Tim BontempsApr 2, 2025, 12:00 PM
Close
Open Extended Reactions
In mid-February, the second of ESPN's three NBA most valuable player straw polls showed Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander with a comfortable -- if not ironclad -- lead over Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic.
Six weeks later, the race is virtually unchanged.
If the results from our final straw poll are accurate -- for each of the past five seasons, they have been -- Gilgeous-Alexander will claim his first MVP award. And in a poll that mirrors the league's official voting and was conducted over a 24-hour period Sunday and Monday, Gilgeous-Alexander claimed 77 of 100 first-place votes.
How the NBA MVP straw poll works
To gauge where the MVP race stands right now, ESPN asked 100 media members to participate in an informal poll that mimics the NBA's postseason award voting process.
To make the balloting as realistic as possible, there were at least two voters from each of the league's 28 markets, along with a cross section of national and international reporters.
As with the NBA's official voting at the end of season, voters were asked to submit a five-player ballot, and results were tabulated using the league's scoring system:
• 10 points for a first-place vote
• 7 points for second place
• 5 points for third place
• 3 points for fourth place
• 1 point for fifth place
He finished second on the remaining 23 ballots for 931 total points, while Jokic finished with 769. After the two stars received all but one first- and second-place vote in the second round of polling back in February, this edition was a clean sweep -- something that hadn't happened across the 19 previous straw polls conducted since the start of the 2016-17 season.
That dominance atop the ballot goes hand-in-hand with what both players have shown on the court.
Gilgeous-Alexander is on pace to win his first scoring title at 32.9 points per game for a Thunder team that enters Wednesday night's game against the Detroit Pistons (9:30 p.m. ET, ESPN) with a 63-12 record. OKC needs to win out to join the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls and the 2015-16 Golden State Warriors as the only teams in NBA history to win 70 or more games in a regular season.
Jokic, meanwhile, is attempting to make history by becoming the third player to win four MVPs in a five-year span, joining LeBron James in 2008-12 and Bill Russell in 1961-65.
Despite Gilgeous-Alexander's lead, Jokic is presenting perhaps his best MVP case.
» Jump to the full NBA MVP straw poll results