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Who is ahead he: Allen Iverson, Tim Duncan
On 2000-01, Shaquille O'Neal On the league-leading 57.2% shooting percentage, averaged 28.7 points, 12.7 rebounds, 3.7 assists and 2.8 blocks.
And did not win the MVP.
The defending NBA champion Lakers fell asleep in the regular season, a 56-26 game, which was a great year for most teams, but for three games in the early 2000s, that wasn't. Therefore, O'Neal was enjoyed MVP honors to support Alan Iversonhe led the league with 31.3 points that season, with the Philadelphia team being the 56-win team, and endorsed Tim Duncanhe averaged 22.2 points, 12.2 rebounds, 3.0 assists and 2.3 blocks, while appearing in all 82 games to win the San Antonio team.
Of course, O'Neal showed that playoff to all the best players, when he led the Lakers to a second straight win, swept Duncan in the Western Conference Finals, then beat Iverson four games in the finals while eventually winning the finals MVP honors.
O'Neal was not happy about not winning the MVP and introduced the award in the media to the award before March of that year. He even seems to throw some shadows at Iverson saying that if he averages 100 points per game (thinking how unstoppable Prime Shaq is, he might not be wrong):
His reign will end with the announcement of Allen Iverson or Chris Webber and even Tim Duncan, the winner of the year. In fact, there is an assumption throughout the league that Iverson has won, and in fact he may win, as the votes will be held this week. “You gave the awards in March because some people did a good job. A lot of people did a good job,” O'Neal said Friday. …. “If I had 50 goals per game, I would have had an average of one hundred,” O'Neal said.
O'Neal also said that if he didn't win the award unanimously, he wouldn't want it:
He accused the media of swearing that he did not want to be “a sympathetic person’s award.” “If I can't win the award unanimously, or if I'm close to winning the award unanimously, I don't want it.” When asked why, he said, “Because I don't know what you're looking for. If you're looking for percentages. If you're looking for consistency. I don't know what you want, it really doesn't matter.”
Voters seem to agree, as O'Neal was third in the vote.
Anyway, it was ridiculous that four-time champion and three-time final MVP O'Neal won a regular season MVP award in his career. Perhaps similar to some modern Nuggets star, O'Neal didn't get the MVP love he deserved, because obviously, he's so best in the league that he saw it when he actually voted for the MVP.
