The Biggest Hurdle for Every 2015 NBA MVP Candidate to Winning the Award
More than 75 percent of the NBA's regular season is in the books, which means it's time to rain reality down on every MVP candidate's parade.
Finding contenders for the league's highest individual honor isn't especially difficult. It's picking a winner that's tricky.
Loose direction and subjective interpretations make for an ambiguous process, the offshoot of which is an indeterminable race during seasons like this, when there is no clear favorite.
What separates contenders from one another often isn't their accomplishments. It's what they aren't doing or, in some cases, what history says they haven't done. We're here to find the most pressing of those hurdles for the legitimate candidates—the ones most consistently mentioned with regards to MVP contention.
Yes, in layman's terms, this is called nitpicking. But splitting hairs is part of this race. Only one player can win, and since we don't yet know who that player is, it's important we prepare ourselves for why each of the most deserving MVP hopefuls may eventually be deemed unfit for victory.
Russell Westbrook: Weakening Narrative
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Manufactured storylines are pivotal parts of determining MVP winners. The circumstances under which stats are being posted and wins are being tallied matters.
Russell Westbrook's case appears air tight to that end. Kevin Durant hasn't played since Feb. 19, during which time the Oklahoma City Thunder point man has gone full Oscar Robertson, averaging a triple-double.
Not just rattling off six triple-doubles in 11 tries, which is what he's done. Averaging a triple-double, to the tune of 33.1 points, 10.6 rebounds and 10.7 assists.
That's on top of his spine-shuddering performance overall. He leads the league in scoring (27.5 points), is third in assists (8.3) and ranks fifth in win shares per 48 minutes (0.234). Oh, and he also has a higher rebounding percentage (11.5) than Nene, Dirk Nowitzki and LeBron James.
"There's an unpredictability to Westbrook's game that makes him an easy target for criticism," writes Bleacher Report's Alec Nathan, "but as Oklahoma City's 14-5 record since Feb. 1 indicates, the method to his madness has been substantiated. And then some."
So true. But here's the thing: Westbrook's dominance—especially recently—can work against him.
Oklahoma City's offense and defense are both better without him since Durant went down. And though the Thunder are 7-4 through the 11 games he's played during that time, they have yet to beat a Western Conference playoff team. Two of those victories saw them struggle against the cellar-dwelling Los Angeles Lakers and Philadelphia 76ers.
None of that should detract from Westbrook's explosive stat lines and exorbitant workload. But he's already at a disadvantage because the Thunder do not own a world-beating record. That his inspiring efforts aren't having a profound impact, as in clinching Oklahoma City's playoff hopes, only adds to that disfavor.
LeBron James: 2010-11 Deja Vu
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Don't stop me if you've heard this one before, because you have.
LeBron James' teammates are too good. He plays beside two other superstars in a weak Eastern Conference. Give MVP honors to someone else who doesn't have such a cushy gig.
Those sentiments can apply to James' inaugural season with the Miami Heat and his current one with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Never mind that one of those stars (Kevin Love) isn't playing up to snuff, or that the Cavaliers are 2-9 without him, or that they're one non-55-point performance from Kyrie Irving shy of being 1-10 without him.
And never mind that those same Cavaliers go from a plus-10.6 points per 100 possessions when he's playing to a minus-7.9 when he's riding pine, an 18.5-point swing larger than that of anyone else on this list.
This is 2010-11 all over again, when James first joined Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade. The Cavaliers are great and contending for a title because they're supposed to be great and contending for a title.
It's no big thing, even though it's actually a huge deal—especially considering that Cleveland has the NBA's best record since beginning the season 19-20, a months-long leap that coincides with James returning from two weeks of rest and relaxation to get his body right.
Indeed, this is an unfair stance. But it's one that will be reflected in the voting process, just as it was four years ago, when both Dwight Howard and Derrick Rose, the MVP winner, finished miles ahead of him.
That is, unless James uses the season's home stretch to reinvent this pedestrian perception—a feat that, given past voting trends, seems possible only if he sprouts wings and leads Cleveland to an undefeated finish.
Stephen Curry: Golden State's Godliness
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Typically, league MVP winners play on great teams, and Stephen Curry headlines an amazing squad.
He is the best player on the NBA-best Golden State Warriors. His candidacy is a no-brainer. But so, too, is Golden State's predesigned lack of urgency as the season nears completion.
“If we were fighting for a playoff spot, I’d be grinding guys a little harder, but we’re in a really good position,” head coach Steve Kerr said after a March 2 loss to the Brooklyn Nets, per Rusty Simmons of the San Francisco Chronicle. “It’s more important for us to keep everyone healthy and fresh. If that costs us a game or two, that’s fine.”
More than six games separate the Warriors from the West's second-best team (Memphis Grizzlies). They are going to win the conference. It's a done deal.
Kerr is subsequently coaching like it's a done deal. Curry's minutes are down this side of the All-Star break, and he's already missed two games against the Indiana Pacers and Denver Nuggets, purely as a precautionary measure.
Now, though, is when MVP-framed plots reach fever pitch. Fans and, most importantly, voters are drawn to late-season exigency, to players and teams overcoming burning, campaign-defining adversity that Golden State has long since left in its rear view.
Only one MVP recipient over the last 30 years has missed more than seven contests as well (Allen Iverson). Curry has just two absences to his name, but that's as of now.
Seventeen games remain for the Warriors, and there's a chance he misses five or more, if only because there's nothing left to play for. His numbers speak for themselves, as does the team's record. And, in the end, this foregone superiority could be Curry's MVP undoing.
James Harden: Late-Season Fatigue
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Essentially, the biggest obstacle standing between James Harden and the highly sought MVP award is also what's helped fuel his inclusion: Dwight Howard's absence.
Upon returning, Howard will have sat out more games this season than in his previous 10 combined (36). Somehow, despite missing someone who plays like a top-10 superstar when fully healthy, the Houston Rockets are in play for the West's second-best record.
All because of Harden.
But they're also in a mini slump at this point. The Rockets are playing .500 basketball in March, are 2-3 against Western Conference foes during that time and have seen their top-three defense devolve into an average entity that regresses even further late in games.
Harden himself is feeling the ill effects of carrying an entire team. He's barely shooting 40 percent from the floor—including 30 percent from deep—since his one-game suspension, and the Rockets, while still chasing Memphis, are in danger of falling outside the West's top four, with the Los Angeles Clippers, San Antonio Spurs and Dallas Mavericks all hot on their trail.
“I’m not worried about myself, just the small things,” he said of his supposed slump following Houston's March 12 loss to the Utah Jazz, per ESPN.com's Calvin Watkins. “I think if we rebound the basketball...if we rebound the basketball, my rhythm will come and our team rhythm will come."
Still one of the league's foremost favorites to nab MVP honors, Harden has little reason to worry about his candidacy or Houston's postseason standing. He has exceeded even the most ambitious expectations, putting forth a season-long masterpiece that won't soon be discounted.
Wilting down the stretch, when this five-headed competition will be determined, is simply a risk of that showpiece—one that, while unjust, could cost him in the end.
Anthony Davis: Archaic MVP Reasoning
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Anthony Davis is not going to win the MVP award.
We can say this with absolute confidence, more so than we can for anyone else on this list. And that's not Davis' fault. The NBA's lack of MVP structure is to blame.
Shaun Powell has more for NBA.com:
"When left up to the voters to describe and define an MVP, everyone brings his or her agenda. They attach their own weight to the unwritten rules. Such as: An MVP cannot come from a team with a losing record, or even a mediocre record. An MVP must play an unspecified minimum number of games. An MVP must be at or near the top in at least one statistical category. An MVP must pretty much be the best player at his position, or second-best, although there's no uniform ranking order to follow.
In other words, it's a free for all.
"
No league MVP has missed more than 11 games over the last 30 years. Davis has been sidelined for 12.
Twenty-eight of the last 30 winners played for teams that ranked in first or second place of their respective conference; not one victor has come from a squad that finished worse than third. Davis' New Orleans Pelicans are fighting against fast-fading playoff hopes, their ceiling within a freakishly fantastic West peaking at eighth place.
It doesn't matter that Davis is posting unfathomable stat lines, is contending for the best player efficiency rating ever or that the Pelicans go from the net-rating equivalent of a bona fide playoff team with him, to a bottom-five lottery contender without him.
Nor does it matter that he, by virtue of win shares, accounts for 31.7 percent of New Orleans' total victories—a mark far higher than any of his four MVP counterparts.
Tired technicalities, historically, mean more than all the incredible things he's doing.
*Stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference and NBA.com and are accurate heading into March 16's games.
