Somewhere late last week, the NBA officially passed the quarter pole in the 2021-22 season, which means it’s time to hand out some fake hardware that acknowledges the good, the bad, the surprising, and the disappointing so far this season.
BEST TEAM: PHOENIX SUNS
It’s like the Suns heard all the “things lined up perfectly for them last year” talk over the offseason and decides to show everyone that while they did enjoy some good fortune, they’re also a damn good team as well.
Phoenix is 20-4, having split with the Golden State Warriors in early season head-to-head matchups that felt like playoff games.
Phoenix is deep and gets contributions from different people, in different ways every single night, which is a hallmark of a legitimate championship contender. While Devin Booker and Chris Paul are the obvious leaders, Deandre Ayton has carried over his playoff excellence into this season, Mikal Bridges is making a bid to be an All Star and wreaking havoc on the defensive end, as always, and offseason acquisitions JaVale McGee and Landry Shamet have settled into their roles nicely.
Last season was not a fluke, nor was their run to the Finals all about luck. Phoenix is for real.
WORST TEAM: OKLAHOMA CITY THUNDER
OKC lost a game by 73 points.
There were games in the ‘90s where the winning team might score 73 points, and here are the Thunder, walking onto an NBA court and getting beaten by 73 points. It’s ridiculous.
No one came into the season thinking the Thunder were going to be anything more than they are — a freakishly young squad still in the early stages of a rebuild, with a war chest of future picks and a few intriguing young names to track — but they had gone in the tank, with Thursday’s mega-blowout loss to Memphis pushing their losing streak to eight before snapping it Monday by toppling the Detroit Pistons, owners of the worst record in the league.
OKC has pieces to build around — Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is outstanding, Lu Dort could play for any contender — and first-round pick Josh Giddey has already shown more than a couple flashes, but this team is a long way from turning this around, and you have to start wondering if players like SGA and Dort will want to hang around to see it through or ask out at some point.
MOST SURPRISING TEAM: CHICAGO BULLS
The Bulls went into Brooklyn and beat the Nets on Saturday, overcoming an 11-point deficit despite missing four rotation players. Outside of Phoenix handling Golden State last week, it might be the biggest “statement win” of the season.
Chicago wasn’t supposed to be battling for the top spot in the Eastern Conference — its big swing last season to acquire Nikola Vucevic didn’t work and resulted in losing a Top 10 pick to the Orlando Magic, and bringing in DeMar DeRozan this summer (amongst others) was viewed as the type of move that would raise their floor, but have little impact on their ceiling.
Apparently, the Bulls never got the memo because they have been excellent all season, with Alex Caruso and Lonzo Ball serving as suffocating wings and secondary ball handlers, Vucevic averaging 15/10, and DeRozan and Zach LaVine basically mirroring one another in every statistical category thus far, giving Chicago one of the best one-two punches in the league.
And they’re doing all this with last year’s Top 5 pick Patrick Williams sidelined after having wrist surgery.
Shout out to the Cleveland Cavaliers as well, who a game above .500, which no one expected.
MOST DISAPPOINTING TEAM: LOS ANGELES LAKERS
Glass Half-Full: the Lakers are in the Top 6 in the Western Conference and playing .500 basketball, despite LeBron missing some time.
Glass Half-Empty: the Lakers are a .500 team, LeBron has already missed some time, and the guys that were supposed to be able to shoulder more of the load this season, don’t seem able or interested in shouldering said load.
It’s preposterous that Frank Vogel is getting heat for the way this season has gone because he’s not the one that build this misshapen roster. Since you can’t fire the players and Rob Pelinka isn’t going to fall on his own sword, there is a real possibility that the man who guided the Lakers to an NBA title just two seasons ago is going to lose his job because the roster he was given to work with doesn’t work.
Russell Westbrook puts up impressive looking numbers (20-8-8 thus far), but if you actually watch the games, the fact that he’s a poor fit and someone that doesn’t impact winning jumps off the television screen.
Anthony Davis plays like someone that doesn’t want to be considered a superstar, just so that he can get mad at everyone for not considering him a superstar, only to revert to not wanting to be considered a superstar when the praise starts rolling in. He’s terrific, but it still feels like he’s capable of more and yet he doesn’t seem to want to get there.
Barring a major injury to James or Davis, the Lakers will still make the playoffs and be in the mix in the Western Conference because LeBron is LeBron and he and Davis are still a nasty combination when clicking on all cylinders, but the Lakers have a lot to figure out and a limited amount of time to do it.
MVP: STEPHEN CURRY, GOLDEN STATE WARRIORS
All you have to do is watch Curry get white-hot from deep once and you’ll understand why he’s the MVP through the first quarter of the season.
His play, his shooting, is an electrical current connected to everyone else on the Warriors roster, and when he gets rolling — when he’s running off screens and burying bombs or pulling up from just across half on a heat check — it elevates everyone else. He gets everyone else going in a way that just makes you realize, “Yeah, Steph is the MVP.”
The numbers are there too — Golden State is tied for top spot in the league with Phoenix as of this writing at 20-4, and Curry is averaging 27.7 points, 5.6 boards, and 6.5 assists while shooting 41% from deep on his usual high volume. He’s carried over his excellent play from last year and it’s rubbed off on everyone else, who seem to recognize they can’t squander seasons like this from the best shooter in NBA history.
Curry’s the MVP leader at the moment, but this race is far from finished, and watching it play out the rest of the season is going to be incredible theater.
ROOKIE OF THE YEAR: EVAN MOBLEY, CLEVELAND CAVALIERS
There are players averaging more points, rebounds, and assists than Mobley. There are fellow freshmen that have logged more minutes and had greater individual moments, but if you watch a Cavaliers game, you immediately see why Mobley is the obvious selection.
In 21 games, Mobley has already made people question if Detroit and Houston screwed up by not drafting him. Some of that is recency bias, as Cade Cunningham has been a little dinged up and Jalen Green has struggled. There are also some genuine “you might have passed on a generational talent” concerns because Mobley already looks like a “do everything on both ends” type of impact player.
Scottie Barnes has been similar in Toronto and Franz Wagner has been tremendous in Orlando, but there is an ease and consistency to Mobley’s game that you’re not supposed to have as a 20-year-old rookie. He’s in the right places, fits in whatever lineup configurations J.B. Bickerstaff wants to roll out, and allows everyone else to be themselves and do their thing on both ends of the court because he’s perfectly suited to pick up the slack and find his own lane.
It’s really impressive to watch and a big part of the reason the Cavaliers are one of the most unexpected surprises of the 2021-22 season.
MOST IMPROVED PLAYER: Tyrese Maxey, Philadelphia 76ers
MIP is a tough award because it often goes to someone that has gone from great to superstar, like when Giannis won it five years ago, or a player that excelled in an expanded opportunity, like Brandon Ingram in his first season in New Orleans or CJ McCollum when he started getting more run in Portland.
Maxey gets the nod because he’s made Ben Simmons’ absence in Philadelphia far less damaging than it could have been. The second-year guard, who made eight starts and averaged 15 minutes per game last season as a rookie, has started all 23 of the Sixers’ games this season, logging 35 minutes a night, delivering 17 points and five assists per.
While not the defensive menace that Simmons is (few are), Maxey is a big part of why Philly is still above .500 and in the play-in tournament pack, and not hanging out with the Knicks, Toronto, and Indiana on the outside looking in.
This is another “just watch and you’ll see it” situation as well because the Kentucky product is playing with a different level of confidence this year, and you can’t take your eyes off him when he’s on the court, where last year, he could easily get lost in the shuffle.
There are some great players having even greater seasons this year, like Ja Morant in Memphis and OG Anunoby in Toronto, but they both feel like established talents taking another step forward, which is what you’re supposed to do when you’re in your third or fourth year and viewed as an All-Star caliber player.
Maxey wasn’t expected to have this kind of impact in Philadelphia this season, so he gets the imaginary trophy from me.
