MVP became meaningless in the 90's when Jordan didn't win every year. Kobe is the MVP in my book. Voting for Nitwitz is just overthinking it, imo. btw: please no one bother arguing with me over this; you'll be typing at thin air. It's my opinion, and you got zero chance of changing my opinion on this, this year.
i agree that's what it's morphed into. i'm just saying i don't think it's a good idea. i mean no one will talk about anyone but dirk and nash, and i don't think anybody (voters, players, fans) think those 2 are far and away the best 2 players. even if someone thought they were 1-2, it would be by a very slim margin. so if no one thinks that, it just seems weird that they're the only 2 we'll consider for mvp b/c they have good teammates. while i agree you don't just look for the top scorer, or best pts/reb or pts/ast combo, in general looking at all the stats gives a good picture. for someone like AI, he would be hugely penalized for how inefficient he is at scoring, even if he scores 32 a game. people like kobe and tmac are usually somewhat efficient (at least tmac back in the day). it's just weird if someone has the best or near the best stats and most think of that person as the best or near the best player and yet no one thinks he should be mvp. the best player is the player who is most valuable and the most valuable player is the best player to me. you can't really claim or say someone is one without the other, imo.
very very good thinking, the whole "make your teammate better" argument seems to used so much for Nash to the point that you think and MVP should be a point guard all the time. Star players improve their team by there mere presence very often.
Switch Dirk and Kobe and Dallas is probably worse, the Lakers might be worse too. Switch Nash and Kobe and Phx is defintely worse, and the Lakers are probably worse to. Switch Duncan and Kobe and the Spurs are defintely worse, and the Lakers might be worse, or they might be better. IMO for a MVP to come from a mediocre team (or even just a good team) it has to be plainly obvious he would make pretty much any team better than any other individual could. There are some cases for this, Jordan's 1st MVP, maybe Mo Malone. They were so much better than competitors it didn't matter they were not on elite teams. IMO Kobe doesn't come close to this test, his cumulative stats are not really all that more impressive than Lebron, Dirk, Nash, & TD, etc, and his team is barely 500. Now I recognize Kobe might be the best player, and he should be in the MVP mix, but personally I'd put Kobe 3rd behind Dirk and Nash--their stats and individual accomplishments are much closer than the descrepency in how well their teams are doing. When in doubt, weighing team performance seems reasonable.
I don't really agree with that. I think a player's value should be judged purely by what he brings to his own team. If you want to say Duncan is more valuable than Kobe, than the argument should be that Duncan brings more value to the Spurs (whatever that means) than Kobe brings to the Lakers.
So say Kobe could make a 0-82 Laker team into a 41-41 team, and Dirk could make a 41-41 Dallas team into a 82-0 team. You don't think the latter is more impressive? I think how a team does is important. IMO it is less special to be a great scorer that can bring respectability to a sucky team than be a guy to make an average team great. So you both look at how important that guy is to his team AND how good that team is. IMO they both are components to who should be recognized as MVP.
I don't agree with that. I don't really see what Dirk can bring that Kobe can't besides more range, and maybe rebounding (hard to compare a guards rebounding to a PF's). Although in Kobe's defense, when he's on, NOONE in the league is more locked in than he is from 25 ft and in at the very least. Dirk hardly sees the types of defense geared towards him that Kobe sees on the Lakers, and doesn't have the need to play the types of minutes that Kobe does. Dirk is not exactly a post threat, and from what I've seen, Kobe is a superior post/attack the paint threat than dirk. People often overestimate Dirk's value to his borderline Allstar team, by undervaluing Josh Howards development to making the Dallas the true elite contenders they are today. Also, Nash is the type of PG that can really only thrive to the superstar level with the right personnel to cover up his deficiencies. He's piratically flawless on offense, but is almost equally as bad on defense. That's why Nash didn't become a superstar until until he hooked up with Nellie and D'Antoni. Duncan would make the Lakers better than Kobe would make the Spurs, but how much is that on the fact the Spurs have a paper thin frontline if you take away Duncan? It's nearly impossible to flipflop the players of different positions to measure their potential impact on the team. IMO, a GM of Year Award must be coupled with the MVP according to the criteria used to evaluate the candidates in recent years. Would Nash even be mentioned in the same breath as MVP if D'Antoni didn't put together that team and system; What about Dirk if Nellie/Cuban didn't go all out to get that talent on the team to insure that his team can take enough pressure off so that Dirk rarely faces hard double teams. Can you imagine someone like Yao or the Shaq of a couple years ago if they never had to deal with hard doubles? In a nutshell, this reward is pointless and the whole system doesn't make sense.
I can't agree more. Out of the so called MVP candidates, the only player that you really can call a complete player is Kobe. Dirk just happens to be the best player on the best team. Nash is a great offensive player, but like you stated, he can't play defense to save his life. In a nutshell, the current mvp ratings are based on players that have systems that maximizes their strengths and minimizes their deficiences. Unfortunately, Kobe doesn't have such a system, that is why he's not even considered a MVP candidate. But there is no doubt in my mind that Kobe is the best player in the league at the moment.
I've heard Mario Elie agree with this on the radio: How can you be the best player in the league, but not the most valuable? That being said, I have no problem with Dirk winning it, its between him and Kobe. I will be pissed however if Nash wins.
Their should be some formula mixing individual statistics to PER and team success and whoever has the highest number should get MVP. Or you could just make 2 awards therefor making both worth less. I do agree, however, the MVP needs to have a criteria, a guideline. It's too subjective right now. I personally would want the MVP given to someone who has a major impact on an elite team. Steve Nash gets my vote but we have not seen Dallas without Dirk for extended time so I can't say Dirk missing has an ill-effect on the team.
"Completeness" doesn't mean you are the best player or MVP. Otherwise Bird, Magic, and Barkley wouldn't be considered better than Pippen or Grant Hill, but the truth is the latter 2 couldn't hold the former's jock. The bottom line in the NBA is you have a magnificently positive impact on your team's offense you are doing something more more rare and more special than being complete, or pretty much anything you can do defensively as an individual. If you want a complete player, you can take Duncan or KG--they certainly impact the defensive side a ton more than Kobe does. Now try arguing KG deserves the MVP. What Kobe, and Tmac in his athletic prime, have not been able to do is fully translate their phenom individual basketball skills into team success. The MVP IMO goes to the best player in the concept of team basketball and best player at contributing to winning, not the best one on one player or most individually skilled player. And yes I don't think having the best individual basketball skills always translates to that person being the best or most valuable basketball player. I think they are different. Not just recent years, for the length of the award--and I personally don't have a problem with it. Had Bird not played with McHale, Parish, DJ, Maxwell, Ainge, etc he would not have probably won his awards. Had Magic not had Kareem, Worthy, Scott, McAdoo, etc, his excellence probably wouldn't have been fully realized. Barkley wasn't considered for MVPs for lowely Phily, but he puts comparable (or lesser) numbers in Phx while making that team elite and he gets the award. Go back further and see all the Bill Russell awards when he wasn't as distinguished as others except to the degree the Celts were winning. And I think this is fair and reasonable to have this factored in. Just because a guy puts on great numbers on a bad to mediocre team doesn't mean he will make a good team great through his personal excellence, team focus and leadership. Kobe's team will barely make the playoffs for Pete's Sake, and it isn't like he is putting up 37PPG on crazy efficient shooting and being a force all around the court (Jordan)--his cumulative stats and individual performance are not that much more impressive than Lebron, Dirk, Nash, etc. Given so many guys are in the ballpark, yeah, weigh team success. Again, I don't think it boils down to an individual skill. IMO Dallas other players would probably not be as involved and effective with Kobe in the offense than Dirk. Of course I can't prove it, but I suspect Kobe would take more high quality oppertunnities from Terry and Howard--and Dallas would be worse for it. None desputes Kobe is unstoppable when he is "on". I personally think Kobe (and Tmac's of years ago) weakness is their lack of resourcefullness when they are not on. When they flutter offensively they keep shooting and their teams often tank. Because so much of their game is predictacted on their one on one phenom skills while their teammates get out of the way and basically watch, their teammates don't know what to do and flounder when they go with slow stretches in games or series of games--which is bound to happen for anyone. Other greats when not on can impact the game defensively (Hakeem, Jordan), getting to the line (Jordan, Wade), setting up others in good position (Wade, Nash, Jordan). In Dirk's case I just think he is a little bit more consistent (fewer off moments) and needs fewer shots for his points--and thus better able to work with teammates.
Desert Scar, I never said Kobe was the MVP. He simply is not in a system that maximize his strengths and minimize his weakness. Among the players you named that are considered to be complete, Duncan, is a post player and relies on others to feed him, and is not exactly someone you can rely on dribbling up the court or finish games b/c of his woeful fts. Garnett, while good at almost all areas, he lacks the mental game to take his skills to to the next level. So I would say, if you were talking about a player that can create, score, play defense, and has the mental game that can put him into overdrive, then I would still put Kobe above those two in terms of being a "complete" player. Putting things into perspective, Garnett is also one of those players that never had the right system around him except for the year he went to the WCF with Sprewell and Cassell. On the other hand, Duncan has always had the system built around him, with Tony Parker and Ginobli rivaling Duncan as the most valuable player on the team during the past years. Some would say that Ginoboli even eclipsed Duncan in the their last championship. Kobe has what it takes to be an MVP candidate, he just needs the platform to achieve that. Currently, the Lakers are no where near achieving that. I won't be surprised if Kobe thrives in the Mavs system, because everyone is an independent unit within the team. In fact, I think he would be even better than Dirk to lead that team.
really...you really think that? Maybe, but Bird did win 61 games his rookie year (up from 29) with no major trades and without playing with any of those players you mentioned except Cedrick...who played on the 29 win team before Bird arrived. Bird made his mark before he ever played with McHalle, Parish, and DJ...not quite sure why you mentioned Ainge.
MVP used to be voted by players, and people got the nod even they didn't make playoff or won 40 games. MVP, as an individual award, should be more objective when voted by players.
Who said this? But if you are such a great player, when 1 player means so much in basketball, how can your team be barely 500. It isn't like Kobe is scoring 40PPG and doesn't have quality players or a Hall of Fame coach. Well Hakeem and Shaq needed the ball fed to them too. Shaq was also a worse FT shooter than TD. Yet would anyone question they didn't deserve their MVPs? Also, Kobe does shut down the opponents interior offense the way the above 3 players do. So guess he must be incomplete in this regard. Like I said I think completeness is overrated. A tremendously effective offensive player--both in terms of their own offense and organzing their whole teams offense into an efficient machine--is much more special. What I think is Bird deserved his MVPs and is more impactfull in terms of his teams wins and losses than Kobe. Same with Magic, or Barkley. Being an efficient offensive juggernuat who also gets his teammates fully involved is more important than any extra "completeness" Kobe has to his individual basketball skills.
You are comparing Kobe to Bird and Magic. I am comparing him to Nitwitz. Nitwitz does nothing to get his "teammates full involved" more than Kobe does...and he is not as complete a player. You are comparing Kobe to Bird and Magic to make a point about why 2 of the 5 best players of all time earned their MVPs, when the rest of us are just comparing Kobe to Nitwitz.
Then why wouldn't you get into -- and I know I'm getting into Berri, whom I loathe, territory -- how much a player means to his team in the overall picture financially? LeBron's rookie salary allowed the Cavs to sign Donyell, to re-up Big Z and Gooden without heading into luxury territory. He makes 1/3rd of what Nash does, but probably brings in nearly twice the profit. If you're going to go down the "valuable" part, taking the word literally, then why not take in all the definitions of the word. Now, I'm not saying you should do this, or that LBJ should be considered under any circumstance -- but this is what you leave yourself open to when taking the term literally. I take the damn thing as "best player in this here NBA." And, though Kobe may be the best player in the NBA, he hasn't been that way since November. He was hurt. Since Day 1, save for two one-week stretches, Dirk has been the best in the NBA. Forget what his team has done, I have.
