A storybook MVP season is there for the taking for Luka Doncic.
Last season, Luka Doncic led the Dallas Mavericks to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2011. Along the way, he put up an incredible stat line, leading the league in scoring with 33.9 points per game, as well as averaging 9.2 rebounds and 9.8 assists. He almost averaged a triple-double during a Finals appearance season.
And yet Doncic finished third in MVP voting, behind Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and Nikola Jokic, who won the award for the third time in his career. Many Mavs fans were upset by the result, and with numbers like Doncic put up, who could blame them? Claims of the media hating Doncic or preferring the narrative of players like Jokic or Gilgeous-Alexander flew back and forth across the internet.
The claims were mostly true. Doncic has developed a reputation for complaining to the refs too loudly and too often, and it annoys a lot of media members. Gilgeous-Alexander leading a young Thunder team to the number one seed is a good story. So is Jokic collecting a third MVP award while putting the Nuggets on his back with jaw-dropping passes and a barely interested shrug.
What’s often forgotten lately is the NBA is entertainment. We watch these players in our spare time, and we want to have fun doing it. It’s more interesting when there are heroes and villains, super teams and underdogs. When players try and fail, try and fail, the finally succeed. Like it or not, we’re all suckers for the hero’s journey.
The NBA awards we care about will never be these objective, purely stat-driven results so many seek. Basketball isn’t played on spreadsheets, or on the pages of Basketball Reference, or in the cutesy graphics of a Stats Muse account. It’s performance art on a 94 foot stage and the people who play the parts matter just as much as the numbers.
The narrative arcs of those people matter, too, and that’s why Doncic can finally win his first MVP award this season. Fresh off a Finals appearance, the Mavericks are no longer the underdogs. Doncic has a supporting cast that can keep up with him. There should be no adjustment period, no slow start.
Falling in the championship round to a juggernaut Boston Celtics team, then coming back the next season on a mission, laser-focused on winning every game. Using that Luka Magic to help the Mavericks win games they shouldn’t on the second night of back-to-back. Taking the number one seed from a darling Thunder team everyone expects to repeat as the top team in the West. Putting up eye-popping numbers for a whole season. And doing it all while laughing with his teammates instead of complaining to the refs.
That’s a narrative the world wants to see. And it’s there for Doncic, if he chooses. Hopefully we get to see it this season.