NBA's 2010-11 MVP thus far is ...

[MavFan6488]

can someone with espn insider please post this article? thanks...

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story?columnist=hollinger_john&page=PERDiem-101213&action=login&appRedirect=http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story%3fcolumnist%3dhollinger_john%26page%3dPERDie m-101213

[Phillip]

dirk

[brock_lobster]

dirk

It must be sad to be delusional, not being able to seperate reality from fantasy. I pity you, Phillip. Perhaps one day you can live a normal life with the help of medication and psychotherapy.

The obvious answer is Manu Ginobili. Best player on the best team, which are the prerequisites.

[21_Dickings]

Why read the article? We all know Kobe is the league's real MVP.

[LakaFan]

Kobe is hands down the MVP besides the mediocre stats and less than dominating record. He's a proven winner and it just looks like he's trying but really he's just waiting for Drew to return.

[Phillip]

Kobe is hands down the MVP besides the mediocre stats and less than dominating record. He's a proven winner and it just looks like he's trying but really he's just waiting for Drew to return.

dirk is putting up fantastic stats, has a dominating record, and even though he is waiting for his #2 scoring option to return, still has the Mavs at the tops of the NBA

mvp imo

[Phillip]

i love dick in my ass

[brock_lobster]

Awesome retort, thanks for reinforcing the notion that you lack any sort of basketball knowledge, nor are you capable of legitimate basketball discussion.

Dirk is not MVP and should never have been MVP.

Next.

[LakaFan]

dirk is putting up fantastic stats, has a dominating record, and even though he is waiting for his #2 scoring option to return, still has the Mavs at the tops of the NBA

mvp imo

But Kobe had an 81pt game one time.

[DAF86]

lol Phillip

[Shank]

Who's responsible for these new idiots? They're just cliches.

[MavFan6488]

i just want to read the damn article...........anyone?

[VBM]

All jokes aside, Dirk is playing out of his mind so far. Mavs have beaten some solid teams along the way too.

Spurs have collectively raised their games this season (whether it's a product of Manu starting is a point that may or may not be worth arguing), and it's tougher to support his MVP candidacy over a guy like Dirk who is hands down the best player on his team.

If the Knick resurgence continues, people will start throwing Amare in the convo as well.

[DAF86]

Who's responsible for these new idiots? They're just cliches.


My best bet is Bump.

I really don't know why I try so hard to make it seem like I'm beign serious when trolling, when is so easy to even get self called "troll masters".

[icem]

can someone with espn insider please post this article? thanks...

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story?columnist=hollinger_john&page=PERDiem-101213&action=login&appRedirect=http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story%3fcolumnist%3dhollinger_john%26page%3dPERDie m-101213

here u go... best i could do

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story?columnist=hollinger_john&page=PERDiem-101213&action=login&appRedirect=http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story%3fcolumnist%3dhollinger_john%26page%3dPERDie m-101213

[MavFan6488]

here u go... best i could do

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story?columnist=hollinger_john&page=PERDiem-101213&action=login&appRedirect=http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/insider/columns/story%3fcolumnist%3dhollinger_john%26page%3dPERDie m-101213
man....you're one funny dude...

comedian is your calling...

[cheguevara]

IMO Dirk will win it and mavs will crash n burn in round 1

[Roddy Beaubois]

During the streakDallas has outscored the opposition by 151 points when Nowitzki has been on the floor and the Mavs have been outscored by 52 points during the streak when Nowitzki has sat

[brock_lobster]

Look, MavFan6488, we all know you only want to see who is #1 because you are desperate to validate your awful franchise by seeing Dirk's name atop the ranking on some useless ESPN poll. Who gives a rat's ass. We all know once the curtains open and the stage is set, Mr. Nowitzki will be assaulting exercise equipment, not hoisting O'Briens.

[Roddy Beaubois]

brock_lobster bringing the goods

[brock_lobster]

brock_lobster bringing the goods
Thank you, Rodrigue.

[Roddy Beaubois]

And no, Dirk's Tounge is not approved yet. :lol at the guy who is constantly lurking under it.

[Greg Oden]

i'd be more inclined to watch a judyntx sex tape that read gray spur fans posts.

[brock_lobster]

i'd be more inclined to watch a judyntx sex tape that read gray spur fans posts.

Not strangely, the decision between you reading posts and watching a heterosexual sex tape is a hard one. Surprising.

[MavFan6488]

Look, MavFan6488, we all know you only want to see who is #1 because you are desperate to validate your awful franchise by seeing Dirk's name atop the ranking on some useless ESPN poll. Who gives a rat's ass. We all know once the curtains open and the stage is set, Mr. Nowitzki will be assaulting exercise equipment, not hoisting O'Briens.
as a spurs fan, i would never dream of making fun of 'mr. nowitzki'. after what happened in '06...and even in last years playoff series, he was shitting all over you... i'm fine with spurs fans making fun of jason terry...but not dirk...he's already looking forward to his next 12-14 game against the spurs.

[brock_lobster]

as a spurs fan, i would never dream of making fun of 'mr. nowitzki'. after what happened in '06...and even in last years playoff series, he was shitting all over you... i'm fine with spurs fans making fun of jason terry...but not dirk...he's already looking for his next 12-14 game against the spurs.

I admit that Dirk is a great regular season player and in the playoff up to the Finals. But, his true colors were exposed two straight years. Between singlehandedly losing game 3 and being shut down by Stephen Jackson the next year, I think he deserves the shame.

[Greg Oden]

Not strangely, the decision between you reading posts and watching a heterosexual sex tape is a hard one. Surprising.

great post

[brock_lobster]

great post
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of your posting history.

[Roddy Beaubois]

Dirk got player of the week again tbh. Averaged 25.7 points and 9.0 rebounds while shooting shot 70 percent from the field and 67 percent from 3-point range.

[Phillip]

brock_lobster = a great new addition to the spurstalk family

:toast welcome

[brock_lobster]

Thank you Phillip. I am glad you have changed your opinions, for I wish not to make enemies. I merely wish to save you the disappointment of having any real aspirations at a title for your franchise, because it is not nor will it ever be reality.

[Phillip]

brock_lobster = faggot

[MavFan6488]

brock_lobster = a great new addition to the spurstalk family

:toast welcome
ban him!

[Greg Oden]

sword fighting with cocks is a hobby of mine

[brock_lobster]

Why are you guys so mad? I thought you were the self-proclaimed masters of trolling. Looks like nothing but a bunch of butthurt crybabies.

[diego]

here is the article:

Quick, finish this sentence: The NBA's 2010-11 MVP thus far is …

Having trouble? Me too. While a great many players have been mooted as MVP "candidates" by the chattering classes -- more than usual, I would submit -- the glaring lack of a favorite in this year's race is one of the league's biggest stories from the first quarter of the season.

In fact, even the description "MVP candidate" is something of a backhanded compliment. The "candidate" suffix serves as a disclaimer: I'd never actually vote for this cat for MVP, they're telling you, but I just want you to know that he's having a heck of a year. Otherwise they'd just stop at "MVP."

There's a good reason for that, too. The lack of true MVP fiber in this season's race is pretty glaring, which is why we've drummed up so many speculative "candidates." Look at the player efficiency rating leaderboard for proof. Normally, at the 20-game mark we'd have several players pushing at or near the 30.0 mark; eventually they'd cool off and only a couple of players would be left in the high 20s by the end, and that's the pot we'd usually pick our MVPs from.

This season we're in a different situation. Only one player -- Chris Paul of the Hornets -- has a PER above 26, an amazing circumstance for this early in the season. In contrast, last season, three players finished the season with PERs above 26 (LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Kevin Durant). That's par for the course: We've had at least three every year since 2003-04. The last time only one player finished above 26 was 2000-01.

Not only does Paul lack for company atop the leaderboard, but he's not exactly blowing the league away himself. We haven't seen a league leader with a PER this low in a quarter century -- not since Larry Bird in 1985-86. And remember, normally at this point in the season we have a league leader with a higher number than the season-ending total, simply because it's easier to rack up an amazing 20-game stretch than an amazing 80-game stretch.

That point is an important one, because even CP's lofty mark may be difficult to sustain. Paul's PER lead is built on three planks -- a career-high 49.1 percent mark on 3s, a career-high 91.4 percent mark from the line and an absolutely staggering steals rate of nearly one every 10 minutes -- that are outliers compared to the rest of his career. A statistician would expect those numbers to revert closer to his career norms -- we call this regression to the mean in the statistical world -- and if it happens we may end the season without a single player with a plus-26 PER.

Perhaps it won't, since Paul has legitimately improved as a shooter -- any time opponents go under the screen now he's busting a J. Nonetheless, it says volumes about the lack of superstar power in the league this season that the top PER belongs to a guy taking 11 shots a game.

So what happened? For starters, last year's leaders have all seen their numbers go way down. James, Wade and Chris Bosh were first, third and fourth in PER a year ago; this season each has seen his rating drop several points, although all three have been on the rise of late. Last year's No. 5 player on the leaderboard, San Antonio's Tim Duncan, has also produced less this time around.

And then there's Durant. After finishing third in PER a year ago at the tender age of 21, many expected him to ascend to the top of the MVP throne. Instead, he's not even the top candidate on his own team right now; while he is leading the league in scoring, he is only 19th in PER.

In fact, Durant's league-leading scoring total is another convincing data point for the relative lack of superstardom this season. His 27.3 points per game would be the lowest league-leading total since Allen Iverson's 26.3 in 1998-99; if you're looking at non-lockout years, it's the least since George Gervin's 27.2 in 1977-78.

Normally, faced with a dilemma like this, MVP voters simply plump for the guy on the team who wins the most games, but even that tactic may fail this year. The teams with the three best records -- Dallas, Boston and San Antonio -- don't have a player in the top five in estimated wins added.

The other voter tactic is to vote for the best player on the most surprising team. This season, in fact, has all the hallmarks of the last time we had no clear-cut statistical candidate -- the 2004-05 season in which Steve Nash prevailed. The top PER player that season, Kevin Garnett, didn't make the playoffs, and the two players who otherwise would have topped the ballots, Duncan and Shaquille O'Neal, both missed too many games.

There's one key difference, however: We have no Phoenix coming out of the woodwork to shock the league. As a result, we aren't awash in "surprise" options. Of the top five players in estimated wins added, only Paul and Utah's Deron Williams play for a team considered to be exceeding expectations, and in neither case is the excess dramatic. You'll also hear people try to talk themselves into Amare Stoudemire (eighth in EWA), but that may die down quickly: The Knicks have played the league's second-easiest schedule thus far.

In fact, all these roads seem to be taking us back down one path: LeBron James, again. His Heat have recovered from a shaky start and he's No. 1 in EWA.

Three factors work against him, however. First, the Heat have dramatically underperformed sky-high expectations. Second, voter fatigue may creep in after giving him the trophy the past two years. Finally, he's not exactly awash in popularity in the wake of this summer, and that may hurt him. As a result, most feel James would require spectacular numbers to produce a three-peat. So far, he doesn't have them.

Instead it will be Paul, or Williams, or Dirk Nowitzki, or Kobe Bryant (quietly up to No. 5 in both PER and EWA), or Dwight Howard (another player whose team is a mild disappointment), or … well, somebody.

But at the one-quarter mark of the season, it seems highly likely that we'll end up with a less-than-overwhelming MVP. Maybe it's a sign of greater parity or maybe it's just an odd fluke, but whoever wins the award this season likely will do so with an unusually pedestrian résumé.

---

[MavFan6488]

here is the article:

Quick, finish this sentence: The NBA's 2010-11 MVP thus far is …

Having trouble? Me too. While a great many players have been mooted as MVP "candidates" by the chattering classes -- more than usual, I would submit -- the glaring lack of a favorite in this year's race is one of the league's biggest stories from the first quarter of the season.

In fact, even the description "MVP candidate" is something of a backhanded compliment. The "candidate" suffix serves as a disclaimer: I'd never actually vote for this cat for MVP, they're telling you, but I just want you to know that he's having a heck of a year. Otherwise they'd just stop at "MVP."

There's a good reason for that, too. The lack of true MVP fiber in this season's race is pretty glaring, which is why we've drummed up so many speculative "candidates." Look at the player efficiency rating leaderboard for proof. Normally, at the 20-game mark we'd have several players pushing at or near the 30.0 mark; eventually they'd cool off and only a couple of players would be left in the high 20s by the end, and that's the pot we'd usually pick our MVPs from.

This season we're in a different situation. Only one player -- Chris Paul of the Hornets -- has a PER above 26, an amazing circumstance for this early in the season. In contrast, last season, three players finished the season with PERs above 26 (LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Kevin Durant). That's par for the course: We've had at least three every year since 2003-04. The last time only one player finished above 26 was 2000-01.

Not only does Paul lack for company atop the leaderboard, but he's not exactly blowing the league away himself. We haven't seen a league leader with a PER this low in a quarter century -- not since Larry Bird in 1985-86. And remember, normally at this point in the season we have a league leader with a higher number than the season-ending total, simply because it's easier to rack up an amazing 20-game stretch than an amazing 80-game stretch.

That point is an important one, because even CP's lofty mark may be difficult to sustain. Paul's PER lead is built on three planks -- a career-high 49.1 percent mark on 3s, a career-high 91.4 percent mark from the line and an absolutely staggering steals rate of nearly one every 10 minutes -- that are outliers compared to the rest of his career. A statistician would expect those numbers to revert closer to his career norms -- we call this regression to the mean in the statistical world -- and if it happens we may end the season without a single player with a plus-26 PER.

Perhaps it won't, since Paul has legitimately improved as a shooter -- any time opponents go under the screen now he's busting a J. Nonetheless, it says volumes about the lack of superstar power in the league this season that the top PER belongs to a guy taking 11 shots a game.

So what happened? For starters, last year's leaders have all seen their numbers go way down. James, Wade and Chris Bosh were first, third and fourth in PER a year ago; this season each has seen his rating drop several points, although all three have been on the rise of late. Last year's No. 5 player on the leaderboard, San Antonio's Tim Duncan, has also produced less this time around.

And then there's Durant. After finishing third in PER a year ago at the tender age of 21, many expected him to ascend to the top of the MVP throne. Instead, he's not even the top candidate on his own team right now; while he is leading the league in scoring, he is only 19th in PER.

In fact, Durant's league-leading scoring total is another convincing data point for the relative lack of superstardom this season. His 27.3 points per game would be the lowest league-leading total since Allen Iverson's 26.3 in 1998-99; if you're looking at non-lockout years, it's the least since George Gervin's 27.2 in 1977-78.

Normally, faced with a dilemma like this, MVP voters simply plump for the guy on the team who wins the most games, but even that tactic may fail this year. The teams with the three best records -- Dallas, Boston and San Antonio -- don't have a player in the top five in estimated wins added.

The other voter tactic is to vote for the best player on the most surprising team. This season, in fact, has all the hallmarks of the last time we had no clear-cut statistical candidate -- the 2004-05 season in which Steve Nash prevailed. The top PER player that season, Kevin Garnett, didn't make the playoffs, and the two players who otherwise would have topped the ballots, Duncan and Shaquille O'Neal, both missed too many games.

There's one key difference, however: We have no Phoenix coming out of the woodwork to shock the league. As a result, we aren't awash in "surprise" options. Of the top five players in estimated wins added, only Paul and Utah's Deron Williams play for a team considered to be exceeding expectations, and in neither case is the excess dramatic. You'll also hear people try to talk themselves into Amare Stoudemire (eighth in EWA), but that may die down quickly: The Knicks have played the league's second-easiest schedule thus far.

In fact, all these roads seem to be taking us back down one path: LeBron James, again. His Heat have recovered from a shaky start and he's No. 1 in EWA.

Three factors work against him, however. First, the Heat have dramatically underperformed sky-high expectations. Second, voter fatigue may creep in after giving him the trophy the past two years. Finally, he's not exactly awash in popularity in the wake of this summer, and that may hurt him. As a result, most feel James would require spectacular numbers to produce a three-peat. So far, he doesn't have them.

Instead it will be Paul, or Williams, or Dirk Nowitzki, or Kobe Bryant (quietly up to No. 5 in both PER and EWA), or Dwight Howard (another player whose team is a mild disappointment), or … well, somebody.

But at the one-quarter mark of the season, it seems highly likely that we'll end up with a less-than-overwhelming MVP. Maybe it's a sign of greater parity or maybe it's just an odd fluke, but whoever wins the award this season likely will do so with an unusually pedestrian résumé.

---
finally! thank you! it only took 2 pages..

[MavFan6488]

@hollinger: lol lebron cocksucker..

wade was named player of the week by the way....not LeBitch..

[Magic2Kobe]

I say Kobe should be MVP. He's the best player on the champs, and had to play without Drew for all these games.

[Blake]

Amare has a case for mvp.

I'd vote for Dirk Nowinanyringsspurs4>0ski