NBA MVP Rankings: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander leads OKC to another marquee win, Joel Embiid returns with a bang
Written by CBS SPORTS ALL RIGHTS RESERVED on January 3, 2024
A lot of casual NBA fans start tuning in on Christmas, but a pretty clear picture has developed at the front of the MVP race over the first few months of the season.
Most sportsbooks have four names, in varying orders, at the top: Joel Embiid, Nikola Jokic, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Luka Doncic. Giannis Antetokounmpo is slotted a super long-shot fifth. That feels just about right to me.
Entering play on Wednesday, Jan. 3, here are my updated MVP rankings.
1. Joel Embiid
Embiid, who leads the league in scoring at 34.8 points a night, returned to the lineup on Tuesday for the first time since Dec. 22 and dropped a cool 31-15-10 on the Bulls. It’s his 15th straight game with at least 30 points and 10 rebounds. He averaged 40 points for the month of December on 61/42/92 shooting splits.
The Sixers entered Tuesday outscoring their opponents by an average of 9.8 points per game with Embiid on the floor, the league’s third-best mark behind Derrick White (who is so freaking good) and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who you’ll see on this list shortly.
Embiid is averaging a career-high six assists per game (10 on Tuesday), but don’t mistake that for a significant leap in playmaking. It’s mostly the tempo of Nick Nurse’s system that is using him as a two-man hub with a barrage of dribble hand-offs. Still, Embiid flips screens and finds cutters, whatever the energy of the action dictates. He’s unstoppable when he faces up.
Aside from Embiid’s on-court domination, he’ll get points from voters for the way he has kept this team together (it’s actually in an even better place) after the James Harden fallout. Tyrese Maxey and Nurse certainly have a lot to do with that, as well, but the Sixers go as Embiid goes, and he has them at 23-10 with the second-best point differential in the league entering play on Tuesday.
Now, here’s the only problem: Embiid has already missed seven games. You can only miss 17 total; after that, you become ineligible for MVP. With three-plus months still remaining, can Embiid go the rest of the season only missing 10 more games?
2. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
Most sportsbooks currently have SGA positioned fourth in the MVP race behind Embiid, Nikola Jokic and Luka Doncic, and I don’t understand it. Yes, we’re splitting hairs between these guys right now, but OKC being the West’s No. 2 seed with the league’s fourth-hardest schedule to this point, to me, gives SGA an edge.
SGA, who went for 36 in a win over Boston on Tuesday, is on track to become just the third player in history to average at least 31 points, six assists, five rebounds and two steals, joining Michael Jordan and James Harden. Factoring in usage rate, no starting point guard turns the ball over less than SGA. He is a rock.
You want head-to-head? In the past two weeks, SGA’s Thunder have beaten Jokic’s Nuggets twice. Both games were in Denver. In the first, SGA hit the game-winner. In the second, he went for 40. OKC beat the Timberwolves the day after Christmas, and, as mentioned, the Celtics on Tuesday night. That makes the Thunder 4-0 vs. the defending champs and the top seeds in each conference over the past two weeks.
It’s true, the Thunder have a really well-rounded team on both ends, but let’s not make it like they are littered with All-Stars. SGA is just like Jokic in that he takes really good role players and elevates them.
Indeed, the Thunder fall by 15 points per 100 possessions — becoming a negative net team — when SGA isn’t on the floor.
When SGA is on the floor, the Thunder feature what would qualify as the best offense in history with a top-five defense to boot, per Cleaning the Glass. If this keeps up, I don’t know how SGA stays below some of these other names on this list, so I’m just getting ahead of the curve.
3. Nikola Jokic
Jokic isn’t shooting as well or scoring as efficiently as he has over the past three seasons (during which he won two MVPs and should have won all three), but this is Stephen Curry territory where even a slight dip in efficiency is only reflected in a mirror — without his own standards to measure against, basically everything Jokic does on a basketball court is either flirting with or making history.
The guy has missed two shots over his last three games for crying out loud (26 for 28).
Jokic remains at the top of most catch-all advanced metrics (big surprise), and another consistent theme since 2021: The Nuggets fall off a cliff without him.
So far this season, the Nuggets have been 27 points per 100 possessions worse when Jokic is off the court. I mentioned earlier that OKC is operating at what would be an all-time offensive rate when SGA is on the court … well, the Nuggets are two points per 100 better than that with Jokic on the floor.
Bottom line: Jokic is the best player in the league. But right now, he would not win MVP.
4. Luka Doncic
Nobody is doing more with less than Doncic, who has the Mavericks at 19-15 entering play on Tuesday despite Kyrie Irving missing nearly half of their games. They are 0-3 without Doncic in the lineup, and they look borderline helpless for any stretch without him.
Doncic leads the league in total points and total points created (points plus assists), per PBT Stats. Credit to Dante Exum and Dereck Lively II for keeping the Mavericks’ differential palatable when Doncic sits, but it must be pointed out that Doncic played 40 minutes per game in December, so take his on-off splits with a grain of small-sample salt.
The bottom line is the minute Doncic steps off the floor, the Mavericks start going under, and they can only hold their breath for so long before he comes back in. Second in scoring. Third in assists. Career-high 38% from 3. And the Mavericks are a bottom-feeder without him. Doncic has been incredible, and if you think he should be even higher on this list, I wouldn’t really argue with you.
5. Giannis Antetokounmpo
Giannis has his two MVPs and now he has Damian Lillard, so the “he’s due” or “he doesn’t have another superstar” narratives are not going to work in his favor. And that matters. Like it or not.
Milwaukee has taken a somewhat bumpy road to its 24-9 record, but think about that: The Bucks have two fewer wins than the Celtics and nobody feels like they have played all that well. Part of that is an unrealistic perception of what they were going to be with Lillard; the defense was always going to fall off, no matter the Adrian Griffin complaints. The offense was always going to soar.
And soar it has, even in a down shooting year for Lillard, with a 123 offensive rating as long as Giannis is on the floor. And that number stays at 120 per 100 possessions even when Lillard goes off because Giannis is the same unstoppable force he’s been for the last half-decade.
Fourth in scoring. Seventh in rebounding. Almost six assists per game. Best shooting percentages of his career. Giannis is killing it. The problem is, so is everyone else on this list.
Keep an eye on …
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