Last night we saw the Cavaliers, Lakers, and Thunder all in action and all were involved in interesting games. Now the Cavs and Lakers are the strong favorites to be playing for the championship, but the Thunder are a playoff team this year largely because of Kevin Durant becoming an absolute monster this season. With all three teams playing in interesting games last night, I started thinking who should be the league MVP this season. I think this is becoming a three player race between, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Durant (I do acknowledge that Dwight Howard, Steve Nash, and Carmelo Anthony are also possible winners).
I first thought of Bryant because the Lakers are just so good this year, and don't get it mixed up, this award goes to a player whose team is having great success. That being said, I don't think Kobe is more valuable to his team than the other two players are. Kobe recently missed 5 games due to injury and in those games the Lakers went 4-1, signaling that while Kobe is dominant and probably the 1 player I want to take the last shot of a game when I need 2 points, the Lakers can win without him. I think his injury will eventually hurt his MVP chances, even though he only missed a few games. The Lakers showed they can without him and the other two guys are needed a little more for their teams to win.
After I crossed off Bryant, I turned to James. Now there's no questioning how valuable James is not only to the Cavaliers but to the city of Cleveland as a whole. Sportscenter ran the stat this morning that the last time the Cavaliers experienced a 4-game losing streak with James in the lineup was back in 2006. That there proves how valuable James is to his team. I truly believe the MVP is going to go to either James or Durant because both of their teams are good and both players are just out of this world. The one negative that James has attached to him is that he won the award last year. I don't know how many voters will want to vote for James to win the award for a consecutive year, but that really shouldn't be a punishing factor.
Contesting James is going to be Durant, and if I had a vote he'd get mine. Durant currently has a slim lead on the scoring title, and while that isn't a huge deal when it comes to the MVP, when he's averaging more points per game than James, Bryant, and Anthony that has to say a lot about his ability. The other reason that I would vote for Durant right now is because of something that many voters overlook. The fact that award is to go to the player most valuable to his team, and that's exactly what Durant is for the Oklahoma City Thunder. The Thunder are in the middle of an incredible turnaround from a year before and Durant is a large reason for that. He has scored more than 25 points a game since December 19 and while he's not a takeover-the-game type of player like James or Bryant, he is a dynamite scorer and if the Thunder didn't have him, they'd be in serious trouble.
This might be the first NBA focused entry by me in the history of IHOB/S2S, which is a telling sign that I really need baseball to start up here soon or the NHL to pick back up.
Showing posts with label LeBron James. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LeBron James. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Friday, November 6, 2009
Teaching Some Lessons
There are some people involved with sports that from time to time need to be sat down and explained certain things so they don’t continue to go out there and make fools of themselves, here are a few examples:
If you haven’t heard by now, Brandon Spikes has suspended himself for the entire game tomorrow against Vanderbilt. His actions against Georgia clearly warranted at least a 1 game suspension if not 3, so I congratulate Spikes for doing this to himself because his coach and his conference felt they did not have to. Unfortunately, Spikes is suspending himself for the wrong reason. He said he’s doing it as a way to avoid being a distraction for his team. While there is some truth to that, he doesn’t seem to believe that he did anything wrong and he’s just doing this to shut the media up so the Gators can focus on beating Vanderbilt this weekend. If Spikes were to say that he was suspending himself for the entire game because he knows what he did was wrong and he was deeply regretful for what he did then I’d be more supportive of this self-induced suspension.
Some of you might not have seen this yet, but last night, BYU and New Mexico were playing in a women’s soccer game and all of sudden thanks to Elizabeth Lambert, an MMA fight took place. Lambert took an elbow to the midsection during the match and then took it upon herself to inflict as much pain on the rest of the BYU women’s team as one person could do. She rightfully has been suspended indefinitely, but my main problem here is how no referee in the entire match saw any of her actions that were worthy of a red card. All she received was a yellow, and when you watch the replay of all the things she did, she clearly deserved a handful of red cards but instead the officials in the match turned their back to all those actions.
Last night the Cleveland LeBron’s took on the Chicago Bulls in Cleveland and when it came down to the last shot for the Cavs, LeBron was called upon to win the game and he drove and was stopped by Luol Deng and Joakim Noah of the Bulls. James took major exception to the fact that no foul was called as he drove to the hoop. James should really stay silent, why is it that superstars are constantly looking for calls to go their ways, they get enough calls as it is. If you’re the best player in a league, shouldn’t you embrace the challenge that teams are going to double-team you and possibly cause you to take a difficult shot where contact is involved? As a superstar, especially with the body of Lebron James who could be an NFL tight end, you should know contact is coming and not complain about it and put the basket in the hoop.
If you haven’t heard by now, Brandon Spikes has suspended himself for the entire game tomorrow against Vanderbilt. His actions against Georgia clearly warranted at least a 1 game suspension if not 3, so I congratulate Spikes for doing this to himself because his coach and his conference felt they did not have to. Unfortunately, Spikes is suspending himself for the wrong reason. He said he’s doing it as a way to avoid being a distraction for his team. While there is some truth to that, he doesn’t seem to believe that he did anything wrong and he’s just doing this to shut the media up so the Gators can focus on beating Vanderbilt this weekend. If Spikes were to say that he was suspending himself for the entire game because he knows what he did was wrong and he was deeply regretful for what he did then I’d be more supportive of this self-induced suspension.
Some of you might not have seen this yet, but last night, BYU and New Mexico were playing in a women’s soccer game and all of sudden thanks to Elizabeth Lambert, an MMA fight took place. Lambert took an elbow to the midsection during the match and then took it upon herself to inflict as much pain on the rest of the BYU women’s team as one person could do. She rightfully has been suspended indefinitely, but my main problem here is how no referee in the entire match saw any of her actions that were worthy of a red card. All she received was a yellow, and when you watch the replay of all the things she did, she clearly deserved a handful of red cards but instead the officials in the match turned their back to all those actions.
Last night the Cleveland LeBron’s took on the Chicago Bulls in Cleveland and when it came down to the last shot for the Cavs, LeBron was called upon to win the game and he drove and was stopped by Luol Deng and Joakim Noah of the Bulls. James took major exception to the fact that no foul was called as he drove to the hoop. James should really stay silent, why is it that superstars are constantly looking for calls to go their ways, they get enough calls as it is. If you’re the best player in a league, shouldn’t you embrace the challenge that teams are going to double-team you and possibly cause you to take a difficult shot where contact is involved? As a superstar, especially with the body of Lebron James who could be an NFL tight end, you should know contact is coming and not complain about it and put the basket in the hoop.
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