Honorable Mentions
The following players won’t finish in the top 10 next year, but deserve to be mentioned along with those that will for one reason or another.
Kristaps Porzingis and Devin Booker
To be clear, neither of these players will sniff a vote next year, not due to lack of production, but because their teams will almost certainly be a special kind of terrible. They’re here as a nod to 2018-19.
Booker could lead the league in scoring by then, while Porzingis (with apologies to the Freak, who we’ll get to soon) is the most unique player in the NBA and continues to put in serious work to improve. Just check his Instagram if you don’t believe me.
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If either Phoenix or New York can sniff 45 wins two seasons from now, one or both will make their debut.
Gordon Hayward and Isaiah Thomas
Their exclusion from the top ten isn’t an indictment against the Celtics, who should cruise to the East’s top seed before all is said and done. It is much more of a reflection on the type of team they will be while getting there.
Thomas’ meteoric rise last season caught everyone by surprise, and voters were more apt to overlook the fact that he’s a one-way player. Add in the injury uncertainty and his new teammate picking up some of the scoring burden, and it’s easy to see how he drops out.
Hayward, unlike Thomas this past season, will be met with all the expectations that come with signing a max deal as the most high-profile free agent of the offseason (I’m not counting KD or Steph, who’s free agencies were a mere formality). To get votes, he would have to not only post incredible counting stats, but also clearly supersede Thomas as the team’s best player. Neither is likely to happen.
Think of the 2017-18 Celtics as a supped-up version of the 2014-15 Atlanta Hawks. That team won 60 games, got the top seed, and didn’t have a single player garner an MVP vote. Gordon and/or Thomas should end up on a few ballots, but in a loaded field, it won’t be enough to get them into the top 10.
Nikola Jokic and Joel Embiid
If either of them make the leap from super fun and intriguing youngster to full-fledged superstar that Giannis made last season, this could be selling them short. But even Antetokounmpo, who led his team in every counting stat, was never in the “he could win it!” conversation, only the “he should be in the conversation” conversation. There’s a difference.
The bet here is that each is still a year away from the latter. Jokic, at least in certain games next season, will not be the best player on his own team. Hi defense remains a liability and Denver will have to battle just to remain in playoff contention.
For Embiid, the issue is purely health. If he played 78 games last year at the same level as the 37 he appeared in, he might have finished higher than Giannis. If and when he does put it together, the sky is the limit. Don’t think it happens next season.
Anthony Davis
Easily the toughest exclusion from the list. If Boogie really has figured it out and the Pelicans get enough shooting to win 50-something games next season, Davis could win the award. He was so good last year that he finished tied for ninth in the voting despite playing for a 34-win team.
But the West got even tougher, and New Orleans could find itself with 45 wins…and the eleventh best record in the conference. Even then, a healthy Davis would find his way into the top ten. His placement here is – what’s the opposite of a vote of confidence? A vote of disparity? Whatever it is, that’s what any team starting Boogie and Rondo gets until proven otherwise.