Is Kobe the MVP?

In his his chat Tuesday, John Hollinger (the best NBA writer around for my money, no matter what you think of his statistics) said something interesting, if not exactly surprising:

Michael (Batavia, NY): If the Lakers finish as the #2 seed, does Kobe Bryant get your vote as MVP? I see an argument for Chris Paul, but the Hornets haven't had all of the injuries the Lakers have.

John Hollinger: I think Kobe's argument for MVP is pretty weak to be honest. His PER isn't even better than Garnett's, who is supposed to be the non-numbers candidate, and it isn't close to Paul's or James's. If he wins, it's a guilt trip by the writers over the '06 vote.

And then:

Bryan (Boulder): To be MVP, Chris Paul should be recognized as the best player in the game. That's what more I want. If Kobe isn't the MVP - and by the way PER is merely an indicator not a precise reflection of value - than why do the vast majority of players, coaches, and GMs routinely cite him as the league's best player?

John Hollinger: No, it doesn't mean best player, it means best season. You'd still draft Kobe ahead of Paul until he proved he could repeat his level of play this year -- but there's no question he's played better than Kobe in 2007-08.

As far as the other part of your question, I wish I knew why everyone keeps saying Kobe is the best player -- he's certainly the most electrifying, and he's the best player 6-6 or under, but LeBron has outPERed him three straight years and Dirk has for four, and it's not like he's had massive intangibles to offset that.

I don't know that I'd go so far as to say that I'd rather have Dirk Nowitzki than Kobe (nor does Hollinger say that though he does imply it later in the chat), but I am sure that Kobe has not been the best or most valuable player in basketball this year.

He can't touch LeBron or Paul in PER (Hollinger's all encompassing stat)--24.34 to 29.84 and 28.52 respectively--and he trails, among others, Garnett, who is the best defensive player in the league, Tim Duncan, also better at defense, and Amare Stoudemaire, who has been amazing since the Shaq trade (but that's a story for another time). Kobe definitely plays better defense than LeBron and probably plays it better than Paul too, and PER does underrate that a lot, but there's no way he can make up that big a difference (4 or 5 points is HUGE).

And then when you add intangible effects, particularly to Paul, things move even further apart. Kobe's supporting cast is a lot better and deeper when healthy (and even with all the injuries it's been at least as good) AND his team has won fewer games than Paul's. Then, if you consider it relevant, Paul essentially saved basketball in New Orleans, turning the team from a lame duck in a lame duck location to a genuine drawing force in a city that desperately needed a bright spot. Should that matter? I don't know, but it certainly can't hurt an already strong case.

Why is it that people, like the chatter from above, repeatedly throw around this claim that Kobe is the "best player in the game" when there's really no evidence that that's true? As Hollinger notes later, even when Kobe played with Shaq, probably one of the 10-20 best players of all time at that point in his career, Shaq was the "most dominant" and Kobe was the "best," like there's somehow a distinction between those two phrases.

I think there are two big reasons for this, which are actually pretty related: 1) Kobe is closer to our platonic ideal of a basketball player, that is, Michael Jordan, than the other players. We want our best player to be Michael Jordan again, but MJ wasn't the best because he was the best competitive 6'6'' 2-guard, he was the best because he was the best. 2) Kobe is a 2-guard, the position that produces the most exciting players who do the most things on offense.

So Kobe is exciting and he looks like what we expect the best player to look like. Dirk doesn't fit what we think a great player should be--his greatness lies in the fact that he's 7-feet tall and an unbelievable jump shooter. That's a killer combination, but it doesn't look pretty. Same story with Duncan--he's great because he's an athletic, smart, totally fundamentally sound 7-footer. He does everything right, but nothing that makes you say, "Wow."

And even Paul, who I think it's pretty hard to argue isn't fun to watch, doesn't seem like a truly great player. The MVP's not supposed to be 6'0'' anymore than he's supposed to be 7'0''. Paul is already putting in probably the best season ever by a small point-guard, so we don't really have a comparison for a player like him. That, however, doesn't mean he isn't the best.

Who's my MVP? Paul, I suppose, because he deserves a small bonus for taking a team that didn't make the playoffs last year to first place in the most competitive conference ever, but I could vote for LeBron every year and not regret it in the least, and Garnett with his defense is a much better option than I would have expected. So that's a tentative vote for Chris Paul, savior of the New Orleans Hornets.

What does CP3 think about that?

Pictures from Sports Illustrated.