We have entered the final week of the NBA regular season. Naturally, people have entered the most vociferous stage of the MVP debate, with official ballots due in the very near future. Three candidates feel like the surefire frontrunners — the Sixers‘ Joel Embiid, the Nuggets’ Nikola Jokic, and the Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo. Ask any three people, and you might get three different answers as to who deserves the No. 1 spot. The next tier is full of extremely talented and qualified players, so it’s no easier to decipher the fourth and fifth spots.
That being said, here are three different ballots from three of our writers in an effort to offer perspective on this wild, tangled race. MVP has never been an easy award to define — what does “most valuable” entail, exactly — but we’ve done our best to pick the five most deserving candidates.
Is Sixers’ Joel Embiid the favorite to win NBA MVP?
Right now, the favorite in Vegas is Nikola Jokic, while Giannis Antetokounmpo’s recent surge and Joel Embiid’s season-long dominance keep them firmly in the mix. A recent ESPN straw poll marked Jokic as the winner, but it was far from a blowout, with the general sentiment being “we’re still not decided.” A lot of voters are still mulling it over right now, which is rare. The national media has normally landed on something resembling a consensus at this point in the season.
Here is each contender’s stat line as of Tuesday, April 5.
- EMBIID — 30.2 PPG, 11.6 RPG, 4.2 APG, 1.1 SPG, 1.5 BPG, 3.1 TOV, 49.3 FG%, 36.8 3P%, 81.7 FT%
- JOKIC — 26.8 PPG, 13.7 RPG, 8.0 APG, 1.4 SPG, 0.9 BPG, 3.8 TOV, 58.3 FG%, 33.9 3P%, 81.1 FT%
- GIANNIS — 30.1 PPG, 11.6 RPG, 5.8 APG, 1.1 SPG, 1.4 SPG, 3.3 TOV, 55.4 FG%, 29.6 3P%, 72.1 FT%
- BOOKER — 26.6 PPG, 5.0 RPG, 4.9 APG, 1.2 SPG, 0.4 BPG, 2.4 TOV, 46.4 FG%, 37.7 3P%, 86.5 FT%
- DEROZAN — 28.0 PPG, 5.3 RPG, 5.0 APG, 0.9 SPG, 0.3 BPG, 2.3 TOV, 50.3 FG%, 35.5 3P%, 87.7 FT%
- LEBRON — 30.3 PPG, 8.2 RPG, 6.2 APG, 1.3 SPG, 1.1 BPG, 3.5 TOV, 52.4 FG%, 35.9 3P%, 75.6 FT%
- DONCIC — 28.3 PPG, 9.1 RPG, 8.7 APG, 1.2 SPG, 0.5 BPG, 4.5 TOV, 45.6 FG%, 35.3 3P%, 74.4 FT%
Here’s where we landed, with some brief explanations of our stances and why Embiid does (or doesn’t) ultimately deserve to win.