March 29, 2022
The Sixers lost to the Suns in Phoenix on Sunday, but Joel Embiid still put up an amazing 37-point, 15-rebound performance.
It's been the norm all season.
Ask anyone around Philly right now and they won't hesitate to tell you: Embiid is the NBA's Most Valuable Player.
Embiid will even tell you it feels like his time.
“Last year, I got hurt. That was the knock on me with not being healthy,” the five-time All-Star told NBA.com. “This year, I’ve gone to a different level. I’m healthy. I don’t know what else I have to do to be able to [win MVP]. I feel like it is my time. But I have a lot of respect for the other guys, and I think they’re great players.”
The national picture, however, doesn't want to make it as clear cut.
In the third and final edition of a straw poll of 100 media members before the end of the season, ESPN revealed Tuesday morning that Denver big man Nikola Jokic is favored, though only slightly, to repeat as league MVP.
According to ESPN, which tallied points based on five-player ballots from each polled media member, Jokic came in with 62 first-place votes out of 100 and 860 points. Embiid had 29 first-place votes and 719 points.
Now, in the last poll back in February, Embiid had the slight lead as MVP favorite, and with about two weeks left in the season, a lot can still change. Things are still in the air, and as ESPN's Tim Bontemps wrote of the poll, Embiid's and Jokic's performances the rest of the way and where the Sixers and Nuggets finish will heavily decide where they land.
"There is still more uncertainty remaining in this race than there usually is at this time of the year. Many voters stressed how tough it was for them to choose which way to go, both among the positioning of top-three finishers and fourth and fifth places.
And while the leader in the final version of this straw poll has gone on to win the league's MVP award the past four years it was conducted, there is reason to believe Jokic still has work to do to officially sew up consecutive awards." [ESPN]
To compare the numbers, Embiid is averaging 29.9 points per game (2nd in the NBA), 11.4 rebounds (7th), and 4.2 assists (50th). He's having a career season, and has a real chance at becoming the first center since Shaquille O'Neal 22 years ago to lead the league in scoring. Jokic is piling up 26.3 points per game (10th), 13.6 rebounds (2nd), and 8.0 assists (8th) in a worthy follow up to his 2020-21 MVP campaign.
And clearly, the Sixers (46-28) are nowhere near the top of the Eastern Conference without Embiid, and the Nuggets (45-21) aren't in Western Conference playoff contention without Jokic.
"This year's voting most closely mirrors the 2017 race, the first year that this straw poll was conducted. In that year's final ballot, then-Houston Rockets guard James Harden held a similarly narrow lead over then-Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook with a few weeks to go, only for Westbrook to capture the MVP by becoming the first player since Oscar Robertson in 1961-62 to average a triple-double for a season.
Because of how compact the races are in both conferences, where Jokic and Embiid finish in the standings is likely to play a role." [ESPN]
If there's one distinct advantage Embiid holds though, it's that he led the Sixers through the exhausting Ben Simmons saga. We don't really need to go over the specifics again (you more than likely know them well by now), but Embiid did talk about the whole thing, and other stuff, in an extensive sit down interview with the Athletic's Sam Amick.
Embiid, sitting atop a trash can (seriously), said:
"It was a tough situation to navigate and go through (with Simmons). Even to this day, I don’t have any hard feelings towards everything that happened. But being in my position, having to answer questions about that whole thing every single day, it was kind of draining. And I’m sure it was draining for my teammates. So the drama was pretty crazy, but my whole thing going into the season was to come in and try to be a better leader. In the past, I was trying to lead on the court, by my play, and I was never really focused on off the court and what I could bring to the table.
So, you know, I knew the situation we were in, and I didn’t know what was going to happen, so I had to make sure that I brought it off the court and on the court. On the court, just try to play at an even higher level than I did last year. The knock on me was last year that I wasn’t healthy enough. So to come back, take another step (with his play), and then also stay on the floor, that was a big goal for me. When you look at this year, sure it looks like I missed, what, 12 games or whatever. But nine of them were due to COVID and all that stuff. So I’m really happy, and I’m excited for myself." [The Athletic]
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