The first is that his case – being the best player on the best team – hasn’t been a compelling one for the last several MVP awards. Three of the last five MVPs have played on the team that finished with the NBA’s best record – a majority, yes, but a number indicating that being on the best team is not a prerequisite for the award.
Further, the MVP cases for those three winners on the league’s best teams (Harden in ’18 and Giannis in ’19 and ’20) are strengthened much more by their individual statistical performances than their team records.
In 2018, Harden led the league in scoring with 30.4 points and finished third in the league with 8.8 assists. In 2019, Giannis was third in the league with 27.7 points, sixth in the league with 12.5 rebounds, and tenth in blocks with 1.5 per game. In 2020, Giannis was fifth with 29.5 points, second with 13.6 rebounds – oh, and he was the Defensive Player of the Year.
Looking at each of the last five MVPs, you could entirely disregard their team record and still make a strong argument that they were the best player in the NBA that season. That’s just not the case with Booker this year.
Booker is 10th in points, not far behind likely MVP Nikola Jokic. But in terms of counting stats, Booker’s MVP case ends there – he’s 36th in assists, 77th in rebounds, 30th in steals, and 99th in blocks. Booker is an improved defender this season, and certainly underrated in that facet of his game, but he’s certainly no DPOY.
The advanced stats don’t do him many favors either. Per Basketball-Reference, Booker is 21st in Value over Replacement Player, 25th in Box Plus-Minus, and 26th in Win Shares. If you were wondering where MVP frontrunners Jokic, Giannis, and Embiid rank in those advanced stats – they rank 1, 2, and 3, respectively, in all three.
Booker is simply not having an MVP season, statistically speaking. And unfortunately for Suns fans, “best player on the best team” just isn’t a good enough MVP case. The last MVP who it could be argued won with that case is probably Steph Curry in 2015 – but he was also 6th in the NBA in points and assists, as well as first by a mile in three-pointers made.