The award was never for the best player on the winning team, it was always about contextual performance within the finals. Steph played mediocre by his standards whereas LeBron was far and away the best player there. But Iggy flipped the script and was the deciding factor, which is why he deserved it
His career is really interesting to me. Humble guy, idolized Pippen, fully embraced being a roleplayer. And then through happenstance and stepping up at the right moment he wins Finals MVP, the ultimate alpha award, which will probably be what he’s most remembered for
Fun preseason moment but actually a smart way to get ahead of the fact that they’re gonna lose a lot of tipoffs if they end up starting that ultra-small lineup with Chris Paul and it doesn’t actually matter
Good win. Not just Durant but the bench being able to close it is a great sign. Obviously it’s the preseason so it doesn’t matter but I imagine most people were expecting the Lakers to win since Beal and Booker were out while LeBron, AD and Reaves all played
Narratives matter—you can just look at the stats if you want to decide who’s better in a vacuum but that’s never been the purpose of these awards. Giving it to LeBron would have been a shitshow for obvious reason, they’d probably still be arguing about it on TV. Giving it to Steph would have been undeserved since he didn’t have a great series and disrespectful to how great LeBron was. But even that aside, Iguodala, despite not being the best player, stepped up and won the Warriors the finals. That’s as valuable as you can get