The NBA season is winding down which means the annual debate on who is the season’s MVP should be kicking into high gear. Based on popular opinion it will come down to four players: Lebron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers, James Harden of the Houston Rockets, Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma City Thunder and Stephon Curry of the Golden State Warriors.Each of these four guys is having an outstanding season, and a case can be made that any of them can and should win the award, all for different reasons. There is no real statistical difference between these four, they all score the ball, pass the ball and operate under very high efficiency. It is just a matter of what the award means to the voters, and what those voters value in their version of the MVP most. 

Lebron James candidacy is bolstered by the “best player in the game” argument. Simply, he is the single best player in the sport, if there was a draft where every player was available to any team, he’d get picked first. He’s averaging 25.7 points per game, 5.9 rebounds per game, 7.3 assists per game, and has a player efficiency rating (PER) of 25.9. Incidentally, these numbers are his lowest in all categories, save for assists, since the 2006-2007 season. Nevertheless, they are amongst the best in the NBA this season. 

 James Harden is riding the “most valuable” train to get his votes. He is the best player on a team that has been without one of it’s top players—Dwight Howard—for very long stretches, and yet are currently tied for the two seed in a brutally difficult Western Conference. He has been a free throw machine, getting to the free throw line a whopping 752 times; 150 more times the nearest player. Harden is putting up 27.6, 5.7, and 7.0 with a PER of 26.9. Notably, his beard is operating with a PER of 97.4, which has to be some kind of a record. 

Westbrook has the “guy is putting up crazy numbers for 2 months straight while willing his team to an 8 seed” on lockdown. OKC lost last season’s MVP, Kevin Durant, to injury and are relying on Westbrook to keep this team from the lottery; so far he has delivered. In March he became the first player since Michael Jordan to record four straight triple doubles, and the first player since “his airness” to record consecutive triple doubles while scoring 40 points. On the season he has 10 triple doubles, the most in the NBA, seven of them coming after the all star break. He leads the NBA with 27.6 ppg, with 7.3 rpg, 8.7 assists per game and a PER of 28.9. 

And finally, Curry is the champion of the “best player on the best team” all-stars, and his Warriors are having an historically good season. Ironically, his numbers are the most modest of the four players, and he is perhaps a victim of his team’s success. They are winning their games by an average of 11 points, which means a lot of blowouts, which also means a lot of sitting for Curry. He’s playing just under 33 minutes a game, the lowest of the four candidates, which contributes to his lack of numbers. That being said, he is still scoring 24 ppg, with 4 rebounds and 8 assists, to go along with a PER of 27.9, while leading his team to an NBA best 61-13 record. It is clear each of these guys could win the award, for their own reasons. The question is, which reason is more important? How should the voters decide whether it’s more important to be the best player on the best team, or the best player in the NBA, or the most valuable? And the answer to both questions is: they shouldn’t. 

This debate takes place in every major sport, pretty much every year. In the NFL it was Aaron Rodgers vs. JJ Watt. Who did more for their team? Who is more “valuable”? And the writers and talking heads came up with their own little gimmicks on how they determine who had the better season, or who was more valuable to their team. Things like “if you replaced X player with a mediocre guy at his position, then where would that team end up?” or “this guy just had the best season by a defensive player ever, if a defender doesn’t win one now, they never will”. Ultimately Aaron Rodgers won, because there is no more valuable player in football than the QB; since he is deemed the best QB, he gets the award. And this is all fine until a guy like Adrian Peterson in 2013 runs for over 2,000 yards less than a year after shredding his knee; in that case it doesn’t matter who the most valuable is, it is who had the best season. And this is often the case. The MVP means something different from season to season. It’s completely arbitrary. One year it’s who is more valuable, the next year it’s who had the best season. 

The problem with the arbitrary nature of the award is that the MVP award is a major determining factor used to determine where players match up with each other historically. I’ve already written that our obsession with rankings needs to go away, but the fact remains that it is a major talking point in the sporting community. People love rankings. Well, how can we place so much emphasis on MVP’s won, when the criteria for the award changes from year to year? Babe Ruth, who a great many people consider the best baseball player ever has one MVP award. One! A guy with 714 home runs, a career 1.164 OPS, and 11 seasons with over 40 home runs has one MVP. Kobe Bryant, widely considered the second best two guard in NBA history has one MVP, even though from 2003-2009 league wide sentiment was that he was the best player in the NBA. The zeitgeist of the way the award was given out was not in his favor, so his very best seasons were overlooked because his teammates were so poor. Even the year when he averaged 35 points a game, outscored #1 seed Dallas 62-61 through three quarters, and put up 81 on the Raptors, while getting his team to a seven seed, he only managed 3rd in MVP voting. Why will he only be considered 2nd best of all time? Kobe, one MVP, Michael Jordan, five. 

Finally, the unfortunate part of the MVP is inevitably it diminishes the accomplishments of the other players up for the award. Most people don’t remember who finished 2nd or 3rd for these awards five years later. I happen to know Kobe finished 3rd in 2006 because I’m a fan of his, but I have no clue who finished 2nd. All four of the players I mentioned are having seasons that should be recognized historically, because what they are doing on a night to night basis is truly remarkable. However, since there has to be one winner, to make a case for one player also entails making a case against another player. And it becomes a commentary of James Harden shoots too much, Westbrook is a ball hog, Lebron didn’t play enough games, Curry’s stats aren’t good enough. 

How to fix it you ask? Create an MVP team. This would be separate from the All-NBA teams because it would be regardless of position. Pick five guys who would be worthy of being an MVP finalist and put them on the team. It is very unlikely there would be more than five players in any given year that were good enough for elite consideration; in fact in some years there might be only two players on the team, other years three players. To use this seasons NBA as an example, there are four players operating at an elite level; they all deserve to be recognized for what they are contributing to the league and their teams. The only reason voters and writers are separating them is they are forced to, because of the way the system works. There can only be one MVP, one winner. They are going to arbitrarily decide what they think the MVP should be and vote accordingly. Why not recognize all four? This way, all of the elite players during a season are celebrated and recognized, with the accomplishments of none being diminished or downgraded. Selflessness and recognizing others are values held highly in all walks of life; it would make sense in sport to celebrate the accomplishments of a group rather than an individual.