LeBron James won his fourth MVP Award on Sunday but it did not come without controversy. James won the award and received 120 of the 121 possible first-place votes,
James was one first place vote from being a unanimous selection for MVP, with the single first place vote going to New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony.
James himself Joked that it was probably a New York voter who did not vote for him.
“It’s probably a writer out of New York that didn’t give me the vote,” James said, via ESPN.com. “I know the history between the Heat and the Knicks. So I get it.”
Most of Sunday afternoon was spent trying to figure out who did not give James that one vote. At one point via some Twitter confusion, it was assumed that Miami sports personality Dan Le Batard was the one who withheld that vote.
That was indeed false and Le Batard did not even have a vote. Early this morning Boston Globe columnist Gary Washburn identified himself as the person responsible for voting for Carmelo Anthony.
Washburn went out of his way in an early Monday morning column to explain why he voted Anthony over James in the MVP race.
I voted for Carmelo Anthony based on his importance to the New York Knicks, who, if you haven’t been paying attention the past decade, have failed to be relevant.
When the voting was announced Sunday afternoon, I was flabbergasted to learn I was the lone voter among 121 to not give LeBron a first-place vote, truly believing Anthony, Kevin Durant, Chris Paul, and perhaps even Kobe Bryant would snag a first-place vote or two.
Secondly, this isn’t the Best Player in the Game award, it’s the Most Valuable Player award, and I think what Anthony accomplished this season was worthy of my vote. He led the Knicks to their first division title in 19 years.
Anthony led the league in scoring average and basically carried an old Knicks team to the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference. Amar’e Stoudemire missed most of the season with knee issues, Raymond Felton missed six weeks, and Tyson Chandler dealt with nagging injuries, leaving Anthony, J.R. Smith, and a bunch of lottery picks from the mid-1990s to win 54 games and beat the Miami Heat three times.
LeBron can win the MVP award every year. He is that good. And it’s to the point where I put him on a Michael Jordan scale. Jordan won five MVP awards but could have earned 10. In the 1992-93 season, Jordan averaged 32.6 points, 6.7 rebounds, 5.5 assists, and 2.8 steals and shot 49.5 percent from the field.
And the MVP award went to Charles Barkley.
Hindsight being what it is, I can understand and see where Washburn was coming from. As he and everyone has said, it’s a Most Valuable Player award, not best player award.
The Heat would probably still be a pretty good team with Wade and Bosh leading the Charge. I’m not sure we can say the same thing about Carmelo.
After watching Kevin Durant carry the Thunder the past week and a half, I’m just shocked he didn’t get any votes.