Rising Suns

This was an email I tried to email Skip Bayless about this column. Unfortunately, ESPN's email links are broken, and I couldn't send the email. So, instead, I'm posting it here. Just pretend you're Skip Bayless.



I guess you couldn't be with ESPN, or a sports columinst of any sort for that matter, if you didn't speak in absolutes.

I agree that it's ridiculous that Shaq has only one MVP award. For many years, I looked at the MVP as an MVPNNSO (Most Valuable Player Not Named Shaquille O'Neal) and eventually became used to the fact that, for some inexplicable reason, Shaq did not win the MVP award every year (Except in 2003, when Duncan won his second. Duncan was absolutely the MVP that year). It's kind of an even more twisted version of the Jordan MVPs, at least Jordan won five of them (He should have seven, Barkley and Malone have no business winning one over MJ). In this case, the media (hey, wait, do YOU have a vote?) felt that giving Shaq one was enough.

Can somebody explain to me how Duncan has two MVPs and Shaq only has one? Iverson? Hey, he's the best pure scorer in the NBA, but the guy will never win anything, ever.

Garnett deserved it last year, hard to argue.

But, saying that Nash winning the MVP is "laughable" is laughable. Amare, Marion, Joe Johnson, and Richardson had career years...because of Nash. The wide-open 3's? Because of Nash's ability to penetrate the lane and collapse the defense in on him. The alley-oops? You ever thrown an alley-oop pass? (wait, don't answer that one) They make it look a lot easier than it actually is- the timing and vision that it requires on both parts requires a lot of practice. And a lot of these alley-oops are in traffic. Nash's ability to see the open man is trumped only by one point guard in the NBA- the erstwhile Sun, Jason Kidd (who I would have given the MVP to in 2002 before Duncan, but not before Shaq). But what makes Nash so dangerous, so valuable even, is the fact that he has a deadly shooting range. You creep up on him, he'll zip around you; you give him a foot, he'll drill the jumper every time.

His ability to score on the perimeter allows him to run circles around defenses. Penetrate and kick, penetrate and lay it in, pick your poison.

So, smart guy, you might ask, why is it that Nash is only now breaking out? He was surrounded by stars in Dallas and never reached this plateau.

True, but Nash is the (pardon me, but I like this saying) straw that stirs the drink. You add the right ingredients and Nash is the best floor general around. Stoudemire is a great player and is going to be a perennial MVP candidate, but he's very young, and has a lot of leaks in his game. I'm not sure where you got the idea that he's a shot-blocker, Stoudemire averages 1.6bpg-rarely timely- that's .1 bgp more than Dirk Nowitzki, who nobody ever accuses of being a shot-blocker, so let's drop that charade.

Stoudemire has a serious problem passing out of the double team, as well. Nash makes it difficult to commit a double team on Amare, because Amare will just kick it back out to Nash for the 20-footer.

These high-flying acrobatics would not be possible without Nash. You don't see how much Nash opens up the floor, much like the people who claim that Wade is the Heat's MVP (a crazy notion, indeed) can't see how much Shaq opens up the floor. Nash is the reason that the defenses are stretched so thin. If you clog the lane, Nash swings it around the perimeter, if you guard the perimeter, Nash penetrates and kicks like nobody in the league. It's like an inverse Shaq effect.

Amare is the X-factor for Nash's ability to leap to the next level, obviously. Amare is the perfect pick-and-roll guy. He's a dominating low-post presence (something the Mavs never had) and has the ability to step out and hit the 16-footer with regularity. While Amare has elevated Nash's game, Nash has elevated Amare's game even more. It's a two-way street.

The effect is contageous. The team sees Nash sharing the ball, and everybody wants to do it. They all want to be involved.

Also, PG is by far a more complex position than center. You have the ball in your hands more than any other player and are responsible for making the decisions in a split-second. Without somebody to handle the ball, who gets in to the big guy? Name me a great center in the post-Chamberlain era that didn't have at least a decent ballhandler to dump it in to him. As Charles Barkley said, "Any knucklehead can score." Running an offense that has no structure like the Suns? An all-improv, all the time offense? Now THAT's difficult.

Now, don't get me wrong, if Shaq had won the award, I would have been fine with it. If I had a vote, I would have had to split it between the two somehow.

Shaq went out East and dominated. Out East where there is virutally no size. Out East where the second best center is a complete offensive liability who, despite being named Defensive Player of the Year three times now, couldn't guard Shaq one-on-one if Shaq played on his knees. Yes, I understand how dominant Shaq is, and he's very valuable, and it's an outrage that AI and Tim Duncan won awards over Shaq, but the East is still Miami, Detroit and a bunch of scrubby teams (Indiana would be a legit contender if they didn't have Ron ArCrazy to worry about). The West is a minefield of tough teams, even with Shaq in South Beach. And the Suns STILL finished with the best record in the league.