As the NBA season cruises past the trade deadline, one player stands out as the frontrunner for this year’s Most Valuable Player Award, Nikola Jokić.
The Nuggets big man has stepped up his game this year in just about every conceivable way, raising his own stock to be considered the best big man in the NBA. The Joker is averaging 8.5 assists per game as of April 1st, putting him just behind Wilt Chamberlain’s 8.6 APG in the 1967-68 season as the second-most by a center in NBA history. Even more impressive is the fact that Jokić already owns four of the top seven seasons in APG for centers (including the ongoing season, despite this being only his 6th year in the NBA).
It is fair to say that Jokić is already the greatest passing center of all time. He currently owns the highest career APG at the center position in NBA history with 5.8 per game, far beyond Chamberlain’s and Russell’s second and third place metrics of 4.4 and 4.3 per game respectively (while you could argue the criteria for awarding an assist was more stringent back then, these are the official NBA statistics that were going off).
Joel Embiid was second in line for the MVP prior to his knee injury, which may eliminate him entirely from the conversation down the stretch of the season. Before the 76ers big man went down, this season’s MVP race was shaping up to be one of the most peculiar ones in decades. For the first time in what has felt like forever, the top two candidates were not guards or even forwards, but the historically most dominant position in basketball, centers. Embiid, of course, has the classic footwork of greats like Olajuwon, with a mid-range and deep shot to boot that bigs of this era have learned to develop. His ability to lead the 76ers offensively and defensively to the top seed in the East for most of the season when healthy put him above the rest for the early part of the year.
Jokić however, with an equally high-level performance in the paint and an even better jump shot, is in another world for the way he controls the floor from the center position. He has dominated the hardwood from the offensive end this season. Looking at the analytic side of things, Jokić’s contributions stand out even more. He currently leads (and has for most of the season) the league in PER, Box plus/minus, win shares, and value over replacement player. The previous season leaders in PER alone have won the MVP each of the last five seasons and 10 of the last 12 years. Jokić’s 31.66 rating is currently good for the 6th best in a season in NBA history.
The Joker is far and away No. 1 in win shares at 10.7, with Antetokounmpo in second with 7.4, followed by Gobert with 7.3 and Lillard with 7.2. In offensive win shares alone, Jokić leads with 8.4, trailed by Lillard with 7.0, Williamson with 5.8, and Harden with 5.2.
In box plus/minus which measures a player's contribution to their team based on traditional data in an NBA box score, Jokić stands alone at 11.9, with Embiid behind him at 8.6, Antetokounmpo at 8.2, and LeBron at 7.8. He is No. 1 in the NBA in offensive rating for those who have taken at least 500 shot attempts on the season, and his value over replacement player is first with a 5.8 rating, with Antetokounmpo in second place at 3.9, Luka Dončić at 3.5, LeBron at 3.4, and Harden at 3.3.
This is all with Jokić clocking in at second overall in minutes played so far this year with 47 games under his belt, compared to 41 for Harden (with only 33 of those games being with the Nets), 44 for Antetokounmpo, 31 for Embiid, and 45 for Lillard.
Jokić has simply elevated what he can do on the court, carrying over his performance in the playoff bubble into this season. The Nuggets center is taking more shots than ever before while making them more efficiently than ever. Simultaneously, he is dishing the ball around as well as any guard in the NBA. During the 2019-20 regular season, Jokić attempted 14.7 shots a game, knocking down about 53% of them. 3.5 of these were 3-pointers, which he hit 31% of last year.
This season, however, Jokić has increased his attempts to 18.6 per game, yet is shooting even better at 57%, and has greatly increased his 3-point percentage to 43% while attempting 3.6 deep balls per game. He is also attempting and making the most free throws per game of his career, clocking in at an 87% conversation rate on the year. All of this combines to give him a gorgeous stat line of 26.8 PPG, 11.1 RPG, and 8.5 APG. Currently, this places him seventh in scoring, eighth in rebounding, and tied for 5th in assists with all-time great passing point guard Chris Paul. No other player in the NBA is in the top ten in all 3 categories.
Really only two other players remain in the MVP conversation other than Jokić. With LeBron and Embiid falling to injury, Curry’s Warriors looking less and less like a playoff team with each passing day, James Harden and Giannis Antetokounmpo are the two players on the outside looking in.
Harden gets the second place nod for being the conductor of the Brooklyn monster that has been assembled in New York. Somebody had to alter their game to make the Net's big 3 work, and Harden has done that while playing the best basketball of his career. Despite my criticisms of his shooting antics in Houston, he is finally playing with equivalent top-level talent for the first time since his Thunder days (CP3 and Westbrook are frankly just not in the same ballpark as Durant and Irving). This union has revealed just how efficient he can be with the basketball in his hands. No knock against the 2018 MVP, but Harden needed to join a team where he wasn’t the clear best player to find team success. With Irving being comparable offensively and KD being the No. 1 or No. 2 player in the world when on the court, he’s found that home.
Brooklyn has succeeded without Durant present for a month and a half now, with the team going 17-3 during that span, in large part due to how Harden has guided the team. Still, the biggest factor that gives him the nod for MVP, being how he has conducted the newly star-powered Nets, is also the biggest factor against him taking home the award; at least in comparison to Jokić.
Jokić, though paired with a partner in crime in Jamal Murray, is much more the one-man show in Denver, leading his team to success without the benefit of surefire Hall of Famers. Even with Murray by his side, the fifth-year guard takes a noticeable step back in the regular season compared to his playoff antics the past two postseasons. Nuggets fans will obviously be happy to have their guard play at his best come playoff time, but that doesn’t matter when it comes to the regular season MVP award. Murray’s playoff numbers the past two postseasons are 24 PPG, 5.8 APG, 4.6 RPG while shooting 47% and 41% from 3-point land. His numbers dip in the regular season however, posting a line of 19.7 PPG, 4.9 APG, 4.0 RPG, shooting 47% and 38% from deep during the same span. This is all to say Jokić noticeably carries more of the load for Denver during the bulk of the season.
Kyrie Irving meanwhile is otherworldly whenever he steps onto the court, no matter the time of the year. Harden is a more complete player than Irving, but offensively, the two guards are as potent as they come. And even if Durant only returns from injury for a dozen games or so before the playoffs, Jokić has no such luxury of having arguably the greatest scorer of all-time show up down the stretch of the season in reserve.
Earlier in the year, Jokić wasn’t getting the same level of attention due to his team’s record, something they’ve since remedied in the pre and post-All-Star break matchups they’ve played. They now stand at 29-18, good enough for 5th in the Western Conference and only .5 games back of the Lakers for the fourth seed. They are 12-3 over their last 15 games, including wins over the East’s top-seeded 76ers and Antetokounmpo’s Milwaukee Bucks. Thanks in large part to the MVP play of Jokić, who has put up 12 triple-doubles so far this year, the Nuggets are primed to take the 4th seed and potentially more. If Denver continues to play their best basketball during the final half of the year, they could yet again find themselves in the Western Conference Finals. But this time they would be boasting the league MVP with team expectations to win, not to be a surprise entry into the final four like last season.
While the Greek Freak is yet again putting up numbers he’s made the norm over the last couple of seasons, his stats are extremely comparable to Jokić’s, with the Bucks having their worst season yet of the last three. Antetokounmpo does have the defensive prowess over Jokić, but not in such a dominant fashion as to take the MVP away from Jokić. Giannis still lacks the shot that the Nuggets superstar has, and despite Antetokounmpo toting a moderate amount of assists per game, (6.2), his are more based on driving kick-outs than the floor general approach Jokić has, which absolutely controls the court. Voter fatigue is always at play when someone wins awards in consecutive seasons, but as someone who supported Antetokounmpo winning the previous two MVP trophies, this year is just not his year.
I will acknowledge and give credit to Dame Time down in Portland this season as an honorable mention. However, I think Lillard lags behind all the previously mentioned players for MVP this year. That being said, it would be tough to exclude him from the All-NBA First team at guard, even with the performances of Luka and Steph this year, Lillard is right there with them with a better team record.
Nikola Jokić has clearly taken a huge step forward this season. Watching him play, you can observe how he sees the game, how it slows down for him as he navigates the court looking to make the best decision possible. If this season is any indication of peak Jokić, he’s in the discussion for taking the top player in the league award after LeBron and KD. But if the 25-year-old continues to improve beyond this year's display, it will certainly be even scarier for the rest of the league.
