NBA 2019 MVP race – part 1

(Originally posted on Tuesday, 30 October 2018)

Part 1 = the end of week 2. Please remember that the season started on Tuesday, so to me every week ends with games played on Monday.

All the statistical data I used I found on this site:
http://www.basketball-reference.com/

I described my way of calculating the MVP value in this post:
Comparing NBA MVPs

Before the 2018-19 season is over I have to make mathematical projections of the MVP values. The assumption behind the projections is that every player and every team will play exactly the same way they have been playing so far (the numbers of projected team wins are rounded to whole numbers).

With the assumptions described above, according to the data from the end of week 2 the current NBA 2019 MVP race list is this:

1. Stephen Curry:    3387.6    (projected team wins: 72)
2. Kevin Durant:    2936.9    (projected team wins: 72)
3. Nikola Jokic:    2675.8    (projected team wins: 68)
4. Blake Griffin:    2595.0    (projected team wins: 66)
5. Khris Middleton:    2573.8    (projected team wins: 82)
6. Giannis Antetokounmpo:    2507.9    (projected team wins: 82)
7. Kyle Lowry:    2374.9    (projected team wins: 70)
8. Damian Lillard:    2263.0    (projected team wins: 55)
9. DeMar DeRozan:    2071.0    (projected team wins: 55)
10. Eric Bledsoe:    1936.0    (projected team wins: 82)
11. Rudy Gobert:    1869.6    (projected team wins: 55)
12. Gary Harris:    1845.0    (projected team wins: 68)
13. Kawhi Leonard:    1828.0    (projected team wins: 70)
14. Joel Embiid:    1823.8    (projected team wins: 47)
15. Nikola Mirotic:    1763.5    (projected team wins: 55)
16. Anthony Davis:    1751.3    (projected team wins: 55)
17. Andre Drummond:    1751.3    (projected team wins: 66)
18. Tobias Harris:    1627.8    (projected team wins: 55)
19. Klay Thompson:    1578.4    (projected team wins: 72)
20. Malcolm Brogdon:    1531.3    (projected team wins: 82)
21. Serge Ibaka:    1530.7    (projected team wins: 70)
22. LaMarcus Aldridge:    1484.9    (projected team wins: 55)
23. Brook Lopez:    1481.4    (projected team wins: 82)
24. Danilo Gallinari:    1469.1    (projected team wins: 55)
25. Jamal Murray:    1465.1    (projected team wins: 68)
26. Kemba Walker:    1428.9    (projected team wins: 35)
27. Ersan Ilyasova:    1426.8    (projected team wins: 82)
28. Draymond Green:    1393.8    (projected team wins: 72)
29. Jonas Valanciunas:    1393.5    (projected team wins: 70)
30. Danny Green:    1376.4    (projected team wins: 70)

Even though the Milwaukee Bucks are the only unbeatable team in the NBA, it's Stephen (Stephenomenon) Curry who is the first clear leader of the race. LeBron James is not on the list, but only because the projected number of wins by his new team is 23 right now.

Please notice that Khris Middleton is ahead of Giannis Antetokounmpo only because Antetokounmpo missed 1 game (out of 7), so his projected overall value is relatively low because he is projected to miss almost 12 games during the whole season. Hopefully he will be healthy and won't miss so many games.