Being one of the top players in the NBA requires having a little bit of ego. That being said, calling yourself the best player in the league shows more than a little hubris. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander recently made that statement, seemingly forgetting that Nikola Jokic is still active in the NBA.
There's no doubt that SGA's meteoric rise to stardom as the leader of the OKC Thunder is nothing short of astonishing. He went from being one small piece of a massive trade package from the Clippers to acquire Paul George to eclipsing every possible expectation for him in this league.
So far, SGA is an NBA Champion, an NBA Finals MVP, an NBA Western Conference Finals MVP, a two-time league MVP, a four-time All-Star, a four-time member of the All-NBA First Team, and an NBA scoring champion. Keep in mind that he's only 28 and has a lot of basketball left to play.
No on gets to declare themselves the best
If you need a list of accomplishments that will allow you to declare someone the best player in the league, that should do it. But it's also not something you can say about yourself. No athlete gets to declare themselves the best player in their respective sport. That's just calling out karma.
It's not that long ago that Ja Morant was with the Grizzlies and declared they were good in the West. What followed was a collapse of epic proportions, both individually for Morant and as a team. Now, Morant is trying to reestablish himself in Portland, and the Grizzlies are working on a rebuild.
To be fair to SGA, he's a far more complete and accomplished player than Morant. That being said, it doesn't help his argument that he has done nothing to address the flopping criticisms, other than dismissing them as a "narrative on social media." Yeah, that's not what's going on there.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander believes he's better than Nikola Jokic
While SGA is an impressive player, not giving the Joker his due is dangerous at best. He has his own list of accomplishments that is a lot longer than SGA's, and started before SGA was even in the league. In Jokic's case, we're potentially talking about the best player of the decade.
Joker is an NBA Champion, an NBA Finals MVP, an NBA Western Conference Finals MVP, a three-time league MVP, an eight-time All-Star, a six-time member of the All-NBA First Team, a two-time member of the All-NBA Second Team, the 2026 rebounding leader, and the 2026 assists leader.
In the 2020s, Jokic is also the league leader in points, rebounds, assists, and steals. On top of that, Jokic is likely to eclipse Russell Westbrook's triple-double record this season and take charge of that bit of history. This is a man who will be remembered as the face of this entire decade in the NBA.
Jokic, not Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, is the best in the NBA
If you genuinely want to be serious about who the best player in the league is right now, it's Jokic. That's from every angle while factoring every meaningful statistic. The problem for him is that he's currently on one of the most aggressively mediocre teams in the history of the league.
SGA, on the other hand, has the best supporting cast in the business. That's not a dig or a slight against him. It's a reality that the Thunder have been impeccably constructed around SGA in a fashion that helps him reach his best. The same cannot be said about Jokic on the Nuggets.
The difference between SGA and Jokic is that the Nuggets would not make it to the playoffs without him, while SGA would not be able to drag a team like Denver into the postseason. Yes, SGA is one of the best players on the court today. Period. He's still not the Joker.
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