Nikola Jokic is going to be the 2024 Most Valuable Player. He has an amazing statistical career, and his squad has the best record in the far higher conference. This would not be an issue if he hadn’t also won the 2022 prize while desperately clinging to the sixth seed.
Jokic received the 2022 award after putting up one of the most remarkable individual seasons in recent memory. However, the Denver Nuggets finished sixth in the Western Conference with a 48–34 record. Jokic’s individual brilliance eclipsed still-spectacular performances by players like Giannis Antetokounmpo and Joel Embiid, who won more games.
This season, Luka Doncic has performed better individually than Jokic. It is tempting to compare them.
Doncic also has significantly more assists (9.8 to 9.0 per game). Jokic leads in rebounds, with 12.4 to 9.2 per game. Many pundits use Jokic’s advanced figures as evidence that his case is strong. Jokic leads the NBA in player efficiency rating, box plus minus, defensive box plus minus, and win share, among other metrics.
Clearly, those catch-all metrics indicate that Jokic is the top catch-all player, correct? Wrong. These measurements are flawed. Player efficiency rate (PER) works for a snap shot but has a number of issues as one delves deeper into how it works. All of the box plus and minus statistics simply indicate how much better one’s team plays with him on
The problem, as with other statistics, is that box plus minus is influenced by factors outside a player’s control. Most notably, it is virtually entirely based on usage. The Nuggets’ dominant starting lineup of Jokic, Aaron Gordon, Michael Porter Jr., Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, and Jamal Murray has played the most minutes in the league (913). They have an impressive net rating of +13.5 points per 100 possessions.
That identical group, with Reggie Jackson in lieu of Murray, has played an additional 442 minutes while maintaining an amazing net rating of +6 points per 100 possessions. Just those two groupings account for more over half of Jokic’s 2667 minutes this season. Jokic has only played 417 minutes this season without at least two other starters on the court.
This is the cause behind Jokic’s incredible on/off and box plus-minus stats. Jokic is a fantastic player who deserves a lot of praise, but his spreadsheet admirers overlook the beauty of his game. To put it another way, Jokic’s last three seasons rank fifth, sixth, and seventh all-time in defensive box plus-minus.
Is there anyone who believes he is the best basketball defender in history? Of course not, but that is what box plus minus tells you if you believe a greater number indicates that the season is fundamentally better. What box plus minus actually tells you is that the Nuggets’ starting lineup plays together more than almost any other unit in the modern period, and it is far superior to its abysmal bench. This is why his plus-minus is so high. Surprisingly, the Nuggets’ starters are significantly better than their bench.
Now, compare that deployment to Doncic’s. Doncic has played 176 minutes with the Dallas Mavericks’ new starting lineup, which includes himself, Kyrie Irving, Derrick Jones Jr., P.J. Washington, and Daniel Gafford.
Jokic deserves all the roses. He is a truly dominant talent and one of my favorite guys to watch. But he won MVP because his individual brilliance eclipsed a terrific player on a better-performing team. It is Doncic’s chance to do the same.
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