Who's Taking Home the MVP?
As the NBA season winds down we look back on what an exciting and unusual year this has been in the league and we start casting our votes for the season awards for Most Valuable Player (MVP), Rookie of the Year (ROY), Defensive Player of the Year (DPOY), 6TH Man of the Year, and Most Improved Player (MIP). Earlier in the year my vote for MVP was Giannis Antetokounmpo and he is still in the running, but as the season wraps up I’m going to go with James Harden a.k.a. “the beard”. Harden could have won this award last year (if not for Westbrook’s 42 triple-doubles), and the craziest part is he is even better than last year. Harden is averaging nearly 31 ppg, 5 rpg, and 9 apg, he is leading the league in points and is 3rd in assists; combine this with the fact that the rockets are the number one team in the league this year, his accomplishments are undeniable. And he doesn’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon this season, he has his eyes of the prize and im not talking about the MVP award, he is looking for a championship and this may just be his year to go get it.
The second award is the ROY and this year there have two major candidates; Ben Simmons and Donavan Mitchell. Coming into the year everyone expected Simmons to be good because he had an extra year of development in the NBA because of his injury that prevented him from playing last year. Mitchell, however, came out of nowhere to help push the Jazz into a potential playoff spot with him being a consistent scoring threat leading all rookies in ppg at 20.3. If he was competing with anyone else then this would be his year, but Simmons has proven that he is far and away the most talented rookie this year. Simmons is averaging 15.8 ppg, 8 rpg, and 8 apg, averaging nearly a triple-double in his first year in the league… unbelievable.
The next award is DPOY and this is the award I felt was the most difficult to decide a winner, I felt as though there were several players deserving, but ultimately I went with “the stifle tower” (Rudy Gobert). My other 2 considerations were Al Horford of the Boston Celtics and Draymond Green of the Golden State Warriors. Horford’s numbers are not amazing this year, but the Celtics have the best defense in the league and it is no doubt due to Horford’s lead. On the other hand, Kevin Durant has put up incredible numbers (mainly on the offensive end), he is 2nd in the NBA in blocks right now and has one of the higher defensive plus/minus ratings, but my reasoning for him not getting the award is because of Draymond Green. Green and Durant complement each other well on defense and owe much of their success to their counterparts. Gobert, however has lead the Jazz to the 3rd ranked defense in the league and done this largely by himself and is averaging 2.3 blocks per game.
The final award is the 6th man of the year, and this one was easy to determine a winner; Lou Williams. This man scored 50 points in a game this year… off the bench! This contest isn’t close, Jamal Crawford is the only one who is even worth mentioning, so there isn’t much to discuss here. The last award is the MIP and this one was also easy to determine who should win; Victor Oladipo. There are two other who I considered close; Tyreke Evans and Aaron Gordon, these two are both having career years, but still can’t quite measure up to the numbers that Oladipo has been producing. Oladipo went from being Westbrook’s number 2 to being an all-star and leading the Pacers to a potential playoff spot. He has averaged an amazing 23 ppg, 5 rpg, and 4 apg; compare this to 15 ppg, 4 rpg, and 2.6 apg (which he averaged last year) and his new leadership position and I say he has the award wrapped up.
