The NBA's regular season journey is coming to an end, the playoffs are just around the corner, teams that qualify for the playoffs and playoffs are preparing for the next game, and those that are long out are looking forward to a comeback next season, and for many media, it is time for them to discuss the major awards. From regular season MVP to DPOY to sixth man of the year, these awards presented by the league at the end of the season are designed to recognize players, coaches and executives who have performed well in the season, although in many cases personal success is inseparable from the success of the team, but this season there is one person who has made all the media difficulties, that is, Los Angeles Lakers superstar LeBron James, should he be selected for the Team of the Year?
The NBA's Team of the Year will be awarded to the top 15 players of a specific season, divided by position: six guards, six forwards and three centers, James is certainly one of the best six forwards in the league, but xiaobian feels that his performance this season is indeed difficult to deserve the honor of the best team. As an old NBA saying goes, if you think someone should be in the Best Team, then you have to say who that person will replace, and that's why James doesn't think James should be in the Best Team of the season. In the editor's opinion, these positions should be reserved for Alphabet Brother, Jason Tatum, Demar DeRozan, Pascal Siakam, Kevin Durant and Jimmy Butler, all six forwards from playoff teams.
Those who support James's selection to the All-Team team have nothing more than two views, the first is that his stats are outstanding, and the other is his prestige. James is the league's second-leading scorer this season, averaging 30.3 points, 8.2 rebounds and 6.2 assists per game, shooting 61.9 percent from the field. James' average of points and assists per game is the highest of any forward, and although he has played only 56 games this season, scoring less than Tatum, Alphabet Brother and DeRozan, James still has 144 more points than Siakam. If we dig deeper into the data, we find that James' total score when the team is behind by a big score is also the first of all the forwards. According to official NBA statistics, James scored a total of 189 points when the Lakers trailed by more than 16 points this season, compared with Siakam who scored only 35 points when the Raptors were behind by a large margin.
But that's one of the reasons James has been questioned this season, and it's because James has a lot of points coming from the team's big scores behind, so many people accuse James of pursuing personal data and breaking records when the team has no hope of winning. It's not that James shouldn't have to get these points, I just want to say that if his scoring ability is largely the main reason he should be in the Best Team, then should we question how many of his points are getting when the team is big behind, and why these points didn't help the team win?
Although James is the league's second-leading scorer, James is not actually eligible to compete for a place on the scoring list because a player must play more than 58 games to enter the individual data leaderboard according to the league's rules, while James has only played 56 games this season. While there are no similar rules for the selection of the Team of the Year, it should be one of the factors that voters will consider, after all, for a regular season of 82 games, the best ability is durability, and James's appearances rank second from the bottom of all team candidates for the team of the year, only slightly ahead of Kevin Durant (one less game than James).
So some people must ask, so should Durant be disqualified from the Team of the Year? Xiaobian does not think so, because there is a more critical factor that cannot be ignored, that is, the winning rate of the team, after all, the Nets have achieved a record of 44 wins and 38 losses this season, ranking seventh in the East and entering the playoffs, while the Lakers have only achieved a record of 32 wins and 50 losses this season, ranking 11th in the West. While many believe that the Lakers' sluggish record this season has nothing to do with James, but rather because of the flaws in the team's lineup and serious injuries, the Nets are not much better. Without James, the Lakers only achieved a record of 7 wins and 19 losses, and without Durant, the Nets only achieved a record of 8 wins and 19 losses, which happened to be the worst record in their respective divisions. But in Durant's case, the Nets have a 33-19 record, while James only helped the Lakers achieve a 25-31 record, so it's easy to see that Durant's presence can make one of the worst teams in the league more competitive, and James this season simply doesn't have that ability.
In fact, James has played an embarrassing record this season with his first net rating of negative (-2.5) since his rookie season and the first time in his nearly 20-year career that his team failed to win when he played, and while it's not entirely James' fault, it's really hard to think that this player should be one of the best 6 forwards in the league when you're on the floor. So regardless of how voters choose to look at this number, please, when it comes to judging the best team, the team's record is indeed a very important reference indicator.
Many people seem to have great admiration for James' ability to play from 19 to 37 while still being able to play such a strong performance, which is indeed a true proof of his greatness, but this argument does not hold up in the selection of the Team of the Year, because the Team of the Year never refers to age, and a player will not be more rewarded for his brilliant career.
It's not just a matter of winning or losing, the Lakers haven't played a meaningful basketball game in weeks, james led the Lakers to four wins after the All-Star Game, and their record in the same period is even worse than the rotten Oklahoma Thunder. Over the years, many people have been accustomed to seeing the personal statistics that can't lead the team to victory as meaningless, and the players who play these data as data brushes, such as Bradley Beale in 2020, who did not make the team of the year, and he averaged second in the league in points per game (averaging 30.5 points per game), but lost because his Washington Wizards ranked ninth in the East.
So why is James different, his Lakers can't even get into the playoffs? The only explanation is that because his name is James, he's the signature of the league, it's the first time he's missed the playoffs in more than a decade, and no one has won more games in the last 20 years, and no one has had more influence on the team than he has. But the Team of the Year is not a lifetime achievement award, it's not about James's historical standing, we're just talking about the performance of the 2021-22 season, this season James is a high-usage player in a bad team, and that's it.
Like the high-usage players on other bad teams, James didn't do very well on the defensive end, his defensive level was only 113.5, and while that wasn't an ugly number, as long as we looked at the Lakers' game, we'd find a lot of examples of him not defending, and his defensive rating was the lowest of all the players eligible for the Team of the Year, and it was far from the level of defense he had in the season he helped the Lakers win the championship.
James' personal data is truly staggering, surpassing Carl Malone to second place on the NBA's all-time scoring list this season, as well as Oscar Robertson to seventh on the NBA's all-time assists list. James' personal achievements this season are not low, but unlike previous seasons, these personal achievements have not translated into team victories. So if you don't win and someone else wins, why are you getting more rewards than they are? After all, basketball is a sport that is meant to win games. What's worse, James not only did not help the team win, but even neglected the defense, he just scored a lot of points for a team that could not even score in the top ten of the division with a big score behind. It may seem cruel, but I believe that the honor of the best team of the year should belong to those most important players of the season, and despite James' best efforts, James and his Lakers are not important this season.