LeBron James Is Your Finals MVP [BLOG]
By Dan Jenkins
@DanTJenkins
Let me prelude this by saying that I'm not the biggest fan of Lebron James. I think he is one of the most egotistical athletes of our time. But what he's doing on the court for the Cleveland Cavaliers during the NBA Finals is nothing short of remarkable.
Only one player in NBA history has won the Finals MVP award while playing for the losing team. That was Jerry West in the 1969 NBA Finals when his Los Angeles Lakers lost to Bill Russell's Boston Celtics in seven games. West averaged 37.9 points and 7.4 assists in that series, while scoring 42 points in a 2-point Game 7 loss.
One thing differentiates West's Lakers from James' Cavaliers -- the Lakers had two other Hall of Fame players (Wilt Chamberlain and Elgin Baylor) on the roster. Who does James have? J.R. Smith and Matthew Dellavedova -- hardly household names.
The rest of the Cavaliers' roster is so dreadful that LeBron has taken 101 more shots than the next closest Cleveland player (James: 163, Smith: 62) while averaging a near triple-double (36.6 points, 12.4 rebounds and 8.8 assists) and playing on almost no rest (45.6 minutes per game).
However, the easy decision for MVP will be Stephen Curry if the Warriors go on to win the series. He was the regular season MVP and he is averaging 26.2 points per game in the Finals. His "hero ball" tactics in Game 5 on Sunday ensured that Golden State return to Cleveland on Tuesday with a 3-2 series lead.
But Curry hasn't had to do everything for his team like LeBron has. The Warriors have had a role player emerge as a hero in both their Game 4 and Game 5 victories.
Andre Iguodala scored 22 points and shut LeBron down in Game 4, while Draymond Green had 16 points, nine rebounds and six assists in Game 5.
It would be quite easy to say that the Warriors would have swept this series in blowout fashion if LeBron went down with an injury in Game 1 -- that's just how valuable he is. Without LeBron James (and Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love) the Cavaliers are a D-League team.
While getting a little help from Dellavedova and Timofey Mozgov in the Cavaliers' two wins, LeBron has still carried the load in historic fashion. He was asked to do even more in Game 5, when "coach" David Blatt decided to play Mozgov for only nine minutes after tallying 28 points and 10 rebounds in Game 4.
I personally am a much bigger fan of Steph Curry -- I think he is going to go down as the best shooter in NBA history -- than LeBron. But to say that LeBron isn't the Most Valuable Player in this series -- win or lose -- would be a tragedy.
