Nikola Jokic winning his third regular season MVP award in the last four years seems to have ruffled some feathers. After Shaquille O’Neal’s initial outburst upon congratulating the Denver Nuggets star, Dwight Howard has joined the bandwagon. The former NBA star expressed his disappointment on X, while also name-dropping some former and current NBA stars who were snubbed from winning the coveted title.
The MVP title has become polarizing in the last few years, attracting controversies following the announcement. This time it was no different. In the standard voting process, Jokic received 926 points with 79 people putting him at the top.
The runner-up and Shaq’s MVP choice Shai Gilgeous-Alexander received 640 points with only 15 voters deeming him fit for the first position. It’s unclear who Howard was rooting for in the MVP race, but he seems to have raised a fair question. He wrote,
“First off I think it’s still a lack of clarity of what “MVP” means and the way it’s voted on. Is it the best player? Or the player who has the most value to his teams success?”
Howard also outlined that players like Shaq and the late, great Kobe Bryant only won one MVP title in their illustrious careers, “It still intrigues me that Kobe & even Shaq only have 1 MVP. Also it’s crazy that Bron doesn’t have more MVP’s than anyone else… he’s probably the most snubbed.”
He also expressed concern over Dwyane Wade and Jerry West never winning the award in their careers. While his confusion and questions are understandable, the process is fairly easy. Additionally, until 1980, the players were responsible for voting the MVP title. So, that clears out any controversy regarding ‘The Logo’ not winning it even once.
Following that, the NBA handed this responsibility to a large group of journalists who get to rank their own top five. The number one spot is worth 10 points, number two is seven points, number three is five points, number four is three points, and number five is one point.
Based on the rankings a player receives from the media members, a cumulative score is generated, and the player with the highest score wins the title. The lengthy post from Howard begs a question, is he alluding that he was also snubbed in the process?
Analyzing Dwight Howard’s 2011 season
When Howard was with the Magic in 2011, he had his closest shot to becoming a league MVP. According to Stat Muse, Superman averaged 22.9 points, 14.1 rebounds, and 2.4 blocks in 78 games. He made the All-Star selection for the fifth time in his career and won his third DPOY. Despite clocking a special season, Howard finished second on the final list by a huge margin.
Derrick Rose beat him for the title, who averaged 25.0 points, 7.7 assists, and 4.1 rebounds in 81 games. On the final scoresheet, Rose accumulated 1182 points with 113 media members putting him up for the first spot. Howard couldn’t even give a decent challenge to Rose, finishing with 643 points with only three people putting him in first place.
There is a lot of speculation about Rose winning the title that season, as it overshadowed Howard’s efforts to bring the injury-ridden Orlando Magic to the playoffs and LeBron James’ incredible run to the finals. Thus, there might be chances that Howard has a personal reason here.
