The people's choice: Nikola Jokić
Who is regarded as the Best Player on the Planet entering the 2023-24 NBA season? According to readers of The Stein Line who voted, it's the Nuggets' superstar ... with a (relative) surprise at No. 2
After three days of polling and more than 1,100 responses, The Stein Line is pleased to (not so) officially bestow Best Player on the Planet status upon Denver’s Nikola Jokić.
It took some creative polling, since Substack’s functionality (as you saw if you voted) only allows for five menu options per poll, but you (yes, YOU) have ranked the NBA’s top nine players based on the nominees I selected … all of whom happened to be pictured in this season preview illustration that the NBA published recently.
The results:
Nikola Jokić (Denver) 497 votes
Stephen Curry (Golden State) 197 votes
Giannis Antetokounmpo (Milwaukee) 132 votes
Luka Dončić (Dallas) 85 votes
Kevin Durant (Phoenix) 50 votes
LeBron James (Los Angeles Lakers) 50 votes
Other 47 votes
Jayson Tatum (Boston) 36 votes
Joel Embiid (Philadelphia) 23 votes
Jimmy Butler (Miami) 21 votes
To make this polling work based on the limitations of the functionality available, I created two polls in the aforementioned story. The first listed the NBA’s four foremost stars from Europe and Africa (Antetokounmpo, Dončić, Embiid and Jokić) and provided an option for OTHER in case my nine nominees did not include your preferred choice. The accompanying poll listed five American-born contenders: Butler, Curry, Durant, James and Tatum.
Not sure I expected Curry, who turns 36 in March, to finish above Giannis and Luka at this stage of his career. KD (who turned 35 in September) and LeBron (who turns 39 in December) essentially tied for fifth. The votes total had to be ever-so-slightly approximated given the percentages involved below; rounding up resulted in six more votes in the final standings than the official total of 1,132 votes registered.
Thoughts?
Let me know in the comments section.
I do think the top 2, pretty fairly, usually splits out to Jokic then Giannis. Jokic winning the chip helped really cement his place atop the league at the moment (just as Giannis' chip the year Jokic got his first MVP helped to seal that for him). After them, I think Curry has as good a case as any, even despite his age, as he hasn't really shown any signs of slowing down, he still is the straw that stirs the Warriors drink, and, even in a disastrous season, he put on a show in the playoffs that equaled some of his remarkable championship performances the year prior (e.g., 50 on Sacramento in a must-win game).
Luka's on the cusp, but his team has to do more to be considered, imo (not even making the play-in is a pretty egregious knock on his candidacy for that honor; but he can make up for that this year). KD is clearly great, but his lack of playoff success the past couple years is hurting his candidacy. LeBron is still LeBron, but, ever so slightly, we've seen the wear and tear start to show. He's still probably top-5 (definitely top-10), but he'd have to have another renaissance year to reclaim that mantle, and I don't think he'll be aiming for that (at least not in the regular season).
Embiid, to me, is a lot like Luka. At this point, we know he can dominate in the regular season. Can he do it in the post-season? Not all of Philly's failures are on him, but as the franchise player, he has to own some of that. And then Tatum is the one who has been on the cusp of joining these names at the table, has had a handful of performances that should give him clout, but, fairly or unfairly, he's being judged on how he does making it to the summit of the NBA. If Boston breaks through this year, you can bet, like Giannis and Jokic before him, he'll get his flowers.
While Steph over Giannis is surprising, I'd still have him third on that list because he's proven it in the post-season whereas the other guys haven't (LeBron aside, but he's no longer dominant on both ends of the court). I'm excited to see what Jokic does this year as an encore.