yes. his team was the second best in the east. regardless of how weak the conference is, it still matters. maybe i worded my wrongs wrong, but when people consider MVPs, they look also the standings in the respective conferences. i believe jkidd finished #2 behind duncan that year.
He took his took team to conference finals with no amare. He made boris diam, shawn marion very rich men. He deserves it.
no, he won b/c of the perception that he "turned" around a franchise that won 29 games. 29-62 wins. that's huge what was forgoten is that amare missed 29 games the year prior. they won 41 games with him and marbury when he was a rookie. i would assume if amare was fully healthy, the suns would win more than 41 games
i think a few of us have different interpretations of MVPs. chris paul's in 07-08 put up 22, 11, on 50%fg and his team in 07-08. NO went from 39 wins to 56 wins. now that's MVP production AND impact. but it is what it is. i just feel the interpretation of the MVP has changed over the years. and it's arguable whether that is right or now.
As long as we're talking about facts, Amare played 55 games that season. And of those 55, the Suns won 22 of them. If Amare were fully healthy, the Suns might've won 40 games. A 5 point improvement isn't HUGE if you're taking 2 more shots, shooting 2 more free throws per game, and playing alongside the best point guard in the league. I'm not denying that production counts. Production and impact normally go hand and hand. However, Nash proved that impact is more important than production.
I think the reason Kobe won it was b/c the voters felt it was Kobe's last chance to legitimately win one, and with the career he's had, the lack of an MVP would be a very noticeable blemish.
Why? They went 22-33 in games Amare played that year. And even if you narrow your focus to games where Amare and Marbury played, they still won less than half of those games (8-10). I'm not saying Nash alone added 30+ win to their team, but he was primarily responsible for it. I think he added more wins to a great team than any other player that year. Suns went from 20th and 21st the prior two seasons in offense to 1st under Nash. And of course the following season, without Joe Johnson and without Amare, the Suns still won 54 games.
I agree that losing Stoudemire does make a big impact for the Suns going from 29 wins to 62 wins. The Suns win even more games, when Amare missed 79 games instead of only 29 games. The Phoenix Suns won 54 games and went to the Western Conference Finals without Stoudemire. He was a part of that run. His cheerleading from the bench paid off. http://www.nba.com/suns/playoffs/2006_index.html
but it seems you take a literal interpretation of your own interpretation of value, namely that it is relative, not absolute, value that matters more. why wouldn't the best player be the player who is most valuable? or conversely, how can you have the most value but not be the best? he is playing at almost the exact same level now as he was then. why is he not the most valuable any more? why has a change in surrounding circumstances changed how valuable he is?
but there are. he's a fantastic player who can put up some huge games and it's certainly not fun going against him, but his production isn't off the charts great and it seems many of the things he gets credit for aren't really supported by the numbers. for one, his improved jumper gets a lot of talk. and while that part may be true as he is taking more 3's and making more of them (up to 33% now), his efficiency hasn't really changed at all. his TS% was 53.2 last year and is 53.7 this year. and neither of those is particularly good. it's not going to kill you like a sub-51 iverson-type performance, but it's not up there with some of the bigger scorers. and it's a big part of the reason he can put up such nice numbers on a fairly slow-paced team and still only have a 12th place PER of 23.0. second, the bulls would be nothing without him is the big case for his candidacy. yet his net +/- on 82games.com actually dropped from 4.0 before the last update down to 1.2 this time. when he's off the court, the bulls offense becomes much worse, but their defense also becomes much better. based on their offensive and defensive efficiencies, they play like a 59 win team when he's on the court and 59.5 win team when he's off the court, so they seem to be quite good either way. while +/- is obviously not perfect, if you're really the most valuable you would think the difference would be bigger (although he's still ahead of kobe's +0.9). it does kind of fit the narrative that the bulls' amazing D has at least as much to do with things as their 17th ranked offense. and finally, he gets credit for being the best clutch player in the nba and people say his performance down the stretch is why the bulls are so confident in close games. and yet, according to this: http://www.82games.com/1011/CSORT11.HTM while he puts up impressive numbers, his FG% once more comes into play, as he is 2nd worst among the top 25 scorers (and one of only 3 below 40%). and dwade's performance against the lakers may have actually knocked rose down to last among the top 25. again, clutch stats are not perfect as they come from a fairly small sample size and who is to say 5 minutes/within 5 points is the proper definition, but like +/-, they aren't made up numbers and don't come from a formula. they just say what happened. so while rose is certainly the best "story" for mvp and will almost certainly get it, saying that there are no possible arguments against his winning the award doesn't really hold water.
that is ALL i'm trying to say. +1. rose will win it this year b/c he's a great story, for putting a once-storied franchise back on the map. dwight howard and lebron james put up much superior stats, and both play at a higher level than him on both ends. dwight won't win it b/c orlando won't have enough wins. and lebron basically gave away the award with his pathetic clutch performances in the past 2 weeks. i like rose. i hope he sees this year that he really needs to become more efficient. that is so huge. the team's defense bails him out and he can afford to shoot poorly (LIKE TONIGHT ONCE AGAIN). in the playoffs, that won't be the case. when teams key in on rose even more in the playoffs, and if he continues to be inefficient, the bulls are going home no matter how great their defense is hopefully rose is taking note of his inefficiency and do better next year. i expect him to.
I don't agree with your relative versus absolute distinction. The reality is that players are not performing in a vacuum but rather are performing within a particular team context. Their value depends on how their abilities mesh with the team they are on in such a way as to improve the team's chances of winning. This is the basis for my MVP criteria. "Best" player can mean different things. When I think of best player, I basically am considering which player I'd take over any other, without any preset teammates or schemes in place. This is more abstract, though also important when you need to choose (for instance) a star player to build around. "Value", in contrast, is based on what a player is doing in the situation he is already in, i.e. how much he's making his team better.
Your argument for Nash doesn't work. How do you even objectively measure top 4-5 players in the league when you have players in 5 different positions. You can only do so by measuring the impact of players on their teams. I would still say Steve Nash deserves it based on your interpretation. He was the best point guard 05-06, and his team had the best record in the league.
I don't know what bull**** you are putting up here. Cavs of last 2 seasons, were having a good record and helping LeBron to MVPs because they had a good defense. LeBron led offense, was all 1on1 and P&R, it got him good numbers but it never got them an efficient team offense. Bulls had a good defense coach and a good defensive team. So was LeBron of last 2 years. The difference was LeBron was a quitter and threw teammates under the bus. Rose ain't afraid to take blame.
lol. the cavs had a good defense BECAUSE of lebron. aren't the heat a top defensive team this year too with lebron as its best defender? so again, stop smoking what you are smoking. check the cavs' both offensive and defensive efficiency this year. they have both plummeted. PS - the cavs WERE an efficient offensive team last year in the reg season, one of the best in the L. if you don't know what you're talking about and just spews dumb stuff, just stop it. and changing teams, teaming up with other stars, lebron is STILL the most efficient player in the L. so is it all pick and rolls or 1-on-1? again, stop spewing trash. your NBA knowledge is really bad. just stop.
Cavs had a good defense because LeBron, but Bulls had a good defense because of Thibodeau. Only ignorant nutthuggers are like that. Cavs changed the coach and Scott wasn't known for his defense, what do you expect? BTW, Heat were a good defensive team last year too. LeBron fanboys can boast his PER but how important is that when he went fishing? Oh, I forget, LeBron do.
do you even watch lebron on defense? and byron scott's nets had one of the best defenses in the L my friend. he can coach defense. the cavs just stink on both ends. and it is b/c of thibs that the bulls defense is that good. when you have boozer play more htan 30 minutes and your interior D is still better than elite, it's all about the coaching philosophy. a lot of guys go fishing every year. even karl malone. does that make kevin garnett a better player than karl malone? again, your nba knowledge is beyond bad
Lebron being efficient has nothing to do with pick and rolls or 1-on-1's. He is saying Cavs' team offence was horrible because Lebron was running it with pretty much only isos and pick and rolls. That's not my point tho, IMO building a good offence is the coach's job, Lebron was forced to do those things because his coach is incompetent when it comes to running the offence. Anyways, I still think Lebron and friends call only get away with that crappy offence with crappy teams, but once you play good defensive team it's hard to get points. I am actually curious to see how Lebron does in a good system like RA's, Phil's or Pop's, as so far in his career he has been in really bad offence that he has to run pick and roll all day long.
the fact that his coach was incompetent, and he had mediocre teammates, and the cavs still had one of the most efficient offenses in the L tells you a lot of the historic reg seasons lebron put up. if you watch the heat, the reason miami has stretches where they struggle is b/c they are trying to speed up the learning process in such a short time and still trying to win a championship. you are still seeing new wrinkles in the heat offense. last few games, i'm seeing lebron setting screen on pick and rolls and he is the receiver (instead of the other way around). he does that a lot with bibby and wade. and so on. and they still haven't defined their roles completely. people think you put talent together and you win. that's not the case. i still think the heat SHOULD win it all simply b/c they have 2 of the top 3 players in teh world. forget lack of PG, C, or bench. i feel when you have lebron or wade, you overcome all weaknesses. that may be too much to ask, but that's the way it is. if they don't win it all this year, they should accept all criticism.
