Tuesday, June 1st, 2010 at 10:37 am  |  140 responses

Kobe: The MVP That Matters

Playoff time is his time.

by Johnny Nguyen

You cannot say “MVP” without recognizing LeBron James, who currently holds back to back MVP titles. LeBron, in the last two years, has single handedly carried his team to close out the regular season with more than 60+ wins. Topping off Lebron’s list of accomplishments is the Cleveland Cavaliers appearance in the 2007 NBA Finals; the franchise’s first and only title appearance. But if we were to judge James on those criteria, then we must also past judgment on King’s performance in the Playoffs. Quite simply, James has experienced a downward trend when it comes to performing in the postseason.

Let’s begin with LeBron being swept in the 2007 NBA finals. The following year, he failed to allow his team to the even compete for a championship, falling victim to the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals. And now he’s lost in the second round of the Playoffs two straight seasons. This downward trend does not appear to be going up any time soon with LeBron’s contract ending, engaging in the most exciting free agent chase in NBA history. It’s unlikely that LeBron will stay in the city of Cleveland as his dreams of winning an NBA Chip is, yet again, put at bay.

Meanwhile, even those who rant about Kobe Bryant being overrated cannot say anything about his performances in the Playoffs. Some may discredit his first three rings giving Shaq the majority of the share holds. Others may criticize his lack of assists in a game questioning his overall leadership. And then there are those who are willing to go as far as to settle arguments with an attack on Kobe’s personal track record. Whatever the criticism may be, very few can deny that Kobe is undoubtedly the most valuable player to have in the NBA Playoffs, and therefore the most valuable player in the game.

It isn’t a coincidence that Kobe Bryant has participated in the last three NBA Finals and currently holds the 2009 Finals MVP Trophy in his living room. With his relentless consistency, commitment to playing both ends of the floor, and his continued leadership, Kobe’s game speaks for itself. Many fail to recognize his attention of details, his implementation of strategy, and his patience with execution. All of this provides an open opportunity for him to win his fifth NBA Championship ring this year.

The Playoffs are not something that is going to be won off luck; night-in and night-out against the same team often require a certain mental capacity. It will separate who will advance from those that will go home. The Playoffs are game of strict strategy. It resembles a game of poker. You cannot play every hand. If you choose to, most of the opponents will stop betting against you. This may seem effective in the short run but it takes lightens the impact of what you could have potentially made with one good hand. Kobe, in Spike Lee’s Documentary dissecting Kobe’s thought process, is recorded saying “I will have the shot later in the game; I rather use it in a time where my team needs it.”

This simple quote reflects his patience to strategically attack his opponents where it will be cause the most damage, such as a game-winning shot. Contrary to popular belief, poker is not so much a game of cards as it is a game of psychology. You’re opponent may have the best hand possible, but you can minimize the impact it has on your stack of chips by the amount of money you choose to invest. LeBron is by far the most effective player in the League according to statistics, and it normally takes more than one person to guard him. You are not going to stop LeBron’s numbers. He can get a triple double pretty much any night. However, you can minimize his blows through help defense, frustrating him in the lane, forcing him to take difficult shots, and stopping his overall momentum. These demoralizing tactics can take a toll on even the most effective player, as we witnessed in the Celtics-Cavaliers series.

Going back to the poker analogy, it is a game where the last player with the chips is considered the victor. The amount of hands you win do not add value. The statistics are irrelevant: The triple doubles, the highlights, the buzzer beaters, even the amount of games you win don’t matter if you don’t win the one that allows you to advance to the next round.

Really, the only thing that matters is who walks away with the chips or in this case the Chip.

(I think the Puppets campaign explained this last year, and Kobe only had three at that point…):

 

Johnny Nguyen is a basketball fan and sneakerhead who you may remember reading about on this site last fall when we profiled the store he and two friends opened in Saugus, MA. You can re-read that story here, and then go to foottraffik.com for more.

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  • The Philosopher

    Allen: I’m not looking for that to buttress an argument, you said that. I was stating a fact, you told me that stating facts out of context is silly, I asked about how the fact was out of context, that’s all. I don’t understand how you perceived that in that way.

  • The Philosopher

    Even though it did buttress my argument that Jordan is better than Kobe.

  • http://slamonline.com Allenp

    Philosopher
    Come on, let’s not play stupid here. You said that Kobe would never be better than Jordan, and he’s not even close to being as good as Jordan.
    That’s a position, or, an argument.
    You threw out the playoffs stat in response to a convo I was having with other folks to make that argument stronger.
    Your fact was stated in that context. You directed it to me based on the comments I had already made.
    Is it clear now?

  • http://lastknickstanding.blogspot.com Bryan

    You know part of the problem with comparing people is not treating that as individuals. People act like Kobe and Mike are on a level field. Kobe started earlier , so he took his lumps early. If for instance Kobe played 2 seasons in college his career scoring average would be 27.5 ppg, and 3 seasons in college same as Mike, its 28 ppg. 2 points per game separates them and Mike was all of a sudden light years better? Mike is better at certain things, but scoring is not one of them. Especially since he shared the ball with Shaq from 18 to 25. tmoney, JR Smith lacks the drive to be a good defender , that doesn’t mean he lacks the athleticism and body to do so. Danny Ainge was 6’3 and slow. I’m sure there were plenty of athletes in both the 80′s and 90′s , but not as many as there are today. The league today is more athletic than the 80′s and 90′s and if you don’t agree with that well the answer can be found in my previous comment toward you. Once again I emphatically say Mike is better than Kobe. But it is not a landslide, and may actually be an argument in the near future if he wins this year.

  • The Philosopher

    My bad, Allen, because I really thought you were edging towards Kobe being better than Jordan, based on your comments. Now, I can say that you agree with me that Michael is better than Kobe.

  • http://slamonline.com Allenp

    Bryan, some folks don’t want to hear that, although I don’t think T-Money is one of them.
    Eboy on the other hand, well we all know how he feels about the Mamba.

  • The Philosopher

    ^now that you clarified that for me.

  • http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:OzhW3M1GBSKkgM:http://fashionsensei.files.wordpress.com/2008/02/jackie-moon.jpg Jackie Moon

    Look, Michael is better than Kobe. But it’s just hating when someone says that Michael is light years ahead of Kobe, because he isn’t.

  • http://SLAMonline zanerr

    To me Kobe is the only one worth getting the honors of MVP!!!! Well aslong as its not a celtic hahaha PEACE!!!

  • Bruno

    the only thing eboy said that i’ll remember is …
    what is going to be more impressive, Kobe’s 4 rings or his three Finals failures? They are almost going to be neck and neck in about 2 weeks …
    hey celtics fan i’ll be damn afraid if i were you cause eboy’s picks this playoffs are mmm how can i call them mmm his picks mmm SUCKED hahaha
    i’m still waitin’ lakers-thunder game 7

  • http://www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com Tarzan Cooper

    I hope paul gets his second finals mvp in game 6 in la, so all la fans can see what a two time finals mvp looks like. They havent seen one since shaq. And SLAM what was with the ‘hey shaq how kobes ass taste?’ line? That didnt work when kobe just tied shaq for four

  • http://slamonline.com tealish

    Jackie Moon’s 6:52pm comment is on point.

  • http://myspace.com/mcnarrative Kieran

    I genuinely cant believe some of the utter nonsense I have just read in the comments section. Think I’m getting to old for Slam.

  • The Philosopher

    Shout out to PAPALOUKAS, The Leader.

  • http://www.kb24.com The Seed

    MJ/KOBE who cares, Kobe has a chance at 5 rings and just three years ago everyone was saying that his career is over. Kobe has proven everyone wrong again and he will win his fifth and I truly believe Kobe will win seven rings and MJ will utltimately have the make the statement he doesn’t want to say and that will be Kobe is on my LEVEL. JUST WAIT!!

  • The Philosopher

    “Kobe is on my level, but he isn’t better than me.”

  • Dynamo

    I don’t know if it has been commented on, but the article has its facts wrong. After losing in the 2007 finals, Cleveland lost to the Celtics in the Eastern Conference Semi-finals in 2008. Then they lost to Orlando in the Eastern Conference finals in 2009. And now, obviously, they have lost to the Celtics again in the Eastern Conference Semi-finals. The second paragraph of this article needs to be corrected.

  • Ronald

    The whole argument that Jordan’s era was weaker is a bit silly. True, players might have been not as well conditioned (due the medicine/science advancement) but players were equally as athletic and fast during those days as they are now. @Allenp: The Philosopher is the king of making out of context statements, you should ignore him when he does that. 1/2 the time his arguments are based on res ipsa, which is plain silly in a debate. The one thing that MJ has over Kobe that no one can deny is his impact on the game. MJ single handedly globalized NBA basketball.

  • http://facebook.com/jray2009 Jray

    Why cant we let guys play an wait for careers to end before the debate begins? Kobe has a solid 4 years ahead of him, wait for him to retire before we can even begin to pass judgement. Same as Kobe and LeBron, enjoy their careers now, debate later.

  • http://www.realcavsfans.com Anton

    Wade>Melo>Bron

  • http://www.springbored.net letsmotor

    i think one thing you have to bring into the conversation if you’re going to compare kobe and michael offensively is the type of defenses they faced and how they responded to them. jordan faced the bad boy pistons’ and the 90s knicks’ defenses often in the playoffs, and while they sometimes succeeded in containing him, he also was able to give them 50+ a handful of times. kobe hasn’t yet proven that he can really dismantle great defenses (of course, he’ll have the chance to prove he can very soon). the best, toughest, and most physical defense kobe ever faced was the c’s in the 2008 finals, and they were able to contain him for that entire series. he struggled shooting, and he never had a game where he just went off. until he proves he can really succeed against a defense like that, that’ll be one of things separating him and michael in my mind.

  • Joon

    Well I think all opinions here are valid and are open to debate. Its hard to say whether MJ or Kobe is better because they played different roles in their own championship teams. Honestly if I was Kobe and had Shaq on my team, I’d definitely give him the ball most of the time because it would just make winning that much easier. If MJ had a Shaq as well I’m pretty sure he would have done the same thing. At the end of the day, if there’s an easier way of getting the job done effectively…why not? Mathematically speaking, its just easier to score 1 foot from the basket compared to 20. Its definitely unfair to discredit Kobe’s role in the threepeat Lakers team because at the end of the day he did what he needed to do to get the job done and getting the job done is just the most important part of playing pro basketball, regardless of getting a Finals MVP or not. Flashforward to 2009 and Kobe is just still getting the job done but in a different context (being “the man”) with the current Lakers team. So all I’m saying is that it don’t matter MJ or Kobe had more Finals MVP awards, they both did what was needed for the kind of team they had and they had results. Bynum could be finals MVP for all I care if he was as dominant as Shaq and help to make Kobe’s job easier.

  • Elias

    Comparing Kobe and MJ is hard, cause they played in different eras. Now if I compare MJ’s best scoring season to Kobe’s best scoring season, the league averages are pretty different. Back then the tempo of the game was faster, or atleast teams shot more. In 86-87 league average for team field goal attempts a year was 7281 and in 05-06 it was 6477, that’s about 800. And the average for team scoring was also pretty big, in 86-87 it was 109.9 and in 05-06 it was just 97. And the free throws have gone down too, probably because the play was more physical back then, then teams shot an average of 2498 free throws a year, and in 05-06 2157.
    So the times have changed, and it’s not easy to make good comprassions of players from different era stats vice atleast.

  • Lucky Luciano

    Where to watch the FINALS in LA??? Heading over from Australia in a couple of days, want to catch game 2 at the Staples, but where to go for 3 and 4?

  • http://www.slamonline.com J

    kobe > lebron but sorry, the article is weak.

  • The Philosopher

    @Ronald: Whether a fact is out of context or in context, it’s still a fact, and it was relevant to a discussion. But as I’ve said a plenty of times, the truth, however it comes out, is distressing to many in the general populous. Seems like the truth distresses you, too.

  • Aaron

    All of these chunky paragraphs are amusing. Kobe’s grind for 5 starts tomorrow at 9pm. And then for 6 in 10′-11′.

  • Kadavour

    @The Philosopher: facts only have meaning with context.

  • The Philosopher

    @Kadavour: Facts have meaning as long as it is on topic.

  • http://slamonline.com Allenp

    Philosopher
    You’re backtracking.
    First you say you were just throwing a fact out there. Then you say it’s relevant to the discussion.
    Unfortunately, it’s relevance can only be determined by viewing it in context.
    Saying that Jordan has never failed to make the playoffs, which totally ignores his years in Washington by the way, is a useless fact in a comparison of Kobe to Jordan unless you compare Jordan’s teams to the teams Kobe had. If Jordan’s teams were demonstrably more talented, which they were, and made the playoffs in a weaker conference, which they did, then that statistic is not really very powerful, particularly since Kobe only failed to make the playoffs ONE time.
    It’s not about distressing truth, it’s about cats spewing random information, connecting non-existent dots and then posing like this solved the mystery.
    I have no problems with “truth” or “facts,” I’m just smart enough to realize that what most people consider truth and facts are just bias confirmations.

  • The Philosopher

    @Allen: I mean, I respect your opinion wholly, and truly. I never said you have problems with truths or facts, I said many of the masses do. And, just because to you someone may be spewing what you may call random facts doesn’t mean that they are not facts, whether in or out of context, for facts are facts. My facts happened to be relevant to a discussion. And you’re right, some perceived truths are biased confirmations. And as far as you telling me how you’re smart enough to realize certain things… who said you wasn’t smart? Me? And, my playoff reference was in fact valid, and a powerful argument on Jordan’s behalf.

  • The Philosopher

    Jordan’s teams were not that talented. Jordan was the mechanism that made them look talented.

  • http://slamonline.com Allenp

    Excuse me, I thought your comments to Ronald were also directed at me. If they weren’t, then we don’t have a problem.
    And, Jordan’s teams were talented, which most people don’t realize. Go back and look at those rosters. Even before Jerry Krause did his amazing job of drafting talent, they had good players. They just got a LOT better under Krause. Jordan was not playing with the same caliber of chumps that Kobe had during his lean years. Kwame and Smush were STARTERS and Luke Walton was a key contributor off the bench. That’s a problem.

  • The Philosopher

    But Allen, what about that Bulls team that won 30 games on Jordan’s watch? Imagine him not on that team.

  • The Philosopher

    They had Sam Vincent as a starting point guard, Orlando Woolridge was no Scottie Pippen. Dave Corzine, Ed Nealy… Jordan had some real johns back then. Kwame Brown had more talent than Corzine or Nealy.

  • http://slamonline.com Allenp

    That is a lie. Kwame is a bum. This cannot be overstated because not only is he a bum, for years he didn’t even try hard.
    And I’m pretty sure they won 30 games when Jordan sat for the entire year, but I’ll check the stats. And they made the playoffs.

  • The Philosopher

    I’m not saying Kwame isn’t a bum, or he tries hard. He just had more talent than Corzine and Nealy. Especially Nealy.

  • The Philosopher

    The year they won 30 games, (1985 – 86) Jordan was hurt, but he made it back and led them to the Playoffs. They were out of it until Michael came back for the final 18 games. This is fact.

  • The Philosopher

    I thought it posted earlier, but I meant to say he came back for the final 15 games.

  • http://thetroyblog.com Teddy-the-Bear

    Why do people think Jordan could have won 8 straight titles if he had never tried baseball? In case any of you have forgotten, he DID come back to play in ’95, and guess what?–They lost to Orlando.

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