Dec 8, 2024; Atlanta, Georgia, USA; Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic (15) controls the ball against the Atlanta Hawks during the first half at State Farm Arena. Mandatory Credit: Dale Zanine-Imagn Images
With NBA action slowing to about a 76ers’ pace this week, it seems like the perfect time to make early award projections.
Only it isn’t.
Nothing says “I’m bored with my sport” more than some so-called analyst mailing in a baseball MVP column on May Day, or a sports talking head deciding to focus on their football MVP picks during the World Series, or some TNT wannabe pregame show attempting to drown out a sleep-inducing Hawks-Knicks matchup in the NBA Cup with some MVP forecasting.
OK, this one thing is worse: Those utterly unimaginative Never Too Early Next Season Rankings printed a week before the transfer portal re-rosters basically every team.
Alas, I digress.
Come to think of it, this is the PERFECT time to talk about the 2024-25 NBA MVP.
No, not because the incomparable Nikola Jokic is such an obvious choice.
Rather, because he isn’t.
In the last couple of years, the NBA has thought long and hard about ways to make early season games important enough that star players would actually perform.
Out of that Think Tank came the … NBA Cup?
Somewhere at NBA HQ in New York, a list of other ideas remains unerased on the back side of some reversible blackboard. One line simply says: Aaron Judge.
Let me explain: When Shohei Ohtani won the American League home run title in 2023, he was lucky he wasn’t playing in the NBA. Because if Adam Silver’s MIT-level statisticians had been crunching the rather simple numbers, Judge would have been declared the winner.
Judge did, after all, hit 0.35 home runs per game that season, while Ohtani’s rate was just 0.33 per game.
Why would anyone employ such a wacky way of determining major achievements? You’ll have to ask Silver, whose people heard a proposal to change the NBA’s current calculator-required statistical approach and…
Well, they thought the NBA Cup was a better idea.
Jokic’s current “lead” in the MVP race is the product of the aforementioned Error In Judge-ment.
On the eve of the NBA Cup quarterfinals, Jokic led the league in rebounds per game and ranked second in both points per game and assists per game.
Sure-thing MVP stuff.
But not in baseball. Or in football. Or, heck, in any fantasy sport.
You see, Jokic—who has played only 19 games while others have shown up as many as 26 times—actually doesn’t lead the NBA in rebounds. He’s seventh, trailing, among others, Ivica Zubac and Jakob Poeltl.
He’s not second in scoring. He’s sixth. Even De’Aaron Fox is ahead of him.
And he’s not second in assists. He’s seventh, looking up at the likes of James Harden and Chris Paul.
Seventh, sixth and seventh… in TOTAL rebounds, points and assists.
That’s how Ohtani won the AL home run title in 2023. He had 44; Judge 37.
There was no disputing it.
Except, apparently, in the Silver Palace.
So who IS the actual leader in the MVP race? Oh, no. I’m not falling into that trap.
If I’m talking NBA MVP on Indiana Day, it’s [not to suggest that Shai Gilgeous-Alexander](https://deadspin.com/shai-gilgeous-alexander-nba-okc-thunder-embiid-jokic-1851137271/) and Jayson Tatum should be considered to be ahead of Jokic. But, rather, that today is the perfect time to fix the data that’ll be used to determine the REAL winner sometime in April.
NBA MVPs should be based on TOTAL points, rebounds and assists, along with total wins and defensive impact. We can talk about the latter two often-overlooked factors some other time.
For now: You want to motivate superstars to play the second night of a November back-to-back? Put NBA awards at stake.
Not NBA Cup banners.