With the season winding down, lets give out our regular season awards.

MVP: Lebron James. IMO the only thing to debate is whether or not he's one of the most valuable regular season players of all time. Just an incredible season, and I shudder to think he has room for improvement.

Rookie of the year: Derick Rose. I think he's the real deal, although I'm not quite sure if he'll quite reach the level of Chris Paul or Deron Williams.

Defensive player of the year: Dwight Howard. If this guy could only learn to block shots softly so the ball stays in play for his own team he might make the leap to an uber elite defensive force.

Coach of the year: Tie.....Stan Van Gundy and Mike Brown. Both have coaxed every ounce of potential from their teams. They place great emphasis on defending their goals and have their teams in position for the playoffs.

Executive of the year: Not my area of expertice but I guess you can make a nice case for Danny Ferry. It looks like all his aqusitions have paid off and they are a MUCH better team than last year, at least record wise. Runner up goes to whoever the GM of the Nuggets is. The Billups trade turned out to be epically lopsided.

Most improved. Devin Harris. They might want to name the award after him. Holy shit did this guy improve.

Sixth man: I'd go with Jason Terry here. Nearly 20 ppg off the bench for a playoff team makes it an easy choice.

The only award I'd disagree with you on is most improved. I'd choose Durant, who aside from his 5.4 jump in ppg (not a whole lot less than Harris' 7 ppg improvement), grabbed a lot more rebounds, and drastically improved his 3 point shot (from .288 to .423). Harris' only huge leap was really just in shots per game; his shooting % actually dropped from .463 to .439. His assists also went up, but mostly due to an increase in playing time. Harris jumped out to the fast start, and his improvement was more of a surprise, so I expect him to grab the award, but I feel that Durant made the more difficult leap this season.

I think this is what did it for me. I'm not shocked that Durant, one of the most touted prospects to come into the league in the last decade, made the leap to budding superstar. The fact that Harris made the leap to a 22/3/7 point guard (on only 3 more MPG than last year) at age 25 is borderline shocking to me. You don't see that very often.

The tricky thing about the most improved award is that it is so wide open. We expect players to improve in their sophomore season...how do we consider them for the award? We expect players' numbers to go up when their playing time increases (and an increase in playing time doesn't always mean the player deserves it). If a player is healthy for the first time, and he has a career year, does he deserve most improved? It's a frustrating award to follow, because the parameters just aren't clear. Of the 23 award winners, at 25, Harris would be older side of the curve; 15 players were under 25. Does he get bonus points because his improvement was unexpected?

My issue with Harris is that he didn't improve from 07-08 to this year, he improved when he was traded to NJ last winter:

Harris' per 36 minute stats:

With NJ last year (25 games): 16.6 points, 7.0 assists, 3.5 rebounds, 1.5 steals, 13.1 fga, 4.5 fta, .438 fg%, .320 3p%
With NJ this year (67 games): 21.5 points, 6.9 assists, 3.4 rebounds, 1.7 steals, 15.1 fga, 8.8 fta, .439 fg%, .292 3p%

His points jumped up, but a big part of that improvement is due to an increase in shots taken. His rebounds, assists, steals and shooting percentages have remained pretty steady (and just watching him, his defense appears to have taken a large step back), and the only notable improvement I see when watching him is his ability to get to the line. This is picking nits (the guy is much improved), but it's enough, I think, to give the award to Durant (although one could argue with him that his single greatest improvement was no longer having an idiot of a coach who thought that his 6'9 swingman who averaged 11 rebounds/game in college should be a guard). Worth noting that, at age 20, Durant would be the youngest ever winner of the award (McGrady, Arenas and Monta Ellis all won it when they were 21). I don't factor in surprise for these awards; if LeBron repeats this season for the next decade (a frighteningly realistic possibility), he should win the MVP every single year. I don't see how most improved should be treated any differently.

Or maybe he didn't improve at all. Maybe he now had his own team to run rather than acting as Jason Kidd's caddy in Dallas. Either way the kid is a remarkable talent......we may have the greatest group of young point guards in their young to mid-20's that the game has even seen.

Chris Paul
Deron Williams
Tony Parker
Jameer Nelson
Devin Harris
Mo Williams
Derrick Rose
Rajon Rondo
Rodney Stuckey
Jose Calderon


This doesn't even count the Gilbert Arena's, Baron Davis', Steve Nash's, TJ Ford's and other good or better starting PG's. Great time IMO to be an NBA fan! Especially a Celtics fan.

That's also not including the group of decent combo guards who were just drafted (Mayo, Westbrook, Gordon, Augustin, Chalmers, Bayless) some of whom will probably be pretty good in a few years.



One of us is confused.

Yeah, me!

I completely forgot that he served as a starter for the year prior to the trade prior to backing up Terry. So i am with Rocco then in that Harris gets my vote although if not for Jameer Nelson's season ending injury he was the clearcut winner IMO.

Yeah, I like all of Rocco's picks, too. I especially like the Danny Ferry pick -- his work in putting that team together has gone somewhat unsung, but Cleveland is a machine. And while landing LeBron in the draft was obviously the key, adding guys like West, Wallace, and Williams has also made a big difference.

As for ROY: Derrick Rose is probably a shoo-in, but has anyone else noticed that Kevin Love is .9 rebounds away from averaging a double-double -- playing 25 minutes per game? He got off to a bumpy start, and he doesn't shoulder the same load that Rose does for Chicago, but he's had a great year. And so has Brook Lopez -- his ceiling may not be as high as Rose's, but he's arguably had the better year.

Harlan Schreiber, by the way, makes some interesting points about the ROY year when making his own picks. (He also chooses Rondo for DPOY. And he is not, so far as I know, a Celtics fan.)

Even as the Rondo fanboy that I am and always have been, I couldn't really make a case for Rondo. Anyone who watches every game he plays would probably agree. He's feisty and has great hands so he gets a lot of steals but his one on one defense appears significantly better because of the great help defense of the Celtics. All the time he does that ole thing and tries to swat the ball from behind and doesn't really pay for it because everyone else rotates so well.

For MIP, I kinda like Paul Millsap. +5.6 ppg and +3.1 rpg. His scoring is up 69% while his minutes are only up 50%.

Hard to argue against any of Rocco's pick, but let me throw a name for coach of the year out there: George Karl.

The Nuggets are 2nd in the West, and yes this is large in part due to their thievery of Chauncey Billups, but it goes deeper than that. That team isn't very good but he has them playing defense for the first time since Carmelo got there. That has to count for something, IMO. I don't think he edges out Mike Brown or Van Gundy as the eventual winner, but he deserves some credit.

Karl is certainly more of a lifetime achieving coach than those two guys, or just about anybody. I'd vote for him this year, if I had a vote.

Executive: I would have to think that Kevin Prichard would get a lot of love.

He's built the Blazers from group of malcontents that suck into a team that has a legit shot at home court in ther first round, with picks and a few good players stocked away in Europe.

Eh, letting Lafrenz's huge contract expire without adding a piece is a huge black mark against. Right now he seems content to just ride it out with these young guys hoping they'll magically turn into a contender. Soon these shiny young players are gonna start hearing little birdies in their ears whispering things like "max contract" in their ears, and thats when the real challenge will begin. Eventually their gonna have to find some veteran talent to come in and put them over the top.........something the Bulls (remember how everyone was ga ga over them when they beat the defending champs in the playoffs?) weren't willing/able to do. Like with the Bulls, I'll believe it when I see it.

Wow. If he's not a C's fan, then he must just be blind.

Rondo is a reckless gambler on defense who gets bailed out by great help defenders who clean up his mistakes. Rondo could be a great defender, but I think he's very overrated at this point, and certainly not even close to DPOY.

I think people would be amazed at how much Rondo's poor habits would be exploited if he weren't on a team with 3 HOFers and a very very good post defender in Perk.

In fact, if a non-KG Celtic deserves some run for DPOY, I'd nominate Perk instead of Rondo. I think the difference defensively between Howard and Perk is far far smaller than advertised.

I'm a huge Rondo fan, and I wouldn't support him for DPOY, either. And I agree that Perkins is the second-best defender on the team, after Garnett.

However, I wonder about this fairly common notion that his one-one-one defense is poor and that he's bailed out by the Celtics great help defense. Given that the Celtics are the best defensive team in the NBA, two years running, could it be that Rondo is playing perfectly within this system -- which involves gambling on the perimeter and trusting your helpers to close the lane? (That's a genuine question -- I don't have a strong opinion on the subject.)

Also, the idea that Rondo's defense (like the rest of his game, I suppose) is helped by playing with "three Hall of Famers" seems weird to me. Ray Allen has never been known for his defense, and even now he strikes me as the weakest defensively of the starting five.

Schreiber's not alone in his praise for Rondo's defense. John Hollinger thought he was the best defensive point guard in the NBA last year. And Kevin Pelton thinks "the arrival of young Ricky Rubio might be the only thing that keeps Rondo from being the league's best defensive point guard for a decade or so." He goes on:

Well those guys need to get out and watch more games, because I'm sorry but anyone that thinks Rondo is the best defensive guard in the league either isn't watching the games or doesn't understand what their watching. He MAY have the tools to become a upper level defensive player in this league but he's not even close right now. And sadly a lot of it seems to have to do with effort. He's perfectly content to allow the man he's defending to cruise past him so he can gamble to try and poke the ball away.

And you don't think there's any chance that's by design -- taking chances on the perimeter and using Boston's excellent help defense and strong interior defenders? Doc doesn't seem to have any problem with his defense -- and the Celtics only had one of the best defenses in years last season and are topping the league again this year. How good would they be if Rondo just made an effort?

I see what you're seeing, at least to an extent, but neither the coaches nor the numbers seem to indicate a problem.

(Also, out of curiosity, who do you think is the best defensive point guard in the NBA?)

Westbrook is putting up numbers that are as good if not better than Rose. But probably 4 people have seen him play, so he's not going to get a lot of love. His PER is about the same as Rose and some of his peripheral stats are better, but his shot selection has been really, really bad on a Thunder team 2% of the country has embraced.

The rookie class is either really deep this year or these group of rookies are padding their stats on bad teams. I sense it's a mix of the two, but I'm hoping for the former, simply because this upcoming draft is a joke. OJ Mayo is averaging 18 ppg on .437/.380/.877 and his name isn't even in the discussion for ROY. Same with Love, who seems to have almost out-Troy Murhpy'ed Troy Murphy. Mario Chalmers and Marc Gasol are having really good years. Luc Mbah a Moute has had a really good year on an awful Bucks team; same for Eric Gordon.

Which is why Rose is (and should be) a lock. He's arguably the most important player for a playoff team (a lousy one, but still), and he is the only rookie about which that can be said. Of the 18 rookies played 20+ mpg, only Oden/Beasley/Lee/Fernandez/Chalmers/Rose will be in the playoffs, and Rose is far more valuable to his teams' success than any of the others.

Yeah, I agree that it's the responsibility Rose is very adequately shouldering that should earn him the award, and not his clear superiority to Love, Westbrook, Lopez et al. And the rookie class is absurdly deep. I'm not sure any of them is a surefire superstar (though Rose seems headed in that direction), but there are a lot of good players.

Espn did their award picks.

The interesting ones were:

One guy(Jon Barry) actually picked D-Wade for MVP. Go figure.

Coach of the Year was pretty split up. Personally, I'd eliminate Van Gundy for the way the Magic choked away the #2 seed down the stretch. They had a great shot at it till they lost to the Kicks last friday. ESPN picked Mike Brown. Thinking about it, I'm not sure Mike Brown did anything this year Doc didn't do last year. Both got handed a pretty good team by their GM and both got a coordinator that helped them alot.

What is the criteria for most improved player of the year? It should be if you really suck one year and are good the next. A jump from 3 points a game to 16 or something. Guys like Rondo and Harris were really good last year shouldn't be allowed to get most improved if they were already really good. Just spit balling here.

Danny Granger should also be in contention for Most Improved.

Danny Granger was selected as most improved in the link two posts before yours.

He is certainly in contention.