Giannis Antetokounmpo leads the race for both MVP and DPOY, following injuries to Kevin Durant and Draymond Green.
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As soon as the news came up that Kevin Durant is out for 4-6 weeks with an MCL sprain, every player fancying their chances for the MVP title would have in some way felt relieved. Although it’s still tough to call whether this will be of any impact on Nets title chances, it surely has impacted KD’s MVP chances.
The 2-time MVP has since taken the top spot in the race for this year’s best player award. The Bucks forward follows the “Slim Reaper” (29.3 PPG) with 28.5 points per game to lead the league in points.
The reigning champions Milwaukee Bucks currently, again on the back of their MVP’s complete performances every night, stand at 5th in the East with a 27-19 record. While the table-toppers Bulls have played 4 lesser games with the same number of victories.
It seems Giannis Antetokounmpo wouldn’t take many games to turn his beast mode on and take over the East again as he now has all the right reasons to do so. The Greek Freak now leads both the MVP and DPOY race. Again!
Giannis Antetokounmpo tops MVP and DPOY race
One of only 3 players to have won both the Most Valuable Player and the Defensive Player of the Year awards, Giannis again leads the race in both categories for the 2021-2022 season.
Like KD’s injury helped his chances in the MVP race, Draymond Green’s absence for the Warriors in the last 5 games is benefiting Giannis’ chances in the DPOY race.
“He can guard anybody,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said after Giannis bullied the Warriors squad in a 118-99 victory last week. “With that size, with that type of athleticism and agility, he can guard 1 through 5. Which is the ultimate weapon. Which is what Draymond can do. There aren’t many guys who can do that.
“Defensively, that’s the name of the game these days. It covers up a lot of holes when you can guard every position. It allows coaching staff to draw up different schemes and put out different lineup combinations. That type of versatility is huge these days.”
As of now, he leads the DPOY race, after not even being ranked last month, and is surely looking like he’ll at least finish top-3 in both the races if he doesn’t win them.
Bucks would surely want to capitalize on his form and repeat the championship glory, unlike 2020, where he won both those awards, but his team failed to even get out of the East to face the Lakers.
