Over the past few years, the winner of the NBA MVP Award has been obvious as the time to vote drew near, perhaps just one or two outstanding candidates making their case to the panel of journalists tasked with picking the one they felt most deserved the honour. Steph Curry took home the trophy in each of the past two seasons, the Golden State guard recognised for the way his deadly shooting and on-ball skills pushed the Warriors to new heights.
However, this season has seen four players deliver compelling arguments to have the trophy handed to them with each seemingly swaying the momentum back in their favour each time they take to the floor. It is hard to imagine anyone tasked with picking this year’s triumphant star will not have James Harden, Russell Westbrook, Kawhi Leonard and Lebron James on their ballot in some order, but selecting one of them ahead of the others is a remarkably difficult challenged.
Over the next week, The Sportsman will be laying out the reasons why each of those players deserves to be recognised as the league’s Most Valuable Player, outlining their contribution to their team’s success and the narrative arc their season has followed.
Russell Westbrook
We start with Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma City Thunder, who has seemingly taken his frustration at Kevin Durant’s decision to leave in free agency as a personal insult. Taking to the floor with a controlled rage, the 28-year-old is currently on course to average a triple double for the season.
He would be the first player since Oscar Robertson in 1961/62 to put up double-digit returns for points, rebounds and assists over an entire campaign, but his improved efficiency has been every inch as important as those eye-popping counting statistics.
During the time he shared with Durant, the knock on Westbrook was that he took shots away from his team-mate, that his penchant for tossing up wild flings was wasteful and the team would do better if he simply set the table for those around him. He seemed incapable of doing that however, and many observers expected that to increase without a second superstar around to keep him in check.
Westbrook has rubbished that, delivering an incredible season in which those triple-doubles merely offer a small window into just how much he has to do in order for the Thunder to pick up each and every win.
Here is a 6’3″ guard averaging 10.6 rebounds per game, a mark which ranks 12th among ALL players in the league, simultaneously ignoring comments that he doesn’t pass enough to register 10.3 assists per game. That is the third-highest mark in the NBA, while he’s also leading the league in scoring at 31.8 points per game and there is little doubt that OKC would not be making the playoffs without him.
By the strictest definition of the term “Most Valuable Player,” the Rockets, Spurs and Cavaliers might all have better teams without their best player compared to OKC without Russ. What he is doing — 33 triple-doubles in 67 games to put this team on course for 46 wins — is remarkable. In terms of pure statistical firepower, Westbrook’s 2016-17 season packs as much punch as one of his atomic tomahawks.
Narrative
There is no doubt that the story of a player’s season weighs heavily on MVP voting, and the fact that Westbrook is doing something nobody else has done in 50 years will certainly play a major factor.
Usually the winner will be part of a team that is either a first or second seed and has a high win total, but this case is one of those outliers to such conventional norms. OKC’s struggles whenever he sits weigh heavily in his favour and he’s doing it without help on the offensive end.
He is on pace to shatter the all-time record for highest single-season usage percentage, something very few other players could do and something that leaves Westbrook standing apart from the three other candidates.
