HoopSkills.com MVP Ballot
I deserve an MVP ballot and they need to take a vote from someone else away from them. This is something that I would take very serious and not just vote for someone who has had the best career but the best year for the best team.
To me this is a two person race between….wait for it….Kobe Bryant and Chris Paul. Lebron James is a great player who saves his team but I’m not a fan of an MVP coming from a marginal team and that’s what the Cavs are right now. If the Cavs were a top 2 or 3 team from the EAst it would be easier to vote for him and honestly I would vote for him but the Cavs aren’t that great and they aren’t in the best conference. It is hard to discount his scoring average, league leading triple doubles and his team falling on their face without him but I still will.
That’s why this race comes down to Paul and Bryant. Who is having the better year? That’s a great debatable question. Kobe has put the Lakers on his back and really showed some honest leadership for the first time in his career. Look back at younger Kobe and you can really see how far he has come. He is making all the players around him better and willing to pass the ball to teammates trusting them and it has taken the Lakers to, in my opinion, the favorites of the West. Does anyone want to play them in the playoffs? They’ll have Gasol, Bryant and Odom all ready to go and Bynum may be back by the 2nd round. In their game last night Bryant scored 20 points in 32 minutes but got off as many shots as Gasol and Odom each. You have to like that. Lamar Odom finally gets to be the piece that teams can forget about and that is where he thrives. I love what Kobe has done this year and I’m very impressed with his growth as a leader and a player. He has increased in nearly every category statistically except scoring average and his team is at the top of the conference after beating New Orleans and the Spurs.
Chris Paul has to be the other top candidate. He’s passed Steve Nash after dominating him this season and has led this team to heights that nobody thought they’d hit. I did predict early on that they’d be a great team if you’ll look back to the start of the season, but I wouldn’t have figured they’d be a top 3 team in the conference. This isn’t an easy task either because this is the toughest western conference I’ve ever seen from top to bottom and Paul is the reason for the Hornets success.
Anyone else confuse the Bobcats and Hornets anymore? I still do but that’s a different story.
Paul is scoring 21 points a game, 12 assists, 2.75 steals and has a assist/turnover ratio of 4.6 to 1. That’s nice. He has made an all star out of David West and Tyson Chandler’s athleticism is really coming out now after being teamed with Paul. The tandem of Paul and Chandler lead the league in alley oops by nearly a 2-1 ratio over the next closest pair. People have said that Paul couldn’t shoot yet he’s hitting 37% of his threes and 85% of his foul shots. He can’t be guarded one on one and is an amazing finisher for someone his size. He is making a player out of Peja again and if this team continues to gel and some of the younger guys develop as projected this team is a true center away from killing people.
But this year isn’t Paul’s best season he will have but it is Kobe’s best year he has had yet. Kobe Bryant deserves the MVP is a close race over Chris Paul. In the end, Kobe has had the best year, the most growth and is the best player on the best team in the best conference.
