this season. Talking about, take LeBron off the Cavaliers and they would be bottom dwellers. I'm like dofus if you take Harden and Westbrook off of their teams, those teams are swimming at the bottom as well.

 

But attainable

 

I think it is. If they can beat the Spurs and Utah this week then I think they get to 60.

Remember they play the Warriors twice without Durant.

 

Going 16-3 seems super optimistic. Granted we are one 19-2 December type run from getting there but I'm being cautious on this stance. I think 58/59 is just as good and much more likely. If we hit 60 wins it's undoubtedly hardens MVP because it means we made another great run.