Derrick Rose won the NBA’s MVP Award in a landslide vote making him the youngest MVP Award winner in league history. Dwight Howard finished second, LeBron James was third, and Kobe and Kevin Durant rounded out the top five. Perhaps the most stunning aspect of the voting — aside from Rose taking 93% of the first place votes — is that LeBron James was left off nine ballots.
That’s right, nine people didn’t think LeBron was a top five most valuable player in the league this year. Three people felt the same way about second-place finisher Dwight Howard. You can see the results of the voting below:
The people who didn’t have LeBron or Dwight on their ballots should have their votes revoked. How can you have followed the NBA this year and not felt those two men were top five players? LeBron was the back-to-back league MVP and his skills certainly did not diminish this season. His scoring was down by three points but the rest of his production was the same and he was still the most efficient player in the league.
Sure Miami disappointed based on their regular season expectations but they still had a fine season and there’s absolutely no reason not to have considered him a top-five MVP candidate. Leaving him off the ballot is the result of a personal issue with him, not an objective judgment of the season he had. It’s nearly impossible to read this and not think it’s related to LeBron’s “The Decision” announcement.
Nine people really left LeBron off their ballots? You know what that gets right? The Scioscia Stare:
Chest bump to Tom Ziller for noticing this
