Kobe is no MVP 11/17/2007
Kobe Bryant is (in one of the earliest looks at season awards on the web) currently not in the running for League MVP. Now that I have your attention (and a lot of people ready to send me hate mail), let me explain. At this early stage of the season, Kobe Bryant has led the Lakers to a solid (and somewhat surprising) 5-3 start...but led might be too strong. All Kobe has done this year is make the Lakers average (or a net 0).
At this stage of the season, when Kobe is on the floor, the Lakers are scoring at 1.01 points per possession on offense, and giving up the same number on defense - a net neutral. Yet, as a team, the Lakers are scoring 1.04 ppp and allowing 1.01 ppp...because they are playing better offensively with him off the court. While several Lakers have had better net effects on the team, Jordan Farmar and Andrew Bynum top the list, at on/off court differences in net efficiency at +0.13 and +0.19, respectively.
Am I endorsing Andrew Bynum (or Jordan Farmar) for MVP? No, far from it (despite a tremendous stretch of defense in the fourth quarter against Detroit last night by Farmar that got the Lakers back in that game). I just wanted to make the point that Kobe Bryant is not working with a group of D-Leaguers in LA and that some players impact the game in ways that some fans might not notice immediately.
All of the numbers I used in this post came from the Stats Page, which now lets you look at some numbers for each player on every team in the league (and more to come soon - I am working on it day by day). Take a look it, look up your favorite player, and find the numbers to support your belief the coach is a moron and should be playing "Player X" more (or you might find out why he is not). Either way, use it and let me know what you think, and what you want to see added next, on the Chat Page.
And please do not send me hate-mail - I fully expect Kobe to be involved in the MVP discussion at the end of the season and readily acknowledge he is one of the premier players in the NBA.
Click here to comment/view comments for this post.
| Erick Says: | |
LeBron James for MVP!! I called it at the beginning of last season that he would win it this season (even though I wrongly predicted a three-peat for Steve Nash). He is playing completely out of his mind right now, and if the Cavs hope to have a similar end-of-season and playoff experience, the lack of talent on that team tells me that LeBron would have to average something like 30/8/8 (incidentally, when was the last time someone had those kinds of numbers?). The one issue I see with LeBron getting the award is the tendency in recent years to give it to "the best player on the best team." To me, that definition is sort of counter-intuitive, since "the best team" would, presumably, have more than one very talented player. "MVP" to me means the player whose team, without him, would suffer the most. Clearly LeBron James. Other than saying Kobe should not get the award, do you have an early season prediction? |
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| Thu Nov 22, 2007 1:45 am |
| Brett Says: | |
Erick, good question - and the answer is...MJ in 88-89, and before that, Oscar Robertson did it 4 times back in the early 60's. And that is it (thank you basketball-reference.com). So, LeBron is in pretty heady company...and if I had a vote, I think I would be leaning towards LeBron for keeping that crummy team in contention. The good news? BrewHoop.com is planning on starting up a Blogger MVP/ROY vote on a weekly/bi-weekly basis and I have been asked to participate, so I will be giving more thought (and page space) to this in the near future. |
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| Thu Nov 22, 2007 1:07 pm |
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