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This year in the NBA has been one of the most
unpredictable in recent history. Who would have guessed
that the Atlanta Hawks, last year’s 8 seed, would be 6.5
games ahead and first in the Eastern Conference, or the
impact that rookie coach Steve Kerr would have on the
Golden State Warriors playoff hopes (I could have, that
guy’s the truth...), or that the Thunder would be fighting
for their playoff lives midway through the season? With
all of this happening, an interesting side story is the MVP
race that is currently underway. More so than recent years,
which have been dominated by one man, it seems that each
candidate is determined to prove that they are the best
player in the NBA. For years now, players have claimed to
be the best, and for years Lebron has smashed their pathetic
pipe dreams, but this season players’ actions are speaking
much louder than their words. Using history as a guide, let’s
try and predict who will reign supreme as Most Valuable
Player at the end of the 2014-2015 season. The players in
consideration are those atop the leader boards provided
by Basketball-Reference and NBA.com.
In the past 20 years, excluding the two lockout years,
on average the winner of the MVP award has played 79.5 of
the 82 possible games. The only MVP winner who played
less than 75 games in the season was Allen Iverson in 20002001 with 71 games played. Going even further, since 1955
only five players have won the award when playing less
than 70 games, and only one of those seasons had the same
82 game schedule we see today -- Bill Walton ‘77-’78 with
58 games played. This goes to show that MVP voters place
immense value on the durability of their MVPs, and rightly
so. MVPs are most effective on the floor in uniform, not on
the bench in club attire.
Candidates who are on pace to play a similar amount of
games include: Stephen Curry, James Harden, Chris Paul,
Marc Gasol.
Advantage: Stephen Curry, James Harden, Chris Paul,
Marc Gasol
The most impressive player in this category is Stephen
Curry, who most consider the MVP front runner, seeing
that in years past the durability of his ankles were highly
questionable. Over the course of the last few seasons he has
steadily proven that it is not an issue. Hopefully, the report
of his recent minor foot injury is just that, minor.
2. Team Playoff Seed
1. Games Played
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Sports Life 14
When it comes to MVP voting, team playoff seed is one
of the easiest ways to separate the actual contenders versus
pretenders. Over the past 20 seasons, every single MVP
has been on either the first or second place team in their
respective conference. In the past 10 seasons, only three of
the winners were on the second place team -- Nash in ‘06,
Lebron in ‘12 and Durant last season. This goes to show
that the voting committee strongly bases their decision on
not only how well the player is doing but, more importantly,
how their team as a unit is doing. This is the source of
much debate considering teams who aren’t necessarily
elite could have players dominating statistically -- i.e.