NBA 2019 MVP race – part 2

(Originally posted on Tuesday, 13 November 2018)

Part 2 = the end of week 4. 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 4 the current NBA 2019 MVP race list is this:

1. Kevin Durant:    2587.1    (projected team wins: 64)
2. Stephen Curry:    2277.6    (projected team wins: 64)
3. Damian Lillard:    2221.8    (projected team wins: 63)
4. Giannis Antetokounmpo:    2137.0    (projected team wins: 63)
5. Kyle Lowry:    2116.1    (projected team wins: 70)
6. Joel Embiid:    2018.8    (projected team wins: 49)
7. Nikola Jokic:    1878.8    (projected team wins: 57)
8. Serge Ibaka:    1767.3    (projected team wins: 70)
9. Khris Middleton:    1713.2    (projected team wins: 63)
10. LeBron James:    1637.2    (projected team wins: 44)
11. Kawhi Leonard:    1637.2    (projected team wins: 70)
12. Kemba Walker:    1631.0    (projected team wins: 44)
13. DeMar DeRozan:    1604.8    (projected team wins: 48)
14. Pascal Siakam:    1568.2    (projected team wins: 70)
15. Klay Thompson:    1538.1    (projected team wins: 64)
16. Paul George:    1532.2    (projected team wins: 50)
17. Jusuf Nurkic:    1511.6    (projected team wins: 63)
18. Victor Oladipo:    1494.0    (projected team wins: 47)
19. CJ McCollum:    1492.1    (projected team wins: 63)
20. Jonas Valanciunas:    1485.8    (projected team wins: 70)
21. Tobias Harris:    1440.2    (projected team wins: 50)
22. Eric Bledsoe:    1412.6    (projected team wins: 63)
23. Rudy Gobert:    1381.9    (projected team wins: 44)
24. Anthony Davis:    1365.6    (projected team wins: 44)
25. Blake Griffin:    1336.6    (projected team wins: 41)
26. Malcolm Brogdon:    1305.3    (projected team wins: 63)
27. Andre Drummond:    1295.4    (projected team wins: 41)
28. Brook Lopez:    1277.8    (projected team wins: 63)
29. Danilo Gallinari:    1273.1    (projected team wins: 50)
30. Jrue Holiday:    1268.6    (projected team wins: 44)

Stephen Curry's projected MVP value got much lower because right now he is projected to miss 12 games and hence his projected total “raw value” is much lower than Kevin Durant's. Joel Embiid's MVP value is dragged down by his team's projected number of wins, similarly to the MVP values of LeBron James and Kemba Walker.

Damian Lillard, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Kyle Lowry got into the top 5. They all should remain strong MVP candidates till the end of the season. Surprisingly Serge Ibaka is at the 8th place and Pascal Siakam is at the 14th place! Kawhi leonard is only at the 11th place, but he is projected to miss as many as 24 games.