Derrick Rose, LeBron James, MVPs and Red Wheel Barrows

Two B/R readers, Karl and Hugh Bart, have contributed much to this article via their thoughtful comments.

In many ways this is a historic MVP battle as few times in the history of the award have there been such distinctions in the candidates.  There has been a historical quandary on the meaning of the award, and this season gives voters a chance to say what it really means. 

In essence, there are are two schools of thought regarding the award. There are those who say that the MVP is the player who plainly has the most value, period. We'll call those the constants. Then there are those who say that the MVP is the player who offers the most value to their team. We'll call those the relatives. 

In 1923 there a poet by the name of William Carlos William (thanks Karl!) who penned a poem that provides the perfect backdrop for this discussion. Here is the poem in its entirety. 

The Red Wheel Barrow

so much depends

upon

the red wheel 

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens.

So Much Depends upon...

How much "much" is "so much?" Isn't this the beginning of the MVP conversation? If you can't make what depends on the player the heart of the conversation, then he's not the most valuable player. On the farm the wheelbarrow is used for so many things. The viability and success of the farm is dependent on the wheelbarrow. 

We'll call the "farm" here the team. The success of the team is a vital ingredient to the MVP conversation. Almost everyone agrees on this point, and history shows it. No player has won the MVP since 1979 without winning 50 games. On this, there is no disagreement between the Constants and the Relatives.

Amare Stoudemire's Knicks do not have enough "much" to be "so much." Sitting at a paltry game over .500, they aren't poised to even threaten to win 50 games. In order to break that barrier they'd have to win 24 of their remaining 31 games. Let's go way out on a limb and take a guess that that isn't going to happen.  

The red wheel barrow...

Williams intentionally broke "wheelbarrow" into two words here to emphasize the utilitarian nature of the different facets of the wheelbarrow. In fact if you look at the manner in which the phrases are completed then you might note that they even bear the shape of a wheelbarrow.

The barrow is part of the wheelbarrow which holds things and bears the responsibility. In a sense the size of the barrow, how much it can carry is equal to its value. In a similar fashion the caliber of the player is measurable. We look at stats and such to determine the values of the players. 

Here is where the Constants and the Relatives disagrees. The Constants argue that the "barrow" is absolute; that the player who produces the most and has the best stats is the MVP. The Relatives say that value is relative to what else is on the team. 

So to take the metaphor to another level, imagine that there is not just one wheel barrow but three, and they are on two farms. The largest and the smallest are on one farm, the medium one is on the other. Constants would argue that the largest wheelbarrow's size makes it the most "valuable." 

The Relatives on the other hand would argue that even though the the largest wheelbarrow is the largest it and concede it has more of a constant value, compared to the needs of the farmer, the medium has wheelbarrow actually has more value.

The argument goes that the while the largest wheelbarrow is in fact larger, the other farm's needs would still be met by the smaller wheelbarrow if the largest wheelbarrow broke. The second farm however is entirely dependent on the medium wheelbarrow. Therefore, the medium wheelbarrow has more relative value while the largest wheelbarrow has the most constant value.

These two different understandings of value are what drive the debate, and now more than ever these two parties have a champion that clearly defines their principles. In the Constant camp there's LeBron James, and in the Relatives camp there's Derrick Rose.

(Granted, there are two other players, Dwight Howard and Dirk Nowitizki that could emerge as that camp's favorite, but this isn't so much about an MVP candidate as it is about how you chose the MVP.  So for the sake of discussion if you prefer one of the others in that category, feel free to mentally plug in "Dwight Howard" or "Dirk Nowitzki" when ever you see "Derrick Rose." )

LeBron James is the consensus "best player" in the world. Sure, there might be some in the camp for Kobe Bryant or Kevin Durant, or someone else. In terms of individual measurable qualities though, there's little question that James stands out among the rest. 

In essence James is a big, humongous, monster sized wheelbarrow. The problem is there's another wheelbarrow almost as large right next to him. His name is Dwyane Wade. To put this into perspective LeBron James has the second highest Player Efficiency Rating in the history of the NBA while Wade has the sixth. 

When we're talking about Wade and James, keep in mind we're talking about wheelbarrows. Sure the farmer needs other things to keep the farm up, but these are wheelbarrows! These are things upon which so much depends! For the purpose of this discussion it needs to be distinguished in order to avoid talking past one another.

Yes the other teams have All-Star talent on them, but there's a difference between All-Star talent and MVP talent. There's no question that Wade is an MVP caliber player. This is what makes the conversation so intriguing. The Heat have arguably not just the biggest wheelbarrow in the NBA, but the second biggest as well. 

Derick Rose has elevated the Bulls, if not to elite level, close enough to it to know what it smells like. He's done so in spite of seeing both his second best and third best players' injured for large parts of the season. This "wheelbarrow" is not the size of either of the Heat's but it's the only one the Bulls have. Therefore the Relative camp feels his value is greater than James. 

And this is the crux of the conversation. It's how you define value. Honestly, it's not that either is wrong. In fact both are right. The NBA has never officially defined things and the fact is that both camps can point to previous winners.

Relatives can point to players like Steve Nash, Allen Iverson, Karl Malone and Charles Barkley; players who clearly weren't the best in the NBA but had more to do with elevating their team's to elite status.

Constants point to the six MVPs won by Michael Jordan and Kareem Abdul Jaabbar, instances where the consensus best player in the NBA has won the award. 

Its just the last two years the two camps agreed it was the same player. The best player in the NBA was the same as the player who had the greatest relative value to his team as well. If you have any question about that, just look at the present state of the Cleveland Cavaliers (though that value is not transferable as some would like to make it).

Glazed with rain water...

Lest you think that value is absolute consider for a moment the whole mortgage crisis. The house which you may be living in may not have changed at all in the last five years; heck it might even have been improved. Yet, at the same time there's a good chance that it has less value. 

What effects value is perception. In terms of your home, it's the monetary value of the home established by what other houses are going for. In other words, you don't uniquely get to determine what the value of your home is. You might feel it's "worth" a certain amount but if no one is willing to give you that amount, it's not worth that. 

In the same sense value is not absolute in the MVP conversation. Not only does perception affect reality, it could be argued that perception is reality. If the perception of your home is that it has less value than you think, the reality is you won't get that much money.  

In this conversation the perception and the reality are both not held by a buyers market but by the media. The media shape the conversation, they hold the conversation and they literally by a vote, determine the winner of the conversation.

The expression goes, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." A slight modification would be "value is in the eye of the voter." In poetry often "rain" or "dew" particularly when settled on something is metaphoric of anointing or blessing. Here the rain glazed barrow indicates that it's been "anointed" because "so much depends" on it. 

This anointing is the what the media does. The media nominates the candidates, the media forms the rules for the debate, they host the debate, they execute the debate, they ask the questions for the debate and then they declare the winner of the debate. The candidates have been nominated.

Certainly the nominees could change mid-campaign season but normally the top two candidates are identified by the All-Star game, and then the debate is held through the duration of the season. Presently in the media mostly there are  the two aforementioned candidates. 

When you look around at the various MVP rankings by those with the ability to vote you see the same two names at the top of the list. When you see the debates on TV between the national writers, it's between the same two players. These nominees have been anointed.

Whether these are the two best candidates or not is moot (before arguing this with me please click on the link). They are the two primary candidates. You can argue about whether they should be in the conversation, but you can't argue that they have become the bulk of the conversation. They have been anointed. The wheelbarrow is glazed with rain.

Beside the white chickens

The chickens are white. The wheelbarrow is red. The contrast to this imagery is very powerful. The red stands out against the white background. Also in this image is the apparent possibility of why the wheelbarrow is where it is. It stands in front of the chickens in all likelihood because it was used to bring them feed. 

These two aspects define what may end up be the decisive factor over the course of the remainder of the season. The MVP candidate must do two things they must on the one hand stand out from their team, and on the other help them to win.

Rose has the inherent advantage in the contrast department because that his the nature of his candidacy. James has the inherent advantage in the other. It's why he joined the Heat and Wade, along with Bosh, to form a super team.

In the end, it may come down to which player can do the better job of standing out with the others strengths. If Rose can elevate the Bulls to a better record than the Heat once Noah returns, he will probably win. If LeBron continues to separate himself from Wade as he has in the past month, it may be hard for voters to not give him the award. 

Either way, it might end  up being a historical decision in the sense that perhaps more than ever before the two camps are so clearly defined and the true nature of "value" could be referenced back to 2011 from here on out.