As of Monday afternoon, LeBron James was named the Most Valuable Player of the NBA's 2009 regular season.James received 109 of 121 first-place votes, while Dwyane Wade received nine and Kobe Bryant received just two. Orlando's Dwight Howard and New Orleans' Chris Paul were also in consideration.
In my opinion, the NBA got this one right, LeBron deserves to be MVP and I'm all right with upsetting a lot of Southern Californians by saying that.
LeBron finished second in points-per-game this season with 28.4 and he added over seven assists and seven rebounds per game to go with it.
Compared to Kobe, LeBron was better in each of those categories, but he does so much more for his team.
This season, he led his team to it's best overall record (66-16, which led the league) in team history, including an astounding 39-2 record at home - one of those games he didn't even start.
LeBron performed well on both sides of the ball, as evidenced by him finishing second in the voting for Defensive Player of the Year, which went to Howard.
Bottom line, LeBron has made the Cavaliers franchise better from the day he arrived and now he finally has something to show for it. A well deserved MVP award.
But to LeBron, that's not what he's worked for since before last year's Olympics in Beijing. After losing in the Eastern Conference Semi-finals last season, LeBron started by trying to improve his jumpshot. He soon moved to lifting weights and working on his defense, all of which were rewarding for him this season.
The Chosen One was quick to point out in a press conference that it was his teammates who helped him earn the award. No LeBron, it's more like you helped your teammates become better basketball players.
For him, it's about helping the city of Cleveland earn its first NBA Championship in franchise history and seeing as how he's only improving as the season goes on, it's hard to bet against them.
As for us in SoCal, after seeing the Lakers lose their series opener at home against the Houston Rockets, I'm starting to get a little feeling that they may lose to an Eastern foe again this season.
However, this time their opponents won't be wearing green, nor will they be from Boston.
And this time, L.A. won't have the regular season's MVP on their side.
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