Now that the NBA Finals are over, I can finally get something of of my chest.
Ryan Anderson of the Orlando Magic won the 2012 Most Improved Player Award this year, ahead of Nikola Pekovic (Timberwolves) and Ersan Ilyasova (Bucks).
It begs the question, is there an American biased among coaches who voted for this honor? Lets take a look at the stats.
Ryan Anderson: 2011 – 10.6 pts 5.5 rebs 2012 - 16.1 pts 7.7 rebs
Started 61 of 61 games (14 of 64 the year before). Minutes also went up by 10 (22-32).
Ryan didn’t really add anything to his game in 2012. He’s still a very one-dimensional player. He just got more three-pointers up thanks to Dwight Howard. It’s the style of play made his stats look so good. He got the minutes because Big Baby wasn’t a good fit next to Howard. Ryan got more minutes, his shooting stroke was the same and his other attributes went unchanged.
Nikola Pekovic: 2011 – 5.5 pts & 3.0 rebs 2012 – 13.9 pts 7.4 rebs.
Started 25 of 47 (11 of 65 the year before) 26 mpg (minutes doubled from ’11)
‘Pek’ saw a lot of garbage time early in 2012, which killed averages. But, when he did get in there, he allowed Kevin Love to change his game…shooting more 3′s and using his face-up game. The improvement of Nikola may just age 5 years to Kevin’s career in the form of less of a pounding on his body. {Down in Orlando, Dwight suffered a herniated disc despite the “hot shooting” of Anderson.}
Ersan Ilyasova: 2011 - 9.5 pts 6.1 rebs 2012 - 13.0 pts 8.8 rebs
Started 34 of 60 in 2011, 41 of 60 in 2012 Ersan played pretty much the same amount of minutes (in the mid 20′s/game). He just had a torrid stretch from March to April. He was starting for Scott Skiles and playing huge with the absence of Andrew Bogut.
In summary…..Nikola Pekovic didn’t play the first 6 games of the season. He then played the next 2, playing only two minutes each night, totalling 0 points and 2 boards…garbage time. He then didn’t play the next 3 at all. Rick Adelman thought his game was too redundant next to Kevin Love’s. That’s what made Pek’s run so impressive, grabbing over 10 boards a night despite playing next to the league’s leading rebounder…wow. That’s when his run started….first 17 minutes, then 24 minutes, then up in the 30′s for the rest of the season. A lingering leg injury hurt his stats the last month of the season and caused him to miss a couple of weeks of games.
Ryan Anderson played by default (Glen Davis wasn’t a good fit) and skill set (3-pt shooting to help space for Dwight). Nikola Pekovic and Ersan Ilyasova made their coaches play the despite early doubts.
The ‘Euro’ players earned their coach’s minutes….both American coaches.
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ah, the usual unbiased opinion from you on nikola PEKOVIC…martin KNEZEVIC. LOL