Even though I love me some Kendrick Perkins, he’s so wrong about this. The NBA MVP frontrunner, Nikola Jokic, is getting a lot of silly and downright dumb criticisms from some former NBA players as they say he’s unworthy of the award because he’s a “stat padder”.
To answer the questions in the title: No and absolutely NO!
Nikola Jokic is definitely not a stat padder and his is more than worthy of the MVP award this season. In fact, I think this might be his most deserving season of the award yet as he’s single handedly led the Denver Nuggets to be the #1 seed in the Western Conference (he was the only Nugget to be selected to the all-star game), even though he is already a back-to-back MVP winner.
Sure, Jokic was great during his last two MVP seasons as well as he averaged 26.4 PPG, 10.8 RPG, 8.3 APG, and 1.3 BPG in 2020, and 27.1 PPG, 13.8 RPG, 7.9 APG, and 1.5 SPG in 2021, but the Nuggets were not a dominating team in those two seasons as they are today.
The Nuggets finished 3rd in the Western Conference in 2020 and were knocked out of the playoffs in the 2nd round by the Suns (4-0), while they finished 6th in the West in 2021 and were knocked out of the playoffs in the 1st round by the Warriors (4-1). Clearly, the Nuggets, led by Nikola Jokic, have played the very best basketball this season the franchise has seen since Chauncey Billips and Carmelo Anthony were smoking teams in the late 2000’s.
And, Kendrick Perkins and every other ex-player who says Jokic is unworthy, do you want to know why that is the case? It’s because Jokic is putting up UNREAL STATS!
As of me writing this article, Jokic is going to finish the season averaging a triple-double as he currently is clocking in 24.6 PPG, 11.7 RPG, 10.0 APG, and 1.3 SPG, while he is also shooting 63.3% from the field (6th highest among all players) and 39.8% (T-40th among all players) from the 3-point line. Remember, he’s a center!
This kind of all-round production from a center is almost unheard of across the history of the game, and Jokic should not be criticized or deemed less valuable due to his position, the number of MVP award he’s already won, or some other kind of irrelevant factor that Kendrick Perkins stupidly alluded to in one of his interviews (I still really like and appreciate the guy, but the comment I’m talking about was out of line).
Moreover, if you look at the other star big men in the game, such as Bam Adebayo (21.2 PPG, 9.8 RPG, 3.2 APG, 1.2 SPG, 53.8% FG), Joel Embiid (33.0 PPG, 10.4 RPG, 4.1 APG, 1.1 SPG, 53.2% FG), Pascal Siakam (25.2 PPG, 7.7 RPG, 6.0 APG, 0.8 SPG, 47.7% FG), Domantas Sabonis (18.8 PPG, 12.4 RPG, 6.9 APG, 0.8 SPG, 61.4% FG), Jarrett Allen (14.7 PPG, 9.9 RPG, 1.6 APG, 0.8 SPG, 65.2% FG), etc., and their stats, they just don’t compare.
Well, him and Embiid are really close, but Jokic is having a better season than Philly’s big man.
And, as for the silly “stat padder” claim, there’s one simple fact that disproves it: the Nuggets are unbeaten when Nikola Jokic achieves a triple-double and are sub .500 when he does not. Or, for the stat lovers such as myself, the Nuggets are 28-0 (64% of their 44 wins) when Jokic gets a triple-double and are 16-19 (.457 winning percentage) when Jokic fails to do so.
As a Celtics fan, I still want Jayson Tatum to bring home his first MVP and be the first Celtic since the legendary Larry Bird won 3 straight from 1984-86, but Jokic is an equally deserving recipient of the honor.
I think that’s enough said about this silly topic.
Images Source: Featured Image: (Wikimedia Creative Common License/Author: All-Pro Reels) (All-Pro Reels, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)
