duncan228
04-11-2008, 09:17 PM
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/dailydime?page=dime-080412-13
Stein Line's Season-Ending Award Ballots
By Marc Stein
ESPN.com
It's the final Friday of the regular season ... and you know what that means.
One by one we dribble through the season-ending award ballots that will soon be shipped back to the league office.
Ready?
Most Valuable Player
Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers
I thought the standings would help me decide. But they didn't.
I thought that Chris Paul having the best season of any point guard in a conference teeming with Hall of Fame-bound quarterbacks and leading his team to the best record in the West -- while possibly saving basketball in New Orleans in the process -- would be clinchers.
They weren't.
I thought I'd be voting for Paul after stacking all that up, but this voter simply can't deny Kobe his maiden MVP because the Lakers might finish a game or two or even three behind the Cinderella Hornets in the nine-team race of the century. I keep looking at Bryant's season and looking at Paul's and, yes, I'm still giving the edge to Kobe.
For all of Paul's undeniable brilliance -- and for all of you who can't wait to angrily dismiss this as a Lifetime Achievement Award for the guy who's considered the Best Player To Never Win The MVP Award -- I'm sorry. But Bryant has had to deal with and do more this season than even CP3.
Bryant has seen more double- and triple-teams and junk defenses. He's endured a far lower grade of overall team health; Andrew Bynum will end up playing less than half of the season and Pau Gasol has missed 11 games, too, just since his Feb. 1 arrival. Kobe has also played through a hand injury of his own that still requires surgery and is asked by his coach and teammates to be All-NBA at both ends, all while shouldering higher expectations than any player in the league.
Kobe certainly could have made this a lot easier if the Lakers hadn't suffered those unforgivable home losses to the Bobcats and Grizzlies in late March, giving New Orleans its huge opening to shock the world and secure the West's No. 1 overall seed. But I'm rescinding my previous contention that the team with the better record would decide the Kobe vs. Paul derby because the win-total difference, in the end, won't be sufficiently drastic enough to separate these two. The variables mentioned above, to me, are bigger.
I know, I know. Now you're going to ask how I could vote for Steve Nash two years running and not vote for Paul now. That complaint, for starters, has never made sense to me. Every season, and thus every MVP race, should be judged on its own. The specifics of every season are different and so is the MVP field every season. Just look at this field: It's suddenly down to a two-man sprint after it seemed for so long that we had four potential MVPs, now that LeBron James and his Cavaliers are sputtering to the finish and with Kevin Garnett's culture-changing impact in Boston unfairly (but unavoidably) taken for granted because of all the wildness out West.
If you insist on persisting with the Nash comparison, don't forget that the little Canadian won his back-to-back MVPs for almost single-handedly turning a 29-win team into a 62-win team in a West that wasn't too shabby ... and then by keeping Phoenix at a 54-win level after they traded away Joe Johnson and then lost Amare Stoudemire for most of the following season. None of that really helps us here anyway because Paul's play is closer to the blueprint of Nash's maiden MVP, but Bryant's season more closely resembles Nash's repeat performance.
Clear cut for Kobe? No one would dare say that. But I finally decided that Bryant has to be my MVP when he's playing the team ball of his life, for a club everyone fears in the playoffs far more than the Hornets, while he's also playing in a stratosphere as an individual that only LeBron can presently reach. At Stein Line HQ, all that adds up to No. 24.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Bryant
2. Paul
3. Garnett
4. James
5. Manu Ginobili, San Antonio
October prediction: Garnett
Coach of the Year
Byron Scott, New Orleans Hornets
This might be the only category going where the poor Leastern Conference supplies us with as many qualified applicants as the West. You can make an unassailable case that Boston's Doc Rivers, Orlando's Stan Van Gundy or Philadelphia's Maurice Cheeks has to be named COY. Washington's Eddie Jordan probably should be in the conversation, too.
Not that the Westerners are lacking. Rick Adelman kept Houston glued together through a significant change in X-and-O philosophy and lengthy injury absences for both Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming. Phil Jackson has to get a decent slice of the kudos in Lakerland for keeping Kobe plugged in through a nuclear October and for Bryant finally showing us his best leadership qualities. Portland's Nate McMillan, meanwhile, is almost forgotten because the Blazers' Philly-like surge from nowhere was back in December. Which seems like years ago with everything happening this season.
And as usual ...
Pretty much no one even mention's Utah's Jerry Sloan or San Antonio's Gregg Popovich. Ditto for the Suns' Mike D'Antoni, who only had to add a completely separate and foreign half-court element to his run-and-gun system -- some midseason modification, huh? -- to accommodate the February arrival of a certain Shaquille O'Neal.
But if you're not going to vote Paul for MVP -- and maybe even if you do -- it's hard to resist Scott's season. Like Jackson, Lord Byron gets some nurturing points for Paul's considerable progress and even more points from me for how he's reached Tyson Chandler, given that Scott can be as hard-driving as the coach in Chicago (Scott Skiles) whom Chandler couldn't wait to escape. With the Hornets on the verge of winning the tightest conference race of all time, I can only conclude that the perennially underrated Scott is no less a factor than Paul or the Hornets' drastically improved health.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Scott
2. Adelman
3. Cheeks
October prediction: Van Gundy
Rookie of the Year
Kevin Durant, Seattle SuperSonics
I totally understand the urge to vote for Atlanta's Al Horford. He's averaging a near double-double for the playoff-bound Hawks. Better yet, Horford is only the fifth rookie center in the past 30 years to make 70 starts for a playoff-bound team, joining Cleveland's Zydrunas Ilgauskas (1997-98), Boston's Eric Montross (1994-95), Charlotte's Alonzo Mourning (1992-93), San Antonio's David Robinson (1989-90) and Houston's Hakeem Olajuwon (1984-85).
Yet I feel compelled to ask Durant's detractors: What more could Durant have done in his rookie season? What more could he have done in this situation? Grab an extra couple rebounds every game? Exhibit more disciplined shot selection?
Fine. Dwell on what Durant didn't do at 19 if you must.
I prefer to focus on how this teenager -- with his NBA body still years away and with very little quality help to distract opposing defenses -- got better as the season dribbled on. I'm voting for the kid who, if he doesn't slip in the Sonics' final three games, will become just the second rookie guard over the last 20 seasons to post a 20-point scoring average, joining then-Sixer Allen Iverson.
Said one Western Conference executive: "Screw the weight room. Screw the bench press. This kid is a real, live basketball player. You'll see. When he fills out, he's going to be great."
Some of us thought his rookie season was pretty good, too, all things considered.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Durant
2. Horford
3. Al Thornton, Los Angeles Clippers
October prediction: Durant
2. Award Ballots, Part Deux
Sixth Man Award
Manu Ginobili, San Antonio Spurs
There are actually more good sixth men in the NBA than we ever mention. Last season's leading sixth man, Phoenix's Leandro Barbosa, hasn't been as deadly this season but he still has the numbers to make dozens of starters jealous. Toronto's Jose Calderon is a personal favorite. Utah's Kyle Korver, Philadelphia's Louis Williams, even Denver's erratic (but frequently electric) J.R. Smith are all highly flammable.
Yet we will continue to say, like certain Spurs insiders do, that Ginobili has been the Spur who makes it happen this season (or doesn't) even more than Tim Duncan.
As noted here before, Ginobili is the only sixth man in the league who will get MVP votes ... and enough with that stuff about him playing so many minutes when Manu's really averaging a modest 31.2 per game.
As Charles Barkley volunteered Thursday night on TNT: "If he keep comin' off the bench, they're gonna have to retire this award."
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Ginobili
2. Calderon
3. Barbosa
October prediction: Barbosa
Defensive Player of the Year
Kevin Garnett, Boston Celtics
This is another category stuffed with quality candidates but ultimately an absolute slam dunk.
Denver's Marcus Camby, Duncan, Orlando's Dwight Howard and New Orleans' Tyson Chandler are fellow standouts from Garnett's size classification. Houston's Shane Battier, meanwhile, is finally starting to get the recognition for his perimeter hounding that typically only goes to Texas neighbor Bruce Bowen in San Antonio or Sacramento's Ron Artest.
But KG has been so defensively transformative -- to steal a David Stern word -- that even I must divorce myself from a long-held vow to vote for my former college classmate Bowen until the Cal State Fullerton legend finally wins this award.
There's no denying the impact that new Celts assistant coach Tom Thibodeau has made (with Doc Rivers' blessing) to spruce up a defense that allowed teams to score nearly 100 points a game last season while ranking 24th in field-goal defense at 46.8 percent. Yet it's KG's versatility and exacting execution as the Celts' defensive anchor and his peerless passion and preparation as a culture-changer that has resulted in Boston holding the opposition to 41.9 percent shooting this season while surrendering just 90 points a game.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Garnett
2. Camby
3. Bowen
October prediction: Bowen
Most Improved Player
Hedo Turkoglu, Orlando Magic
We sing the same whiny song every April. Do you give the MIP to the player who jumps from non-factor to impact player? Or to the guy who goes from good to really good? Or to the guy who makes the subtle statistical climb but otherwise monstrous leap from good to the rarefied air of full-fledged stud?
This one will probably never be easy.
I'll hit you with more than a dozen names and I know you'll email me more. Fire away: Who am I leaving out?
Rudy Gay, Andrew Bynum, Beno Udrih and Rajon Rondo are already on my list. So are Mike Dunleavy, Chris Kaman, LaMarcus Aldridge and Calderon. Ditto for three big men who might have been too good already to be considered here -- Howard, Al Jefferson and David West -- and the reigning MIP out in Oakland who made us legitimately ask if you can be an MIP for two seasons running.
But we're not going with Monta Ellis again. Nor are we voting for Chris Paul, even after listening to Professor Hollinger make a case for CP3 as the MIP on Chad Ford's NBA Dish podcast this week and agreeing with him. To a point.
We're voting instead for Turkoglu, even though the league's official ballot -- as noted here previously -- instructs us to vote for an "up-and-coming player" and not "a player who has made a comeback."
Turkoglu is no up-and-comer at nearly 29 and in his eighth season, but he finally answered those around the league who have wondered for years what he's capable of if he could stay focused. Uninterested? Disinterested? Whatever the right word is -- we always mess that one up -- Turkoglu went from that unflattering description to a go-to guy in the fourth quarter for a 50-win team. He's raised his nightly scoring output from a career average of 10.5 points to 19.6 per game and has ranked in the top five in fourth-quarter scoring all season. Which adds up to an MIP to us.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Turkoglu
2. Gay
3. Aldridge
October prediction: Jason Maxiell, Detroit
3. All-NBA Update
Any adjustments to my All-NBA leanings, as promised last week, would be shared here before my official ballot was turned back in to the league.
Allow me to register three changes.
My only egregious mistake: Denver simply can't have two representatives on a 15-man squad. Not even after the Nuggets rebounded from those heinous weekend losses to Sacramento (which didn't dress Ron Artest or Brad Miller) and Seattle (the first 60-loss team in Sonics history) to wipe out an early 15-point deficit and win their biggest game all season Thursday night at Golden State.
No matter how ageless Allen Iverson has looked for the Nuggets at 32, Utah's Deron Williams can't receive worse than third-team treatment for his contribution to a team that could conceivably win the West and his repeated ability to win games against his pal Chris Paul. So he takes Iverson's place.
But that one was a relatively easy gaffe to spot. D-Will honestly should have been there from the start.
The toughest call continues to be at first-team center, because Amare Stoudemire has played enough in the pivot this season to qualify as a center for All-NBA purposes, still plays a fair bit of center on a nightly basis when Shaquille O'Neal is off the floor ... and because Amare has been more of a go-to guy than Dwight Howard as one of the five most fearsome forces in the league over the past few months.
Howard, however, is a center without reservation and made a real run at joining Wilt Chamberlain in an exclusive club of players to average 20 points, 15 rebounds and 60-percent shooting for an entire season. He's about to land agonizingly short (21.0 ppg, 14.4 rpg, .598 shooting) in that ambitious quest, but Howard has managed to lead Orlando to its first 50-win season since Shaq's departure in the summer of 1996 after the Magic went 60-22.
The solution? After planning to put Stoudemire ahead of Howard on the first team -- and then wrestling with it ever since because it's so tough to choose between them -- I'm defaulting to Tim Duncan as my first-team center.
I know, I know: Duncan loathes being typecast as a five man and was even switched by the league from center back to forward on the All-Star ballot when the Spurs protested Duncan's reclassification as a center. "Without trying to cause too much of a stir," Duncan told us back in November, "it just seems like a limited position. I think I can do a little bit more than what a center is labeled as [doing]. But it's just a label."
Yet it's a label that keeps getting slapped on Duncan because he logs so much time as the Spurs' only recognizable big man, operating as the anchor of the league's most vaunted defense and generally functioning as a five. Don't know why Duncan would protest this interpretation if it gets him on the All-NBA first team, so this is how my revised ballot will look along with one last tweak: Dirk Nowitzki's valiant and increasingly clutch play on one leg to cap his second-half resurgence and ensure that the Mavericks wouldn't miss the playoffs was the clincher for me to nudge the reigning MVP onto the second team ahead of Carlos Boozer, who will now share equal billing with D-Will.
FIRST TEAM
F Kevin Garnett (Boston)
F LeBron James (Cleveland)
C Tim Duncan (San Antonio)
G Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers)
G Chris Paul (New Orleans)
SECOND TEAM
F Amare Stoudemire (Phoenix)
F Dirk Nowitzki (Dallas)
C Dwight Howard (Orlando)
G Manu Ginobili (San Antonio)
G Steve Nash (Phoenix)
THIRD TEAM
F Carlos Boozer (Utah)
F Paul Pierce (Boston)
C Marcus Camby (Denver)
G Deron Williams (Utah)
G Tracy McGrady (Houston)
FIVE TOUGHEST OMISSIONS (Listed alphabetically)
Carmelo Anthony (Denver)
Chauncey Billups (Detroit)
Baron Davis (Golden State)
Allen Iverson (Denver)
Antawn Jamison (Washington)
Stein Line's Season-Ending Award Ballots
By Marc Stein
ESPN.com
It's the final Friday of the regular season ... and you know what that means.
One by one we dribble through the season-ending award ballots that will soon be shipped back to the league office.
Ready?
Most Valuable Player
Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers
I thought the standings would help me decide. But they didn't.
I thought that Chris Paul having the best season of any point guard in a conference teeming with Hall of Fame-bound quarterbacks and leading his team to the best record in the West -- while possibly saving basketball in New Orleans in the process -- would be clinchers.
They weren't.
I thought I'd be voting for Paul after stacking all that up, but this voter simply can't deny Kobe his maiden MVP because the Lakers might finish a game or two or even three behind the Cinderella Hornets in the nine-team race of the century. I keep looking at Bryant's season and looking at Paul's and, yes, I'm still giving the edge to Kobe.
For all of Paul's undeniable brilliance -- and for all of you who can't wait to angrily dismiss this as a Lifetime Achievement Award for the guy who's considered the Best Player To Never Win The MVP Award -- I'm sorry. But Bryant has had to deal with and do more this season than even CP3.
Bryant has seen more double- and triple-teams and junk defenses. He's endured a far lower grade of overall team health; Andrew Bynum will end up playing less than half of the season and Pau Gasol has missed 11 games, too, just since his Feb. 1 arrival. Kobe has also played through a hand injury of his own that still requires surgery and is asked by his coach and teammates to be All-NBA at both ends, all while shouldering higher expectations than any player in the league.
Kobe certainly could have made this a lot easier if the Lakers hadn't suffered those unforgivable home losses to the Bobcats and Grizzlies in late March, giving New Orleans its huge opening to shock the world and secure the West's No. 1 overall seed. But I'm rescinding my previous contention that the team with the better record would decide the Kobe vs. Paul derby because the win-total difference, in the end, won't be sufficiently drastic enough to separate these two. The variables mentioned above, to me, are bigger.
I know, I know. Now you're going to ask how I could vote for Steve Nash two years running and not vote for Paul now. That complaint, for starters, has never made sense to me. Every season, and thus every MVP race, should be judged on its own. The specifics of every season are different and so is the MVP field every season. Just look at this field: It's suddenly down to a two-man sprint after it seemed for so long that we had four potential MVPs, now that LeBron James and his Cavaliers are sputtering to the finish and with Kevin Garnett's culture-changing impact in Boston unfairly (but unavoidably) taken for granted because of all the wildness out West.
If you insist on persisting with the Nash comparison, don't forget that the little Canadian won his back-to-back MVPs for almost single-handedly turning a 29-win team into a 62-win team in a West that wasn't too shabby ... and then by keeping Phoenix at a 54-win level after they traded away Joe Johnson and then lost Amare Stoudemire for most of the following season. None of that really helps us here anyway because Paul's play is closer to the blueprint of Nash's maiden MVP, but Bryant's season more closely resembles Nash's repeat performance.
Clear cut for Kobe? No one would dare say that. But I finally decided that Bryant has to be my MVP when he's playing the team ball of his life, for a club everyone fears in the playoffs far more than the Hornets, while he's also playing in a stratosphere as an individual that only LeBron can presently reach. At Stein Line HQ, all that adds up to No. 24.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Bryant
2. Paul
3. Garnett
4. James
5. Manu Ginobili, San Antonio
October prediction: Garnett
Coach of the Year
Byron Scott, New Orleans Hornets
This might be the only category going where the poor Leastern Conference supplies us with as many qualified applicants as the West. You can make an unassailable case that Boston's Doc Rivers, Orlando's Stan Van Gundy or Philadelphia's Maurice Cheeks has to be named COY. Washington's Eddie Jordan probably should be in the conversation, too.
Not that the Westerners are lacking. Rick Adelman kept Houston glued together through a significant change in X-and-O philosophy and lengthy injury absences for both Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming. Phil Jackson has to get a decent slice of the kudos in Lakerland for keeping Kobe plugged in through a nuclear October and for Bryant finally showing us his best leadership qualities. Portland's Nate McMillan, meanwhile, is almost forgotten because the Blazers' Philly-like surge from nowhere was back in December. Which seems like years ago with everything happening this season.
And as usual ...
Pretty much no one even mention's Utah's Jerry Sloan or San Antonio's Gregg Popovich. Ditto for the Suns' Mike D'Antoni, who only had to add a completely separate and foreign half-court element to his run-and-gun system -- some midseason modification, huh? -- to accommodate the February arrival of a certain Shaquille O'Neal.
But if you're not going to vote Paul for MVP -- and maybe even if you do -- it's hard to resist Scott's season. Like Jackson, Lord Byron gets some nurturing points for Paul's considerable progress and even more points from me for how he's reached Tyson Chandler, given that Scott can be as hard-driving as the coach in Chicago (Scott Skiles) whom Chandler couldn't wait to escape. With the Hornets on the verge of winning the tightest conference race of all time, I can only conclude that the perennially underrated Scott is no less a factor than Paul or the Hornets' drastically improved health.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Scott
2. Adelman
3. Cheeks
October prediction: Van Gundy
Rookie of the Year
Kevin Durant, Seattle SuperSonics
I totally understand the urge to vote for Atlanta's Al Horford. He's averaging a near double-double for the playoff-bound Hawks. Better yet, Horford is only the fifth rookie center in the past 30 years to make 70 starts for a playoff-bound team, joining Cleveland's Zydrunas Ilgauskas (1997-98), Boston's Eric Montross (1994-95), Charlotte's Alonzo Mourning (1992-93), San Antonio's David Robinson (1989-90) and Houston's Hakeem Olajuwon (1984-85).
Yet I feel compelled to ask Durant's detractors: What more could Durant have done in his rookie season? What more could he have done in this situation? Grab an extra couple rebounds every game? Exhibit more disciplined shot selection?
Fine. Dwell on what Durant didn't do at 19 if you must.
I prefer to focus on how this teenager -- with his NBA body still years away and with very little quality help to distract opposing defenses -- got better as the season dribbled on. I'm voting for the kid who, if he doesn't slip in the Sonics' final three games, will become just the second rookie guard over the last 20 seasons to post a 20-point scoring average, joining then-Sixer Allen Iverson.
Said one Western Conference executive: "Screw the weight room. Screw the bench press. This kid is a real, live basketball player. You'll see. When he fills out, he's going to be great."
Some of us thought his rookie season was pretty good, too, all things considered.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Durant
2. Horford
3. Al Thornton, Los Angeles Clippers
October prediction: Durant
2. Award Ballots, Part Deux
Sixth Man Award
Manu Ginobili, San Antonio Spurs
There are actually more good sixth men in the NBA than we ever mention. Last season's leading sixth man, Phoenix's Leandro Barbosa, hasn't been as deadly this season but he still has the numbers to make dozens of starters jealous. Toronto's Jose Calderon is a personal favorite. Utah's Kyle Korver, Philadelphia's Louis Williams, even Denver's erratic (but frequently electric) J.R. Smith are all highly flammable.
Yet we will continue to say, like certain Spurs insiders do, that Ginobili has been the Spur who makes it happen this season (or doesn't) even more than Tim Duncan.
As noted here before, Ginobili is the only sixth man in the league who will get MVP votes ... and enough with that stuff about him playing so many minutes when Manu's really averaging a modest 31.2 per game.
As Charles Barkley volunteered Thursday night on TNT: "If he keep comin' off the bench, they're gonna have to retire this award."
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Ginobili
2. Calderon
3. Barbosa
October prediction: Barbosa
Defensive Player of the Year
Kevin Garnett, Boston Celtics
This is another category stuffed with quality candidates but ultimately an absolute slam dunk.
Denver's Marcus Camby, Duncan, Orlando's Dwight Howard and New Orleans' Tyson Chandler are fellow standouts from Garnett's size classification. Houston's Shane Battier, meanwhile, is finally starting to get the recognition for his perimeter hounding that typically only goes to Texas neighbor Bruce Bowen in San Antonio or Sacramento's Ron Artest.
But KG has been so defensively transformative -- to steal a David Stern word -- that even I must divorce myself from a long-held vow to vote for my former college classmate Bowen until the Cal State Fullerton legend finally wins this award.
There's no denying the impact that new Celts assistant coach Tom Thibodeau has made (with Doc Rivers' blessing) to spruce up a defense that allowed teams to score nearly 100 points a game last season while ranking 24th in field-goal defense at 46.8 percent. Yet it's KG's versatility and exacting execution as the Celts' defensive anchor and his peerless passion and preparation as a culture-changer that has resulted in Boston holding the opposition to 41.9 percent shooting this season while surrendering just 90 points a game.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Garnett
2. Camby
3. Bowen
October prediction: Bowen
Most Improved Player
Hedo Turkoglu, Orlando Magic
We sing the same whiny song every April. Do you give the MIP to the player who jumps from non-factor to impact player? Or to the guy who goes from good to really good? Or to the guy who makes the subtle statistical climb but otherwise monstrous leap from good to the rarefied air of full-fledged stud?
This one will probably never be easy.
I'll hit you with more than a dozen names and I know you'll email me more. Fire away: Who am I leaving out?
Rudy Gay, Andrew Bynum, Beno Udrih and Rajon Rondo are already on my list. So are Mike Dunleavy, Chris Kaman, LaMarcus Aldridge and Calderon. Ditto for three big men who might have been too good already to be considered here -- Howard, Al Jefferson and David West -- and the reigning MIP out in Oakland who made us legitimately ask if you can be an MIP for two seasons running.
But we're not going with Monta Ellis again. Nor are we voting for Chris Paul, even after listening to Professor Hollinger make a case for CP3 as the MIP on Chad Ford's NBA Dish podcast this week and agreeing with him. To a point.
We're voting instead for Turkoglu, even though the league's official ballot -- as noted here previously -- instructs us to vote for an "up-and-coming player" and not "a player who has made a comeback."
Turkoglu is no up-and-comer at nearly 29 and in his eighth season, but he finally answered those around the league who have wondered for years what he's capable of if he could stay focused. Uninterested? Disinterested? Whatever the right word is -- we always mess that one up -- Turkoglu went from that unflattering description to a go-to guy in the fourth quarter for a 50-win team. He's raised his nightly scoring output from a career average of 10.5 points to 19.6 per game and has ranked in the top five in fourth-quarter scoring all season. Which adds up to an MIP to us.
STEIN'S BALLOT
1. Turkoglu
2. Gay
3. Aldridge
October prediction: Jason Maxiell, Detroit
3. All-NBA Update
Any adjustments to my All-NBA leanings, as promised last week, would be shared here before my official ballot was turned back in to the league.
Allow me to register three changes.
My only egregious mistake: Denver simply can't have two representatives on a 15-man squad. Not even after the Nuggets rebounded from those heinous weekend losses to Sacramento (which didn't dress Ron Artest or Brad Miller) and Seattle (the first 60-loss team in Sonics history) to wipe out an early 15-point deficit and win their biggest game all season Thursday night at Golden State.
No matter how ageless Allen Iverson has looked for the Nuggets at 32, Utah's Deron Williams can't receive worse than third-team treatment for his contribution to a team that could conceivably win the West and his repeated ability to win games against his pal Chris Paul. So he takes Iverson's place.
But that one was a relatively easy gaffe to spot. D-Will honestly should have been there from the start.
The toughest call continues to be at first-team center, because Amare Stoudemire has played enough in the pivot this season to qualify as a center for All-NBA purposes, still plays a fair bit of center on a nightly basis when Shaquille O'Neal is off the floor ... and because Amare has been more of a go-to guy than Dwight Howard as one of the five most fearsome forces in the league over the past few months.
Howard, however, is a center without reservation and made a real run at joining Wilt Chamberlain in an exclusive club of players to average 20 points, 15 rebounds and 60-percent shooting for an entire season. He's about to land agonizingly short (21.0 ppg, 14.4 rpg, .598 shooting) in that ambitious quest, but Howard has managed to lead Orlando to its first 50-win season since Shaq's departure in the summer of 1996 after the Magic went 60-22.
The solution? After planning to put Stoudemire ahead of Howard on the first team -- and then wrestling with it ever since because it's so tough to choose between them -- I'm defaulting to Tim Duncan as my first-team center.
I know, I know: Duncan loathes being typecast as a five man and was even switched by the league from center back to forward on the All-Star ballot when the Spurs protested Duncan's reclassification as a center. "Without trying to cause too much of a stir," Duncan told us back in November, "it just seems like a limited position. I think I can do a little bit more than what a center is labeled as [doing]. But it's just a label."
Yet it's a label that keeps getting slapped on Duncan because he logs so much time as the Spurs' only recognizable big man, operating as the anchor of the league's most vaunted defense and generally functioning as a five. Don't know why Duncan would protest this interpretation if it gets him on the All-NBA first team, so this is how my revised ballot will look along with one last tweak: Dirk Nowitzki's valiant and increasingly clutch play on one leg to cap his second-half resurgence and ensure that the Mavericks wouldn't miss the playoffs was the clincher for me to nudge the reigning MVP onto the second team ahead of Carlos Boozer, who will now share equal billing with D-Will.
FIRST TEAM
F Kevin Garnett (Boston)
F LeBron James (Cleveland)
C Tim Duncan (San Antonio)
G Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers)
G Chris Paul (New Orleans)
SECOND TEAM
F Amare Stoudemire (Phoenix)
F Dirk Nowitzki (Dallas)
C Dwight Howard (Orlando)
G Manu Ginobili (San Antonio)
G Steve Nash (Phoenix)
THIRD TEAM
F Carlos Boozer (Utah)
F Paul Pierce (Boston)
C Marcus Camby (Denver)
G Deron Williams (Utah)
G Tracy McGrady (Houston)
FIVE TOUGHEST OMISSIONS (Listed alphabetically)
Carmelo Anthony (Denver)
Chauncey Billups (Detroit)
Baron Davis (Golden State)
Allen Iverson (Denver)
Antawn Jamison (Washington)