The problems with the NBA regular season awards

[slightly biased bias fan]

I find many aspects of the NBA end of season awards ridiculous, especially that they will continually award them slowly throughout the progress of the finals series. I can't be the only one that finds this ludicrous, that while elite athletes and teams are meant to be concentrating on intense career changing games they are distracted with awards and All NBA teams along with ceremonies and speeches in-between games. I really think a small window should be created between regular season and finals to host a Awards Ceremony to hand out all the awards and be done with it, it can also serve as a black tie/espys vibe with fashion etc. and can also provide as opportunity for new NBA awards such as best community work for a player/team, best personal foundation etc.

Secondly the whole voting system is flawed. How can a player that has more first votes lose to someone who has less? (aka Barkley losing the MVP with the most 1st place votes). A much simpler system would be a 3,2,1 vote where each allocated voter gives a score from each game or round and at the end of the season, the player/coach with the most points is the winner. This system can be implemented for all awards e.g. 3,2,1 for best defensive player, rookie etc. and All NBA teams can be tabulated though these points too. I think this system is much fairer as well, as it takes away the end of season bias because some players that seem to win it, tend to have big stats at the end of the season and these games stick in the minds of the voters.

[Endless Paradise]

I find many aspects of the NBA end of season awards ridiculous, especially that they will continually award them slowly throughout the progress of the finals series. I can't be the only one that finds this ludicrous, that while elite athletes and teams are meant to be concentrating on intense career changing games they are distracted with awards and All NBA teams along with ceremonies and speeches in-between games. I really think a small window should be created between regular season and finals to host a Awards Ceremony to hand out all the awards and be done with it, it can also serve as a black tie/espys vibe with fashion etc. and can also provide as opportunity for new NBA awards such as best community work for a player/team, best personal foundation etc.

I believe I read something a while ago about how the NBA eventually wants to move towards giving awards their own timeframe between playoffs and the regular season or something like that.

Secondly the whole voting system is flawed. How can a player that has more first votes lose to someone who has less? (aka Barkley losing the MVP with the most 1st place votes). A much simpler system would be a 3,2,1 vote where each allocated voter gives a score from each game or round and at the end of the season, the player/coach with the most points is the winner.

Err, how is this fundamentally different from the current system? Someone could theoretically have more votes of 3 than other players, but still lose out because they have fewer total points.

That said, I suspect that neither the NBA nor the voters want the responsibility of having to watch all 82 games of all 30 teams and ranking as many as 15 players from each team.

[PhoSita]

I like Simmons's idea to track "game balls" and see which players lead the league in signature performances.  Should be a separate award though.

How often does the MVP get awarded to the wrong guy though?  Curry was the obvious choice this year.  The last one I can remember that was a weak selection was Derrick Rose.

[jambr380]

I like Simmons's idea to track "game balls" and see which players lead the league in signature performances.  Should be a separate award though.

How often does the MVP get awarded to the wrong guy though?  Curry was the obvious choice this year.  The last one I can remember that was a weak selection was Derrick Rose.

I think there are a LOT of people who would disagree with you about Curry being the obvious choice this year. Harden carried a very injured constantly changing Rockets team on his back all year. Curry's team was stacked and remained relatively healthy.

If not for GS winning all four of their matchups against Hou, the award very well might have gone the other way.

You are right about the MVP, though - generally there is not too much of a problem with who gets it (although super-dominant players seem to sometimes get penalized so that somebody else can have a 'chance'). I think the issues are more with the all-nba and all-defensive teams which rank people who aren't right at the top - more players who feel shunned.

[GC003332]

The real problem with the awards is that for the past few season the Celtics haven't been a part of them   Save Marcus second team all rookie.
One issue if you are going to host an event after the season and before the playoffs is having all the players available.
Unless you lock into their contracts guys that have missed the playoffs, Rookie teams members etc
have hightailed it out of town and are on 'Vacation'.
Unwind on some beach or dress up in a stuffy suit and tie.
They set them out the way they do so each individual award winner has their own moment is the sun.
Having them all tied together would take that away from them.

[PhoSita]

I like Simmons's idea to track "game balls" and see which players lead the league in signature performances.  Should be a separate award though.

How often does the MVP get awarded to the wrong guy though?  Curry was the obvious choice this year.  The last one I can remember that was a weak selection was Derrick Rose.

I think there are a LOT of people who would disagree with you about Curry being the obvious choice this year. Harden carried a very injured constantly changing Rockets team on his back all year. Curry's team was stacked and remained relatively healthy.

If not for GS winning all four of their matchups against Hou, the award very well might have gone the other way.

You are right about the MVP, though - generally there is not too much of a problem with who gets it (although super-dominant players seem to sometimes get penalized so that somebody else can have a 'chance'). I think the issues are more with the all-nba and all-defensive teams which rank people who aren't right at the top - more players who feel shunned.

Curry was a dominant individual player (i.e. top 5 in the league, hands down) on a team that completely dominated the league.

Harden had a good season, but his performance was not clearly better on an individual level than Curry's, and Curry's team was much, much better.  And there's a strong case to be made that Curry's impact goes beyond stats.  Harder to make that case for Harden.

[Denis998]

The NBA lost all credibility in the awards voting system after Lou Williams won the 6th man of the year. The media proved to be nothing short of a high school voting for a popularity contest, just because Drake makes a song about you it doesn't mean that you deserve the award. From now going forward, none of these awards mean anything to me, I am much looking forward to the NBPA Player Awards coming out later in the summer. Hopefully the actual players have more sense in judging skill and playing ability than by the so called "professionals".