[Highlight] Austin Reaves when asked about Luka’s high scoring stretch: ‘Yeah and he continues to drop in the MVP race..maybe he’s got to score 60, I don’t know’
84
Impossible he got suspended so he can’t play the Wizards on Monday
Nets were playing 4D chess tonight
AR probably gonna drop 50 in his honor, I can already see it coming. First option Reaves always goes off
Yes, first option AR does tend to go nuclear, averaging 35/6/10 over the past two years.
Reaves scores 75 to honour Luka like Bam honouring Kobe.
Would be funny if he overtakes Luka in the rankings as a result
AR going for 84 against the Wizards on Monday would be fun… but not a good look for Luka’s ranking. š
Refs were trying to double tech Luka for a minute now, this is just them being able to do what they intended to do. Definitely deserved a T, but not a double T for that soft ass shit.
Bam paid these refs off.
elite defender on and off the court
Yeah his defence at home must be amazing
Can’t believe he got suspended out of respect for Kobe.
I was unironically excited about getting my workās free tickets for Monday because it seemed plausible that Luka would get near the record š Now I just have to watch the āWashington Wizardsā play ābasketballā šš
Hey, you might see Bronny play more than 5 minutes~
I legitimately think Reaves could get 70.
so he gets it against okc
Not if Dort elbows his kidneys first.
No kidneys makes Luka even lighter, good strategy
Dort seen chasing Luka around the floor, trying to bite his legs off
82* out of respect for Bam’s legacy
Even if he drops 84 against the thunder he ain’t getting MVP. That’s how biased people are. It’s like once a narrative about his defense is set, they keep sticking to it burying their heads in the sand.
101
When people ask about a new trophy for the offensive player of the year, those same journalists always argue no need for that because MVP is basically that, but thenā¦ they just hate Doncic, period.
He couldn’t get the free throws necessary.
So you think Bam is the MVP because of one game?
Even people who donāt like Luka have to admit itās objectively insane he dropped 2 spots after winning 12 of 13 games while averaging like 40 ppg
They donāt actually watch basketball and are still going off the Luka bad on defense narrative
Heās led the entire league in steals in March
Luka gets steals: āsteals arenāt a a good metric for defenseā SGA leads in steals: āterrific two way player!!ā
Flirting vs harassment?
Itās not even an argument Luka is some amazing defender. It just highlights the stupidity of people harping on his defense when itās been perfectly fine and often good for awhile now
A lot of people see random lowlight clips of his defense and just think thatās what he does all the time. Heās probably below average to average but his offense more than makes up for it
I mean…steals aren’t a good metric, no matter WHO it is.
AI led the league in steals, and he was a shit defender his whole career.
But Luka has been totally fine on defense these past few months. Which is why you barely see any posts about his defense anymore, which was not the case in November and December
Yet they will never talk about jokic being the worst defender on the court lol
The goalposts always move for Luka, and seemingly only for Luka too
it really is bizarre when you look at the whole national media narrative about his career.
it started to turn negative after about his 3rd straight year of getting a 1st Team All-NBA selection
Windhorst calling him a fat baby and the entire community not absolutely destroying windhorst but instead taking his side disgusted me to no end.
Windhorst is fat as fuck and has an agenda
I’m not fat phobic, but I find it so strange that one of the biggest nba journalists is a fat white man who it seems never played much sports. That’s why winshorst bothers me.
yeah these “journalists” have gotten way too big of egos, especially since the print media has basically completely disappeared so now they’re all “TV” personalities. sick shit. don’t deserve their positions
The goalpost moves for Jokic, but it moves in his favor lol
Luka has a 40 point triple double,” it’s another day at the office yawn”. SGA scores 25 with 10 assists “ lets throw a parade for him!”
Havenāt seen a single low light
Jokicās defense has always been a talking point as his main weakness what you smoking ?
I think the point is Jokic has 3 MVPs despite this, so itās weird that people are using it as a mark against Luka.
I think this year it has been used against both him and Luka more than others. Especially juxtaposed against the generational defensive talent they’re competing against.
He would have 4 if it weren’t for the defense argument. That’s why Embiid has one. I swear you guys lived under a rock for that season if you actually think Jokic didn’t get roasted and passed over due to defense lol
man, I am a huge Jokic guy, love him, but I think he is 4th because of how terrible he and his team has been on defense. I also admittedly hate Luka, and would have him tied for 2nd with SGA. I think I would have alone in second if he had played all season like he’s playing now. I know he had good stats earlier but I watched those games too, he’s different these last 2 months. SGA has been consistently great but I don’t think his highs have been as high as the other 3 contenders.
I have never been a Spurs guy but I guess I am now. When I watch Wemby, it’s clear he’s the best player in basketball to me and I’ve felt that way since about christmas
Ugh I hate this about Jokic conversations, so many recency bias nephews want to put him in the top 5 centers of all time and it’s like dude, he only plays one side of the basketball. The best of the best centers were two way monsters that had huge impacts on both sides of the ball.
Jokic is an offensive savant, no question. His defense is going to hold him back on all time rankings and people need to be willing to accept that.
The way people were going on about his defence you’d think he’s the worst defender in the league
he’s literally bare middle of the road too which is funny. Brunson is statistically the worst defender in the league
You can’t say that or a bunch of his dick riders come out to defend him lol respect for being honest about your team though
Brunson is the king of New York but my man is a juicewrld concert security guard on defense
His defense isn’t as terrible as people say but he’s still a pretty mid defender
Michael fucking Wilbon
I mean the MVP tracker is not the actual race. It just a column.
Itās literally just to get people talking about it - mission accomplished
Yea it is insane but itās also insane in a cool way. The fact that Shai, Wemby, Jokic, Luka are all in this in amazing fashion is great for the game
Needs some yanks in there as well. Otherwise ‘24 might be the last gold they’ll get in a while (curry/bron/kd cant save them forever)
Whoever gets knocked down among shai, wemby, jokic and luka will always receive backlash because of how talented they are. That is good for basketball.
Itās for engagement. I donāt think Wemby as great as he is on both sides of the ball, should be ahead of a guy leading the league in assists and rebounds while averaging a near 30 point triple double but Wemby is first outta nowhere.
It should correct itself when the playoffs start but the NBA is a corporation at the end of the day and theyāll do whatever it takes to increase viewership, engagement and revenue.
While also being top 5 in steals and one of the better players in defensive efficiency.
He also leading the league in total steals over the last month. Defense is their usual main knock against him, but then theyāll come back with a high steal count doesnāt mean good defense.
No Laker has finished top 3 in an individual voting player accolade in over a decade. They won a title as the regular season #1 in that time frame.
Luka have to admit itās objectively insane he dropped 2 spots
Luka didn’t drop any “spots”. There are no spots. The ladder is literally nothing more then a power ranking.
Why do people follow the ladder? Why? It has absolutely no impact or anything to do with how MVP is decided.
lol so you know the players are reading this and keeping up with it.
Mind you Shaun Powell is very biased so nobody should be taking his ratings that seriously but he accomplished his goal of getting everyone talking.
Why does Shaun Powells garbage ranking get posted though?
Heās worse than a random Redditor
Promise? Iām firing up my Brunson agenda then if itāll get more respect.
I can respect a Knicks fan stanning his guy. Powell is just a clickbaity bitch.
I know thatās a low bar, but thanks nonetheless
Cause this has happened before also, when luka dropped 73 he fell down in rankings couple of years ago
Powell did an AMA on this subreddit a little over a week ago and this is how he described his methodology:
I can sit here and say that I have computerized data, and watch every single possession, plus/minus, and all those sorts of things, but I would rather not get too complicated. Sometimes it’s just the eye test.
That’s not the full quote but the rest of it was pretty aimless rambling
He’s also had Jalen Johnson at 7th on the ladder for 2 weeks in a row now, which seems crazy to me, but nobody’s really commented on it because people understandably don’t really pay attention after top 5.
Ant 10 Jalen Johnson 7 is certainly a takeĀ
Certainly a takeā¦of all time
God, I wish someone would pay me money to be this fucking stupid. I could pull so many ridiculous takes out of my ass. HIRE ME ESPN!
Love Jalen Johnson, but wow thatās asinine
Seem to me like intentional tanking of hot takes just to get clicks. There’s no shot that’s a real take I refuse to believe it, especially with how low Ant is ranked
The funniest part is, Luka had to average like 34/8/8 to be around 6-7 like a month or 2 ago because his defense wasnāt good and his team sucked. Apparently Jalen Johnson gets in with worse numbers all around with bad defense as whatever seed the Hawks were at the time (certainly wasnāt top 3)
Basically vibes
And honestly it should be talked about how unfairly Luka gets evaluated compared to other MVP candidates. Iām glad AR is bringing attention to it. I personally think you can make a strong case for SGA, Wemby, and Luka, but the disdain people have for ranking him above other players is noticeable. Itās like pulling teeth to get the media to admit he should be in the conversation as the leader in scoring, dragging a weaker supporting roster to the 3rd seed, and who is on a crazy hot streak right now. I mean, heās poised to have more player of the weeks and player of the months this season than SGA if he gets the one for March, which he should.
who the heck is Shaun Powell. Never heard that name before.
He’s the writer of the KIA MVP ladder.
It gets published everywhere weekly (or sometimes bi-weekly, he strategically updates it whenever a player he likes has a good game so he can bump them up, or delays it if they had a bad game).
It looks “official” and people take it as gospel since it’s coming from the NBA, but in reality it’s just one guy’s opinion.
I mean itās almost a fact that the NBA MVP is decided by one person because he can influence the talking points and opinion of voters. He can always rank Luka as 5th and the media will just follow his opinion and then the voters follow by following the mediaās opinion.
Its not even “one guy”, its “some dude” cause he doesnt know shit about basketball
Known Jokic fanboy who is in charge of the MVP ladder which the NBA regularly posts
does he have other content there we can evaluate his ball knowledge.
From experience, he needs to score at least 74 since he got dragged for scoring 73 on 93 TS%
Yeah people joke about that but in case anyone doesnāt know, he literally did fall in the MVP rankings immediately after scoring 73 points on 25⁄33 FGs. Like thatās a real thing that happened.
Luka may genuinely be the first player in NBA history to suffer from voter fatigue before actually winning a major award. I swear voters are just so numb to his greatness from literally his rookie season that he has to clear an extraordinarily higher bar than anyone else to win.
Itās a literal fact, Itās a credit to Lukas greatness and consistency, heās essentially been the same player since coming into the league, voters never had the time to adjust because he was already exceptionally gifted. By the time it was hit third or fourth season, his greatness has diminished and been pushed to the side because they think thatās the standard for Luka which is sad because we know he obviously has much more to offer than scoring
Also the narrative when Luka dropped 73 was the nba is weak and Luka scoring 73 shows how bad the nba is
That was particularly funny cause when Bam dropped 80+ on 40+ free throws, that conversation didn’t flare up anywhere near as much, while being much more relevant in that case.
Luka having the most efficient high scoring game ever, on few free throws, against a team fighting for a playoff spot created a stronger debate about the quality and integrity of the league than Bam blatantly stat padding vs a taking team.
And then Luka went into Bamās house and put 60 on his head. It had guys sounding like porky pigā¦ ahbadeahbade.
Don’t remind mo of that shit. The day before they were praising Embiid then when Luka did it aaaw the league defense sucks.
I never understood this when it happened. Luka played well its not his fault the Hawks had no effort and just sucked a massive dick that night lol
They didnāt though. Luka needed all those points that night. You just write random shit?
Lmao yes they did a lot of how Luka got hot and shit on them was them letting him literally walk into the paint and score on them. I watched this one in person and they definitely felt a sense of like urgency later on but its because he was embarrassing them when they started the game with basically no defensive effort
Just watch this weak shit from them lol https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRblNTXolvo dudes were scared to touch him at first. They tried later and Luka is special so he’s still going to score on you when you play real defense but if you let him play most of the first half without much pressure bad shit is going to happen
Luka will be shipped back to Spain and banned from NBA when he drops 60 again
I feel like I’m going insane with the Wemby for MVP narrative
Since when do we give MVPs to players with nowhere near the box score stats as the other candidates because of defense that’s never how the award has been given until now lol
He wasn’t even being talked about much for the award until about a week ago now suddenly he’s entirely leapfrogged Luka and is even about to takeover 1st from SGA?
It is weird, all of a sudden they made it about defense when Joker has been winning them all decade.
So many talking heads are talking about if he is Best player in the world already… The Wemby PR is crazy rn. Don’t get me wrong he is top 5 player already but at least let him get a playoff run in before they start putting him in that convo.
I’ve got nothing against the guy but I’ve really never seen such a blatant “we want this guy to be the face of the league” push at this stage of someones career in my life. Usually it starts this way and then the media gets bored after a year or two and starts hating.
After SGA basically eliminated Jokic from contention with the back to back wins against the Nuggets where he kept hitting dagger 3’s, people got bored and decided to find a new contender.
Literally this, the next week was about Cade and JB, then Wemby started campaigning hard, and in the mean time Luka had a great month as well lol
Before that it was either SGA or Jokic, no one was even talking about Wemby, and Luka was getting hated on by the blind mob
I love that the logic was that people were changing and talking about others more after the Jokic losses, but that it also doesn’t apply to Luka who has now entered these conversations now too.
Bill Russell won it off defense against Wilt back in the day. Pretty sure Wilts boxscore was better too.
It was before media had a vote for it, players themselves vote for MVP which is why we had Bill, Reed and Unseld for MVP
It makes no sense lol
good time to start i guess
Gambling companies made the call to Adam Silver
Because that guy just won 22 of 23 for the last stretch of games with the largest margin of any team in the NBA?
The same team that Luka had to score 60 to win vs, the Miami Heat, the Spurs put away early into the game. Wemby was +20 in 26 mins and played the bench in the fourth.
Watch the actual games. The moment Wemby comes out, the tide shifts, the other team builds a run until he comes back in and then the Spurs build such a ridiculous lead that it doesn’t matter anymore.
BUT BOX SCORE WATCHERS IN SHAMBLES.
Some Lakers homer media person should ask him why he thinks heās the MVP. Apparently that boosts your MVP odds
Scoring 40 a game over the last 3 weeks drops you!
Honestly, I don’t care who wins it anymore. This MVP race has been even more toxic than usual. Fans are literally doing deep dives on box scores from weeks ago to justify why their guy should be MVP.
At the end of the day, the MVP award is mostly a narrative award. Almost all the MVP candidates will have similar stats and great performances.
This is the most interested I’ve ever been in final voting count as opposed to just who wins. Having 4 legitimate guys is gonna make for some very interesting ballots with at least one weirdo not having any of the 4 guys in their top 2.
Iāll tell you right now, unless your team gets past OKC, and Shai has worse numbers because even getting the 1 seed wonāt be enough, majority is going to him. I have been following the league for a while, so I have seen these MVP races, usually you can tell from the vibes who is going to win. People made up their mind when SGA hit those shots against Denver as if one game is supposed to tell the whole story. Last year from vibes it was overwhelmingly Jokic, but then you could tell it shifted 1-2 months before.
Howver it had no logic, just vibes and narrative over a couple games, with the voter fatigue as well. People talked about the amount of wins as if one guy didnāt have an incredible roster and the other didnāt have a problematic one. My prediction, 71% Shai, 19% Wemby, 5% each Jokic and Luka.
But MVP counts for legacy point too, so it is great to have one
Plus we can all see the writing on the wall that Wemby is probably gonna be the next to dominate MVP voting. Gotta get them in before he hits his prime
I have encounter people who ragged on Kobe and Shaq for only have one MVP as if it meant they weren’t that dominant. Need multiple other posters to explain how LeBron haven’t win MVPs since 2012 doesn’t mean he’s not one of the top 5 player at minimum since the 2010s.
Yeah, but they should fix the voting for that system. I can understand stupid former players commenting (even if their comments are stupid) cause at least they were players but media personalities? Really? What do they have? They just watch the games like us lol.
So true
Nothing will top 2022-23 with the toxic Philly fans & Joel openly weeping for the award.
Efficiency nerds miss that Shaiās turnover % + 3pt% is higher than Luka in large part due to pass attempts/ball control + 3 pt shots taken
If the efficiency is somewhat close give me the guy whoās never bashful. Those back breakers/buckets when you need it are so valuable
Yeah Luka will take every garbage shot in the game and I hate he gets underrated (somehow) because of that. Late in the shot clock with a double deep in the corner? Luka takes that shot. He will finish bad possessions because he knows he is the best chance of getting anything out of them but that does lower his efficiency.
100%. Steph Curry does that a lot too.
Nothing is more disgusting than seeing a superstar NOT try to chuck up a shot at the end of the quarter to preserve their stats.
So Shai is what Cam Thomas thought he was?
He’s also terrible at stat padding. When he plays in garbage time, he’ll just take some difficult shots and usually miss. It doesn’t really matter, but it will hurt his efficiency. As Reaves said, Luka sometimes just gets bored and tries something.
I don’t think SGA is at all passive either this narrative is just from the Celtics game
He doesn’t take as many threes because that’s simply not his playstyle
If there’s an MVP candidate that should probably shoot more it’s definitely Jokic
You could make solid arguments for both of them in certain circumstances, I think.
Really the problem is that people just look at the numbers like TS% and make efficiency arguments when it’s just one data point out of dozens that should be considered.
Genuinely curious but why would it be Jokic? Pretty sure the Nuggets lose more often than they win when Jokic scores 40+. I’ve also seen him do plenty of last second shots and end of quarter heaves so he’s never seemed shy about scoring when he has to score. I feel like it’s actually ideal for other teams to make Jokic score more. You’re tiring him out faster and keeping his teammates cold.
Heās right the disrespect Luka has gotten this year has been wild to watch.
This is the best heās ever played.
Sorry Austin, Luka ain’t Bam
I told you guys the media hates Luka
Funny thing is, he did score 60 and still dropped š¤£š¤£
Thatās the joke
He actually rose from 4th to 2nd and then back down where he should be.
The 34 point basically triple double that he averaged 3 years ago wasnāt enough. What is at this point?
They will give plenty of reasons to put him down but never criticize other mvp candidates lol, NBA media hates him too bad it’s them that cast votes
Yea he’s gotta drop 60 or something if he wants to have a chance at MVP. Wait……..
He did score 60 a week ago and now he’s in 4th spot lmao.
Thatās the joke Sherlock
Reaves and Luka might be the closest iv seen Luka to a teammate. Absolute fumble if we donāt keep him.
He gotta break the Wilt 100 pt record to get a shot at MVP itās a joke atp
He already did though
With this comment, Luka drops down 32 spots in rankings.
Jokic overtaking Luka because Lukas defense is bad is hilarious considering how much better the Lakers have been lately and how many Nuggets games end up close or losses because the opposing team is cooking Jokic on defense.
He didn’t stop 9⁄11 can’t be mvp
Itās just such a joke that the media has Wemby as the only other contender for MVP
Just like 2024
the media hates luka. wdym hes averaging 40 on a 10 game winning streak and hes dropping positions on the mvp ranking?
all they will be talking about on Monday would be Luka getting his 16th Tech … AGAIN!!!!
That’s all. And then glaze Wemby and Jokic. Luka automatically slides to 5th, if JB even remotely approaches 30 points scored.
The shade š¤
Is it reasonable to compare to when harden was averaging 40? At what point during that season was Harden number 1 in voting? I believe Harden was averaging 40 over 32 games, maybe Luka just needs to keep it up. Regardless, he should be top 3
SGA is the analytics GOD. Apparently thatās all that matters these days for some reason.
Sick NetRPG and EPM bro!
Analytics always look excellent when youāre on a good team. The plus minus in a blowout is exceptional way worse when youāre on the other side.
to maybe have a higher ranking in MVP race
Yeah give it to wemby for beating okc 4 times this season
There isnāt really much you can do when the league is narrative driven.
He did already score 60 a week ago!
If Lukaās baby mama drama went public earlier he would be the runaway mvp
Why are players and coaches so whiny about the MVP race these days?
Iām pretty sure the MVP judges think I could beat Luca 1v1
Lol, Luka cries to the refs every single games and now he’s pivoted to crying to MVP voters.
ik lakers have a lot of white players and it gets confusing but this is austin reaves, not luka doncic
Being asked about Luka Doncic…..
sooo hows that luka crying for mvp? thats austin, his teammate, making fun of how ridiculous the mvp convo around luka has gotten
Maybe he should play more dƩfense
Yall played the Nets.
Its not like Luka dropped 41 on OKC or Spurs and won big.
Lakers are 21-21 vs teams above .500 and 27-5 vs teams below .500. While the Lakers are a solid regular season team, they wont last in playoffs due to mediocrity vs winning teams.
And they are only there bcs of Luka, he is without a doubt the most valuable. Okc and spurs record would not be affected as much, without Shai or wemby, as the lakers without luka.
When did he drop?
The logic for that was that he is playing very good and has had very high scoring games. You make that make sense because I canāt.
End the MVP race. No rankings, no straw polls, no tampering of votes or voters discussing the selection with other voters. Anonymous votes at the end of the season only.
Luka is clearly best in the league rn, every one elseās arguments has to go into semantics to make sense
He had 41/8/3/ thats cool
Jokic had 33/18/12 that’s pretty cool too
Some redditors really need to understand the concept of sarcasm
He did that too
Cause fck MVP race. It’s a joke at this point.
Itās not really a race though. Not a weekly poll like college football. The voters vote once.Ā
At this point are we not just putting too much stock in the mvp ladder
The race is close this year! I hope he wins
Luca is great at 50% of the game played on his side of the court however
No.. maybe he should play defense. 2 sides of the court. Canāt win mvp with the leading candidates are playing both sides. So tired of the Luka hype.
Maybe try and play defense for one minute over all this score 60 nonsense? š¤
Isnāt mvp voting done after the season? What does he mean dropped two spots
Luka has played good defense since the All-Star break but people donāt want to say that.
Silly Austin, Luka has already done that.
Is the ranking not one manās opinion? Why do so many people care?
Maybe he should play defense and his team should have a better record. Itās pretty clear why wemby and shai are above him.
As if spurs and okc roster werenāt way better than lakers. Also Luka does play D, he is not great, but not bad, just a plain average, this is just a narrative to hate on him.
yeah cause begging for a mvp always works. fucking lakers
u cannot possibly be speaking when brown has been begging for mvp considerations for months now lmao
He would absolutely climb the MVP rankings if his team wasn’t 10 games behind the 1st seed. Luka is having an MVP type season but the Lakers have not been good enough when other candidates are comparable with much better records.
Flip Jokic / Luka’s teams with SGA / Wembys teams in the standings and the MVP rankings would also flip - all four guys are having stellar seasons with their own strengths.
The only thing Iād challenge there is that Jokic won one as a low seed with the best stats while Luka lost one due to low seed with best stats and weāve already seen that happen. I think SGA is the clear top dog but the needs for Luka to be a top mvp candidate have changed on him, seemingly always hurting him