NBA MVP Ladder: Usual suspects emerge, with a (Dallas) Maverick crashing the party

LeBron James continues to be a force of nature. James, who will turn 35 on Dec. 30, has the Los Angeles Lakers flying high with the best record in the NBA at 13-2 and should get the Lake Show back into the playoffs for the first time since 2013.

James already has four MVP awards to his credit, but it’s been seven years since the last one (in 2012-13 for the Miami Heat, coincidentally the last season the Lakers made the postseason). He’s made some changes to his game this season to make room for newly acquired star Anthony Davis and the early results have been spectacular.

LeBron is scoring less — 24.9 points per game would be his lowest mark since his rookie season in 2002-03 — but he might be doing more. His career-high 11.3 assists per game leads the NBA by a large margin (1.6 per game ahead of second-place Luka Doncic of the Dallas Mavericks) and he’s also putting up 7.7 rebounds and 1.3 steals in 34.9 minutes a night.

He’s shooting 48.6 percent overall (his lowest since 2007-08) and is hitting 34.6 percent on 5.4 attempts per game from 3-point land. Perhaps most significant, being with a team that looks like a contender seems to have re-energized LeBron at the defensive end, where he has been much more active and engaged than he was a season ago.