Goeiedag, enchantée and welcome to this week's episode of Eight 2 Four presents: All-NBA Team of the Week. The end of the regular season is near, there is only 1 game left to play for all teams. There are still a couple of fights for positioning but in general, we have a pretty good idea who is playing the Play-in games and who is playing in the Playoffs. We’re not going to discuss the importance of the final day of the regular season, instead we will give you our favourites for the individual awards, the MVP, MIP, Rookie, Sixth man and Defensive player of the year. We’re not giving you lists of 50 names for each award, we have done the work in the background and share with you why we have picked these guys. Get ready for your All-NBA Team of the Week.
PICK #1
First up, the MVP of the regular season, Nikola Jokic of the Denver Nuggets. This shouldn’t be a surprise for most of you listeners, we have plugged Jokic in the past because he has had an incredible season. Before Jamal Murray had his eason-ending injury, Jokic was already leading the MVP race, alongside LeBron and Embiid, but he has taken it to the next level after that. Without Murray, nobody expected the Nuggets to keep playing at the same level as they did before. Instead, since Murray’s injury, the Nuggets are 13 and 4, placing them in third spot in the West.
Jokic is incredibly important for Denver. Not only is he playing statistically his best season ever, he is making the players around him better and he is available ALL THE TIME. The last time Jokic missed a game was on the 7th of April 2019, that is more than 2 years ago. He has played every game since then. That in itself puts him in a category of his own for this MVP race. Without him, even with Murray, Denver wouldn’t have made it into these Playoffs. Maybe not even in the Play-ins.
PICK #2
Our Most Improved Player of the year is, without a doubt, Julius Randle of the New York Knicks. The Knicks made very little changes to the roster that last season finished 12th and, again, pulled an unlucky position in the draft lottery and dropped to 8. Nobody was the Knicks to have a season of importance, maybe they would compete for a spot in the Play-In games. But Randle blossomed to a fantastic player under new coach Thibodeau and pushed his team to a much higher level. If they win their game tomorrow, they will find themselves in the Playoffs with home court advantage in the first round.
Statistically, Randle improved massively on his first few years in the league. Yes, he did play a lot more minutes which allowed him to rack up some stats but he was also a lot more important than before. He was rewarded earlier this season with a spot on the All-Star teams but he has improved again since then. His performance this season is so much more impressive than anyone else and that’s why he deserves this award.
PICK #3
Our Rookie of the year debate has been the most heated and difficult to sort out. We decided to give it to LaMelo Ball over Anthony Edwards, mostly based on how they started the season. Edwards needed some time to get used to his new team and playing in the league but once he found his groove, he was awesome. Ball on the other hand, started off really strong and stayed strong until his injury. And that injury is really the only thing that allowed Edwards to come back into this discussion. But the injury is there and we have to take it into account. What plays in Ball’s favour is that he was still great when he returned.
Ball has given us plenty of highlights this season, not in the least with his assists. His passing is definitely his strongest weapon, something we, in Australia, already saw last year when he played for the Hawks. For me personally, I would have picked at number 1 but it was clear that the Timberwolves did not want to upset D’Angelo Russell, their star point guard. Ball fell to third but has shown the league that he is more than ready to play his part in the future of the NBA.
PICK #4
We give the Sixth Man of the Year to Jordan Clarkson of the Utah Jazz. Funnily enough, his teammate Joe Ingles was his biggest competition but all-in-all Clarkson deserves this award. His role on the Jazz team is one of the hardest a player can be assigned, to be a scoring spark off the bench. He has to take over Donovan Mitchell’s role when he is off the court. And Clarkson performs. His selfish style would be frowned upon in most teams but for the Jazz it is vital and one of the reasons they are one of the highest scoring teams in the league. He torches most opponent teams' second units and has helped the Jazz to many victories.
For Clarkson this will be the first season since his stint with LeBron in Cleveland, where he has a very good chance of making it to the Finals. All he has to do is to be the human spark plug for the Jazz off the bench. He has a career-high in points per game this season and is proving incredibly reliable with the ball in his hands. Most teams in the Playoffs will struggle keeping him from heating up in at least 4 games.
PICK #5
Another difficult decision was made for the Defensive Player of the Year. We decided to give it to Ben Simmons of the Philadelphia 76ers, over Rudy Gobert of the Jazz. The reason we went sith Simmons over Gobert has more to do with their defensive style than their actual numbers. Gobert is a monster under the boards and can protect the ring like no other but Simmons is more versatile and is able to defend different types of players on different parts of the court. For example, against Dallas he was able to shut Luka down and we have seen some amazing defense on Giannis too. Gobert is a one-trick pony, but it is a wonderful trick though.
Both players have been going at each other on social media as well, with Simmons calling Gobert out more than once. His last comments were: “He guarded me, I had 42 and apparently, I’m not a scorer.” And as much as Gobert’s defensive performances are fantastic, I do side with Simmons. It is more impressive for someone to defend every position and a different kind of player every night. That is why Simmons is our Defensive player of the year.
This is our All-NBA team of the Week. Please share our podcast and give us 5 stars. If you have any questions, you can contact the show on eight2fouroffice@gmail.com. Thank you for listening, ballers out!
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