A Very Merry 2012 NBA Preview

Here are some of my picks and predictions for the upcoming 66-game NBA season.


NBA Champion:  Miami Heat
I don't see them being denied.  They got better in the offseason by obtaining Shane Battier, and they apparently will run a better offense predicated on player movement.  With a more balanced offense, a ball-swinging Battier, health, and an improved post-game from LeBron James, the offense should be fine, even without a PG (though Norris Cole has looked OK).  Defensively, they are still missing a big man to control the paint against big centers, but their ridiculous wing defense should allow them to overcome that.

Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and the Thunder will give them a great NBA Finals though.


Chicago and Dallas are the viable candidates to take out Miami or OKC this year.  The Los Angeles teams are my sleepers.

KD vs. CP3 will likely determine the MVP race this season.  

NBA MVP:  Chris Paul or Kevin Durant
Chicago has a target on their back now.  I see them having a mini-2009-Hornets season, which drags Rose's MVP shares down because the Bulls don't meet the same gaudy expectations that carried over from the slight overachievement of the season prior.  New York's stars are too even to win MVP.  Kobe and the Lakers are getting older, LeBron and D-Wade hurt each other, and Dwight Howard is a complete wild card for MVP.  There's a good chance he switches teams midseason; I highly doubt they'll give him a league MVP award.


That leaves Paul and Durant.  By picking up where he left off last season- on a new team that sucked last season, no less- Paul's narrative is set for the MVP race.  It won't matter that Blake Griffin is on the team- Paul is established.  The voters will see it as Steve Nash and Amar'e Stoudemire all over again.


Durant has a shot, as I see him running away with another scoring title and OKC being the best regular season team in the West.


My sleeper pick is LeBron James.


Defensive Player of the Year:  Dwight Howard
Dikembe Mutombo won this award in 2001 after switching teams.  This award is based more on ability, reputation, and defensive stats, as opposed to narratives and team success, which sort of govern MVP voting.


Sixth Man of the Year:  A Maverick
The best Maverick coming off the bench has the best chance.  That team is deep.
If James Harden is a sixth man- please, Scotty, let him start- then he's the favorite.


Tracy McGrady is my LULZ pick.


Most Improved Player:  John Wall
This had a Denver Nugget written all over it until they all left for other parts of the world.  I think Wall has an all-star worthy season this year.  Perhaps next year, he'll make a D-Rose leap.  This year's improvement will be good enough for the award.


Serge Ibaka and even James Harden have a shot at this as well.


Rookie of the Year:  Kyrie Irving
I'm taking Irving since he'll have control of his team, but Brandon Knight and Ricky Rubio are possibilities, too.  

Deron Williams is N.J.'s anchor.  

Sleeper teams:  Nets and Suns
I was a lot more comfortable with this Nets pick before Brook Lopez got injured, but Mehmet Okur softens the blow.  Deron Williams has become a hugely underrated player after being traded last season and being shrouded in darkness while Paul and Rose have gotten the positive point guard headlines for the past year.  Williams is a top-7ish player in the league, and the Nets aren't a terrible group.  I think Williams elevates his team to the playoffs.


Steve Nash finally has a Suns team that defends and fits.  But it's too late now.  Phoenix won't be a contender, but they've got a great chance at making the playoffs.  Nash guarantees a good offense, while Marcin Gortat and Grant Hill provide balance with strong defense.  Phoenix is a solid team.


Those are my picks.  Merry Christmas, and enjoy the NBA season!

Tech-Tech, Parade!

This game was probably supposed to offer us something better.  It was supposed to spice up the MVP story and make the voters think twice about handing Derrick Rose the trophy.  Dwight Howard could have given voters a personal choice regarding not only what they value in basketball, but what they value in life.  Life, damn it.   

Do they prefer the two-way center who provides an interior presence on both ends of the court?  Do they value the perimeter player who can control the offense with the ball in his hands and make plays to close games out?  Do they look for the best player or the most valuable player?

Image Via http://hoopedia.nba.com

You can forget about me answering those questions or describing which type of player the voters should value more.  Why?  Because much like Jameer Nelson's shot to cap what could have been the most thought-provoking game of the year, the game simply did not matter.  Both Nelson's 3-pointer and the potential of the game brought a lot of initial excitement.  Ultimately, both excitations came to an anticlimactic turn, where they then veered out of control, spun out, and ended safely and boringly on the side of the road, waiting to get picked up by a very cordial tow-truck driver sent by AAA.  No crash or danger- just a long wait in the short time before the regular season is over to give Mr. Rose a well-deserved award.

It's not about Rose deserving or not deserving to win though.  Be reasonable people- of course he is a worthy candidate.  That's enough to give him credit as a winner. 

It's about the little things that can create an MVP winner in a given season.  It's also about how this season, Howard, because of who he is and what he is, didn't get the fairest of shakes.  Rose got what he needed this year.  Today's game was the perfect coronation of Rose becoming MVP.

I remember a few years ago when Kobe Bryant and Chris Paul were getting the major hype as legitimate MVP candidates.  Aside from Kobe never winning one before '08  despite him being a top-tier all-time talent, the major showcase that propelled Bryant past Paul in the race was the Lakers winning an important home game versus Paul's Hornets, with Bryant delivering a too-youthful-for-2008 Kobe-looking reverse two-handed dunk that put the crowd on its feet and the Hornets out of the nest.  Today's game would have been different because Howard's Magic don't really have a chance of catching Chicago in the standings, but wouldn't it have been something if Howard dropped 30 points and 20 rebounds on Chicago's vaunted defense and tough mother F’er brand of basketball and blocked Rose on one of his acrobatic drives into the lane?  We didn't get to see it.  Howard didn't get his chance to showcase what he brings to the table.  He got his 18th technical foul and was forced to sit this one out.  Rose makes all the plays, including the integral close-out on Nelson that preserved the win.  His challenges into the middle of Orlando's defense, like this showcase of MVP candidates today, were won by Rose- everything uncontested.  Howard's campaign stalled. 

It ended because players half his size are allowed to hack him every time down the court, and he hasn't learned that the referees don't know how to- will never know how to- equalize things properly for the smaller players against the bigger players.  Howard has to balance being aggressive with not being aggressive and being aggressive enough and not acting up and not talking to the referees but also being physical and being an enforcer in a new era where enforcers don't exist but "stay physical Dwight!" but don't react and let them hack and it all balances out- or else you get technical foul after technical foul.  Dwight has to make sense of the last, incoherent sentence I wrote.  It comes with being bigger than everybody else.            

The MVP award is a historical document.  Forty years from now, the 2011 MVP award is going to be a primary source for students of NBA history.  Today's game didn't cost Howard the trophy, didn't cost him a piece of history.  But it did negatively affect the people's showcase.  Little things like that affect who wins these awards every year.

Today, this game means that Rose's Bulls won their 60th game on the home court of most likely his closest rival for MVP- a rival who didn't even play in the game as Rose dropped 39 on his (literally) defenseless team.       

In 40 years, this game means nothing.  It could have though.  A true student of the game must keep in mind that it is the little things that lead up to the making-of-history moments.