1. Nikola Jokic, Denver Nuggets
2. Luka Doncic, Dallas Mavericks
3. Joel Embiid, Philadelphia 76ers
4. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Oklahoma City Thunder
5. Jayson Tatum, Boston Celtics
The Next Five: Anthony Edwards, Tyrese Haliburton, Kevin Durant, Giannis Antetokounmpo, LeBron James.
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lol no
Any list that says there are 7 players playing better than KD is full of shit
Wtf is Hali doing lmao
Tyrese believers we are winning
Haliburton should be up 1 or 2 spots
Team performance doesn’t matter to MVP race anymore?
He’s already above Giannis and KD who average similar stats on similar efficiency while having the worst record of the whole group. I think his ranking is fine.
Giannis and KD are better defenders than Tyrese but their offensive numbers are definitely worse right now. The strongest case against Tyrese is that it’s only 13 games in right now. But he’s literally making or assisting on around 40% of the Pacers points and is generating over 50 ppg with his assists factored it. Man has had like 4 -5 15 assist games already this year and his assist to turnover ratio is historically good (only person who comes close the past few years is Chris Paul)
Not until he starts playing defense
His offense is historic. Jokic and Luka aren’t good defenders either
lol jokic? 😭💀
Agreed. He doesn’t get enough scrutiny for his individual poor defense. I just want him to be in the right spot, even if he can’t do anything about it.
Absolutely from a purely individual performance standpoint. But he needs to build his reputation first via team records to be recognized in a traditional award race like this.
I think Luka should be like 3 or 4 rn, he didn’t play to his standards this past week & lost 2 winnable games, & even Jokic should be dropped one spot. Also KD should be 6th at least, but maybe due to him losing without Booker he’s ranked that low
Jokic has been losing without Jamal.
Not saying Jokic should be moved down because of it because that would be ridiculous either way
Actually no need fir Luka to ball right now tho - he has Kyrie with him who is averaging 28 ppg and clutch 3s. I hope he plays silently and heats up for the playoffs if they do make it.
But man js the league hyped up for Luka every year. People see statlines here and there but Luka’s enjoyment for the game and Luka Magic nickname just lives rentfree inside people’s mind. He wont ever be less than top 5 in MVP I think.
Plus I am a massive Luka fan :)
KD should be top 3 without question. It’s fucking ridiculous that he’s not. He’s put up 31 ppg on 59/52/89 shooting splits (unheard of numbers). The Suns lost a few games early in the season as this is a completely new team and multiple starters were injured. Suns have since figured it out and are on a roll. I bet most of this sub doesn’t even know that the Suns have won 5 games in a row now.
Suns have won 5 games in a row now.
& thats exactly the reason why KD isn’t top5, bcz they won these games when Booker came back. Its not KD fault his teammates are injured but the losing record he got without Booker hurts him
Jokic is without his 2nd best player, Lukas performances still werent that bad and who is gonna be above Jokic and Luka. I doubt anyone will wanna give Embid the mvp because of what happened last year. SGA isnt performing better than Jokic or Luka and might actually have the better team than the both of them (well better than the Nuggets without Jamal) and everyone else is a step behind.
Also same goes for Giannis. He should be way higher, but because of a bad start to the season, he is close to the bottom. Doubt it will stay that way though.
I feel like KD should be in the top 5. But then I look at the top 5 and I dunno who to remove. Maybe Tatum? KD has been unreal for more than a few games now.
Yup definitely Tatum
1 Shai
Why did they fail something so easy
Luka ain’t top 5 and I’m Slovenian
LA bias.
Thunder are above the Nuggets and Jokic is still number 1. what a joke. it’s not like SGA has worse numbers than Jokic. Jokic is cruising on reputation. he should be 3 on this list. not 1. I’d put Luka as 1, SGA 2, Jokic 3, Embiid 4, Tatum 5.
7 more rebounds and 2,7 more assists are not better numbers? 6 triple doubles and most games without Murray? Also Denver demolished OKC. Shai had only 7 points. Not to mantion that OKC played against others without Fox, Steph, LaVine, Booker, Ingram etc
Thing is Nuggets efficiency plummets whenever Jokic is off the floor while Thunder stays elite with or without Shai on the floor. Shai is insane that he’s putting up eye-popping numbers on an extremely deep team. And Jokic is insane that Nuggets is a title favorite when he’s on the floor and a bottom 5 when he’s not. And it’s not like Nuggets are far below Thinder in the standings. They are only 1 win apart so it’s not logically that controversial to pick Jokic over Shai.
Don’t get me wrong, Ant has been balling, but KAT has been our best player since the Boston game.
Yeah and he’s barely getting any recognition or credit for it. There seems to be this notion that Ant is hard carrying the offense while Kat is just there lol.
Also no Gobert no party
Casuals don’t know
It’s true, I don’t.
Hasn’t KAT’s defense just randomly been elite
Not randomly. He has always had the potential to be a good defender (check out his pre-draft notes, his NBA player comp is Amdrew Bogut) he just played with DLo, Teague, Wiggins etc who just pretended to be matadors and would Ole people at him uncontested as the rim protector. Now he is the help defender instead of the sole rim protector and we have guys like Ant, McDaniels and NAW to hound PoA players.
KAT being compared to Bogut is actually an elite comparison
I feel like you are assuming actual performance matters. Mvp is a narrative first award.
NAZ REID
Since the Boston game:
KAT: 25.4/8.6/3.1/1.1/1 on 58/50/90
Ant: 24.6/5.4/5.4/1.9/0.5 on 43/34/86
KAT has been more clutch as well with big shots against the Warriors and the Pelicans.
KD should be top 5 ngl
Ain’t Maxey playing better than Embiid? I also don’t get Jokic as the frontrunner
How is SGA not 1-2 right now?
He’s basically new Tatum. His team is very good even when he’s not on the floor. I’d still put him over Luka and Joel because you need to respect the record, and Shai clearly their #1 guy.
What? The whole thing with Tatum is we’ve historically fallen way off when he’s not on the floor.
Despite all the other good players we’ve had over the years, the difference in performance with him on vs off the floor has consistently been insane.
Haven’t looked much into Shai’s on/off numbers yet but I’d be pretty surprised if what you’re saying is true based on the little I have seen.
Since you said, I checked Clearing the Glass just now. I edited my comment to address what you mentioned. Yes, Tatum has the biggest impact on their team, so does Shai. But there are players who have far bigger impact on their team. What you said is true that Tatum’s on/off is massive, but in a context of the MVP race, it puts him and Shai (far) below Jokic (and Hali, that is if we ignore team records).
His team is very good even when he’s not on the floor
Uh, any stats to back this up? Cause this is clearly not true lmao
It’s funny because Shai’s impact metrics are like top 2-3 in almost every stat.
Only behind in Jokic
The problem with EPM or other impact metrics is they aren’t reliable to quantify defensive impact. On/off analysis isn’t the end all method as well ofc. Either way, it still stands true that Shai #4 isn’t the most controversial thing here.
Lotta great players playing great rn