Q: Why is everyone handing Kobe the MVP and counting me out? I'm carrying a lousy team and averaging nearly a triple-double every night. I play hard every game. I've become a really good rebounder and weak-side shotblocker at crunch time. I lift my offensive game at the end of every game and score with 2-3 guys guarding me. When I drive to the basket, I can go left or right and guys bounce off me like superballs. I always make the right pass. I always make the right play. Every time I'm on national TV, I put on a show. Basically, I became who you wanted me to be ... and if that's not enough, I'm only 23. Do you realize I'm the same age as MJ during the 63-point game at the Garden? That's right, I'M THE EXACT SAME AGE AS MJ DURING THE 63-POINT GAME!!!!!!! And you're all taking me for granted already??? Yeeeesh. No wonder MJ played baseball for two years.
--LeBron J., Cleveland
SG: Let's get one thing straight: MJ played baseball for two years because David Stern secretly suspended him for 18 months for gambling and told him to come back for the '95 playoffs. Get your facts straight. As for your other points, you're right -- you and Chris Paul are the leaders for MVP at the three-fourths mark because you're both having superlative seasons, as is Kobe, with the difference being that neither of you has Phil Jackson or a great bench, and in your case, you don't have even a borderline All-Star on your team. It's you and 11 role players. Switch you and Kobe and you'd be doing just as well, but he'd be gritting his way through every Cavs game on cruise control and leaking fake trade rumors through his agent. I also can't forgive Kobe for what happened during the first 15 games, when he moped around and pushed for a trade. Does someone do that during an MVP season? I say no.
Yes, James has been amazing, but Kobe's been Kobe, and he's been more Kobe-tastic this season than any other. His Kobe-ness has been off the chart this year, and he's hurdled that one hurdle that he's accused of not being able to hurdle, he's made the players around him much better this season. Plus, he plays a lot better individual defense than BronBron does (even if BronBron did a good job against Kobe in their two meetings this season). Kobe had this MVP award won back during the FIBA trials in Las Vegas. When all the best players in the league are gathered on one team, and even then he outplays, outhustles and outshines all of them, you know he was ready for a special year. Kobe will win it this year mainly because he hasn't won it previously, and he may not have as good of a chance to win it again. It would seem strange that one of the all time best players this league has ever seen hadn't ever been awarded an MVP award, and that fact will be factored into how people vote.
If it were only on the merit of this one season, then yes, LeBron has a very good case to make, and possibly Chris Paul has an even stronger case. Even before the Gasol trade, Kobe had a team that many were picking to finish somewhere between 7th and 10th in the West near the top of the Conference most of the season. This idea that Kobe was just 'cruising' early in the year while trying to figure out if he had a decent team around him is just bunk, also.
Bill's just bitter that it's looking more and more likely that his Celtics aren't going to make the finals, while the Lakers will.
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