The National Basketball Association has only seen four players win back-to-back Most Valuable Awards since the turn of the century.
Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, LeBron James (twice) and Stephen Curry are the only men to go back to back in that period.
So while Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks might be favoured to repeat heading into the season, the next MVP will likely be another player on another team.
Looking to join this list is last year’s MVP Antetokounmpo. The award is often given to the player with the best story to be told and whose narrative was written before the season began, with the story line finishing at the end of the year as the most valuable player.
The Greek Freak is currently the favourite to win this year’s MVP, with Stephen Curry, James Harden and Kawhi Leonard close behind. Two teammates, LeBron James and Anthony Davis, are also short odds to win this year’s award. However, when two teammates are that close, they often cancel each other out with voters, making each of them unlikely choices.
With all the free agency drama he created and the chance to win the first title with a second franchise, it is hard to say that anyone will win this year’s NBA MVP award over Kawhi Leonard of the Los Angeles Clippers.
(Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
Already a two-time NBA Champion and Finals MVP, many are moving the 28-year-old into the upper echelon of players in the league and are outwardly predicting that he will take his new team to the promised land of the NBA Finals, and even help guide them to their first title in franchise history, just as he did last season with the Toronto Raptors.
Damian Lillard of the Portland Trailblazers is a dark horse candidate for MVP. With so much on the Western Conference this year, a player that often saw his game start late at night on the East Coast will likely catch the eye of many more fans this season.
Also, with many people picking Portland as a dark horse team to make some noise in the West this season, the narrative already has a few paragraphs written in the preseason, which gives the 29-year-old a leg up in the MVP chase.
With the season just over two weeks away, let the MVP race begin.
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