Thursday NBA Roundup: LeBron James Won't Win MVP but Deserves Recognition
What a difference two days can make.
Tuesday night, the Cleveland Cavaliers dropped a game against the Houston Rockets, losing by six points while LeBron James wore a suit and helped Tyronn Lue coach. Thursday night, they steamrolled the Brooklyn Nets en route to a 107-87 victory, led by 24 points, four rebounds, 11 assists, two steals and a block from James.
Sure, the Nets are an easier opponent, and it's not like James was perfect. Despite shooting 8-of-11 from the field and 8-of-10 from the free-throw line, and despite punctuating his performance with vicious transition slams like the one below, he still turned over the ball six times.
But even when he was making mistakes, it was abundantly clear what an effect he can have on this often vulnerable Eastern Conference contender. Thanks to James' feeds, Kevin Love found himself drilling plenty of quality looks, and even Timofey Mozgov was making some noise on the offensive end—his 10-point showing against the Nets was only his fourth double-digit outing in March.
Along with the fun twist that stems from James moving past Dominique Wilkins for the No. 12 spot on the historical scoring leaderboard, and even though off-court turmoil has ruled Northeast Ohio airwaves for large portions of the season, James' presence has consistently elevated his squad.
The Cavs outscored Brooklyn by 28 points with James on the court Thursday night, and that shouldn't come as a surprise. Just take a gander at his on/off splits throughout the season:
With James, Cleveland has scored a scorching 115.2 points per 100 possessions, which would be the NBA's top regular-season mark, narrowly ahead of the Golden State Warriors and their 114.5 offensive rating. But when he sits, that number plummets to 101.4—better than only the season-long mark of the offensively inept Philadelphia 76ers.
The four-time MVP's impact isn't quite as substantial on the defensive end, but he still helps his team become just a little more suffocating.
No one is going to argue that James should hold up the Maurice Podoloff Trophy for the fifth time. If they are, they should spend a little more time watching Stephen Curry light up opponents. But he should still be present on plenty of ballots for the league's top individual award.
According to Basketball-Reference.com's MVP Award Tracker, based entirely off historical correlations between certain statistical factors and actual voting results, James should finish sixth with a 3.5 percent chance of winning. But if voters want to discount Draymond Green and Kevin Durant for playing on teams with even stronger challengers—Curry and Russell Westbrook, respectively—the Cleveland forward will only move up in the order.
After all, he's quite clearly the most impactful Cleveland rotation member:
If MVP actually meant "most valuable player" in its literal sense, James would indeed have a convincing argument. And he's probably well aware of this, given some of his recent comments.
"At this point I understand the moment that I'm in, I understand how important I am to this team and what we're trying to do so I'm just stepping up my play a little bit," he told Cleveland.com's Joe Vardon on March 27.
The Warriors can still win without Curry, though they certainly wouldn't be competing with the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls for the best record of all time. The Oklahoma City Thunder would remain competitive if either Durant or Westbrook fell out of the rotation. The San Antonio Spurs would have few issues making the playoffs if Kawhi Leonard suddenly retired.
But the Cavs? They'd be a disaster without James, and that's not just an opinion. Two days before he sparked a massive win in front of the home crowd at Quicken Loans Arena, the world witnessed that firsthand.
The optics of this season have prevented James from asserting himself as a typically strong MVP front-runner. Between Cleveland's James-fueled off-court drama and the Dubs' headline-stealing dominance, his previously unassailable grasp on the "best player alive" title has been weakened significantly.
Don't be fooled, though. This guy is still pretty good at basketball.
Thunder Survive a Scare
Los Angeles Clippers head coach Doc Rivers was almost an evil genius.
Knowing he was playing a tough Oklahoma City Thunder squad in hostile territory, he chose to rest Chris Paul, DeAndre Jordan and J.J. Redick. With Blake Griffin still sitting out, that left LAC to start Austin Rivers, Jamal Crawford, Wesley Johnson, Luc Mbah a Moute and Cole Aldrich.
Somehow, it almost worked.
Austin Rivers had the game of his life, dropping 32 points, four rebounds, five assists and two steals against Russell Westbrook and the rest of the OKC backcourt. With Crawford matching his point total in similarly efficient fashion, the Clippers almost pulled off a shocking victory before falling apart at the end and eventually losing 119-117.
It's tough to tell how much this means.
Was it evidence that the Thunder are more vulnerable than we previously imagined? Could they have overlooked a Clippers squad missing four starters? Was it just impossible to stop the Batman-Robin pairing of Rivers and Crawford?
Chances are, this was nothing more than a nondescript win over a team that shouldn't have kept the margin quite so close. But it did continue to expose some of OKC's weaknesses: The Thunder backcourt couldn't stop a nosebleed, and the offense once again devolved into isolation plays during crunch-time situations.
The likely No. 3 seed in the Western Conference may have survived a scare and escaped with a victory, but the opponents will only grow tougher in a few weeks.
Playoff Picture Still Mixed Up
The Houston Rockets couldn't have asked for a better look to send their matchup with the Chicago Bulls to overtime. Standing unguarded in the right corner, Trevor Ariza lofted up a wide-open triple at the buzzer that would have tied the game at 103, but it clanged off the iron and fell harmlessly toward the floor.
Had Ariza connected and helped Houston emerge with an overtime victory, the Rockets would've broken out of a three-way tie and moved past the Utah Jazz and Dallas Mavericks to sit alone with the Western Conference's No. 7 seed. Instead, they're a half game back of the aforementioned squads and would miss the postseason festivities if the season ended after Thursday night's action:
| 6 | Portland Trail Blazers | 39-36 |
| 7 | Utah Jazz | 37-38 |
| 7 | Dallas Mavericks | 37-38 |
| 9 | Houston Rockets | 37-39 |
Chicago, on the other hand, gets to smile. Led by Nikola Mirotic, who dropped 28 points, four rebounds and three assists off the bench, the Bulls pushed closer to the playoff field:
| 7 | Detroit Pistons | 40-35 |
| 8 | Indiana Pacers | 39-36 |
| 9 | Chicago Bulls | 38-37 |
| 10 | Washington Wizards | 36-39 |
Both these teams have some work left to do, but this result at least guaranteed that each will live to fight a little while longer.
Pacers Need More than Paul George
One player wasn't enough to get the Indiana Pacers past the Orlando Magic. As much as Paul George tried to carry his team, he ended up on the wrong end of a 114-94 margin that dropped Indiana into questionable territory for the playoff pursuit.
The loss pushes the Pacers to 39-36 on the season, leaving them alone at No. 8 in the East. And since the Bulls got the job done against the Rockets, thus closing the two-contest gap to just a single game, that's even more problematic.
None of the blame should fall on George's shoulders Thursday night. Not after he finished with 27 points, eight rebounds, three assists and five steals while shooting 11-of-23 from the field.
Instead, let's point some fingers at everyone else.
The rest of the Indiana starters—Myles Turner, Ian Mahinmi, George Hill and Monta Ellis—struggled to make an offensive impact. They scored a combined 36 points and needed 36 shots to get there, finishing with a putrid field-goal percentage of 39.7 percent.
And it's not like the bench was much better.
Lavoy Allen played decently, and C.J. Miles knocked down three shots from beyond the arc. But Rodney Stuckey and Ty Lawson failed to make any sort of impact, while Jordan Hill's defense was often questionable against the Orlando frontcourt.
Indiana should still be one of the favorites to emerge from the Eastern Conference morass with a playoff berth, but it needs far more than just George. Dominant as he can be, he's only one man.
Line of the Night: Al-Farouq Aminu
Though C.J. McCollum came through in the clutch for the Portland Trail Blazers during their 116-109 victory over the Boston Celtics, this night belonged to none other than Al-Farouq Aminu.
Heading into this affair, the 25-year-old forward had never scored more than 20 points in a single game. He'd hit that exact number twice before—once in November 2010, and once just five days prior to his heroics against the C's. Even within the impressive history of the Rip City franchise, no one had submitted this type of line since Derek Anderson in 2003:
On the night, Aminu produced 28 points, nine rebounds, one assist, one steal and three blocks while shooting 11-of-19 from the field and 6-of-11 from beyond the arc. And at this rate, with him tying his career high on March 26 and then shattering it on March 31, there's no telling what he's going to do next.
Anyone want to bet against Aminu going for a 50-spot when the Blazers take on the Miami Heat this Saturday?
Adam Fromal covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter: @fromal09.
All stats, unless otherwise indicated, are from Basketball-Reference.com or Adam's own databases and accurate entering games on March 31.
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