1. Award Stuff Part II: We just finished up our award picks last week and I realized I left out a few things. We made all our picks in terms of awards but we had also been reviewing each award historically speaking. In that sense, we short thrifted our historical review of the Sixth Man, Most Improved, and MVP awards. So, while we wait for final playoff seedings to be locked in, let’s look at some history.
Sixth Man: We noted in our pick of Jason Terry over Nate Robinson, that this award generally goes to a player on a good team because of a perception that the a bench player would have more impact on a good team, than a team that was perpetually behind. We actually received a decent amount of emails that disagreed with that this theory. Without taking a position on the issue one way or another, let’s take a look at each Sixth Man and see if this is true:
-1982-83: Bobby Jones, 76ers (65-17, won title)
-1983-84: Kevin McHale, Celtics (62-20, won title)
-1984-85: Kevin McHale, Celtics (63-19, lost in NBA Finals)
-1985-86: Bill Walton, Celtics (67-15, won title)
-1986-87: Ricky Pierce, Bucks (50-32, lost in 2nd round)
-1987-88: Roy Tarpley, Mavs (53-29, lost in conference finals)
-1988-89: Eddie Johnson, Suns (55-27, lost in conference finals)
-1989-90: Ricky Pierce, Bucks (44-38, lost in 1st round)
-1990-91: Detlef Schrempf, Pacers (41-41, lost in 1st round)
-1991-92: Detlef Schrempf, Pacers (40-42, lost in 1st round)
-1992-93: Clifford Robinson, Blazers (51-31, lost in 1st round)
-1993-94: Dell Curry, Hornets (41-41, did not make playoffs)
-1994-95: Anthony Mason, Knicks (55-27, lost in 2nd round)
-1995-96: Toni Kukoc, Bulls (72-10, won title)
-1996-97: John Starks, Knicks (57-25, lost in 2nd round)
-1997-98: Danny Manning, Suns (56-26, lost in 1st round)
-1998-99: Darrell Armstrong, Magic (33-17, lost in 1st round)
-1999-00: Rodney Rogers, Suns (53-29, lost in 2nd round)
-2000-01: Aaron McKie, 76ers (56-26, lost in NBA finals)
-2001-02: Corliss Williamson, Pistons (50-32, lost in 2nd round)
-2002-03: Bobby Jackson, Kings (59-23, lost in 2nd round)
-2003-04: Antawn Jamison, Mavs (52-30, lost in 1st round)
-2004-05: Ben Gordon, Bulls (47-35, lost in 1st round)
-2005-06: Mike Miller, Grizz (49-33, lost in 1st round)
-2006-07: Leandro Barbosa, Suns (61-21, lost in 2nd round)
-2007-08: Manu Ginobili, Spurs (56-26, lost in conference finals)
Of the 26 winners, only one, Dell Curry, won the award without being on a playoff team. In fact, only in the five-years stretch from 1989-90 to 1993-94 has the winner come from teams at or near .500 (Curry, Schrempf twice, and Pierce). In fact, a scan of the voting records show virtually no support for non-playoff sixth men outside of Curry. Parenthetically, Curry was probably the best candidate for the 1993-94 award, though Armen Gilliam had as much of a claim for the playoff bound Nets.
-Most Improved: In assessing this award, it hits you that silliness of the award. We don’t know if the criteria is improvement from mediocrity to good player or from star to superstar or whether a surprise improvement matters more than an expected one. We can infer that the award is meant to be for a surprise performance but at the end of the day, who really cares? Indeed, many of the awards are forgotten (Don MacLean, Alan Henderson) or were not necessarily that impressive to begin with (Isaac Austin, Bobby Simmons). Really, the award was instituted mostly because its predecessor, comeback player of the year went too often to a rehabilitated drug/alcohol abuser. For what it’s worth, there were six comeback players of the year (from 1980-81 through 1985-86) and here is the lowdown on each:
–1980-81, Bernard King, Golden State: King barely played in 1979-80 for Utah, which I believe was related to substance problems. King never relapsed and was great for the rest of his career until knee injuries hit.
–1981-82, Gus Williams, Seattle: Williams sat out 1980-81 in salary dispute with management that ended up back in town a year later, no worse for wear.
–1982-83, Paul Westphal, New York: After struggling with injuries his first year in New York, Westphal came back and played an 80 game slate, albeit as a part-timer (10 ppg, 5.5 apg in 24.7 mpg). He would play one more season before retiring.
–1983-84, Adrian Dantley, Utah: Dantley came back from a major injury to resume his career.
–1984-85, Micheal Ray Richardson, New Jersey: Richardson is the famous relapser that may have cause the award to disappear. Richardson, had a very public relapse the next year that ended his NBA career and embarrassed the NBA. While attitudes have changed as to how to treat addicts in terms of stigma, to this day, it is clear that the NBA has very little tolerance for drug use, as we’ve seen quite a few players bounced quickly and summarily.
–1985-86: Marques Johnson, L.A. Clippers: Johnson didn’t miss any time with drug issues but after Milwaukee traded him to the Clippers it came out that Johnson had secretly gone to rehab. He struggled his first year in L.A. in 1984-85 (16.4 ppg, .452 FG%, 5.9 rpg, 14.3 PER) but bounced in 1985-86 (20.3 ppg, .510 FG%, 5.5 rpg, 18.9 PER). Unfortunately, Johnson promptly blew out his knee in 1986-87 and never really played again (this ironically ocurred when the Clipps lost Norm Nixon in that off-season with a severe knee injury too).
While drugs certainly where an issue with the comeback award, only Richardson ended up making his award look bad. Nevertheless, the NBA decided that calling attention to the issue was not a great idea. Hell, Chris Andersen would be an excellent candidate for the old award this year. I understand the changes by the NBA office but frankly a return to the comeback award would be a little more fun.
–MVP: There is really not so much to say about the MVP this year or in past years, as this award is always well covered. I though, instead, with the help of Basketball-Reference.com’s awesome database, we could look at a few of the funnier MVP votes. By votes, I don’t mean ultimate results but players whom some individual voters deemed MVP worthy. We can’t hit them all but here are a few highlights:
–1979-80: While Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (24.8 ppg, 10.8 rpg, 3.4 bpg) took the award handily, Julius Erving, George Gervin, and Larry Bird, all had several first place votes. None of this is too shocking but somehow, Tiny Archibald (14.1 ppg, 8.4 apg) and Dan Roundfield(!) (16.5 ppg, 10.3 rpg) each gut some first place votes. Tiny’s vote was particularly odd since Bird was clearly the best player on the team.
–1980-81: Somehow, someway, Phil Ford (17.5 ppg, 8.8 apg) and Kelvin Ransey (15.2 pg, 6.9 apg) both got a first place vote, which is more first place votes than Magic Johnson received.
–1981-82: Larry Bird (22.9 ppg, 10.9 rpg, 5.8 apg) lost out in a close vote to Moses Malone. The weird thing here is that while Bird had 20 first place votes, some voters felt Robert Parish (19.9 ppg, 10.8 rpg) was the better player, as he received four first place votes.
–1983-84: Did you know that Jeff Ruland received a first place vote for a team that went 35-47? Ruland had a very good year but there was no basis for him to get that type of vote.
–1988-89: The award voting had fewer sloppy votes after 1984 but there are still some oddities. For example, Magic and MJ had most of the votes but Patrick Ewing (22.7 ppg, 9.3 apg) had eight first place votes when Hakeem Olajuwon (24.8 ppg, 13.5 rpg) had a better season and only two first placers. In fact, Ewing never outplayed Hakeem year-by-year. Even so, consistently a few voters would give Ewing some first place votes over Olajuwon.
–2000-01: Shaq has rarely received fair treatment from the voters. His loss to Allen Iverson in the 2000-01 voting is one thing but the margin of vote was nuts. AI had 93 first place votes to only seven for Shaq (who finished behind Tim Duncan too). Shaq was better than both players by a fair amount, though his feud with Kobe Bryant obviously hurt him. Still, there is no way Shaq should’ve fallen that much.
–2002-03: In another odd development, Ben Wallace (6.9 ppg, 15.4 rpg) received a first place vote, when the field included Shaq (27.5 ppg, 11.1 rpg), Garnett (23.0 ppg, 13.4 rpg), and Duncan (23.3 ppg, 12.9 rpg).
–2003-04: We love Peja Stojakovic (24.2 ppg, 6.3 rpg) but his getting a first place vote over KG (24.2 ppg, 13.9 rpg, 5.0 apg) is astounding.
There are plenty other odd choices over the years but I thought the above choices were particularly without merit, with Ransey being the most weird. The bottom line is that MVP voting has some holes around the margins. I assume the weird results occur because of local influences. The end lesson is not to take the voting too much to heart. Mistakes happen and that doesn’t change who objectively was the best.