Shai Gilgeous-Alexander became the second guard in history to win the regular season MVP award and the Finals MVP Award after winning the NBA title in the same season, where he was also the scoring champion of the league. The first guard to ever accomplish this was the Bulls legend Michael Jordan, who did it four times (1991, 1992, 1996, and 1998).
This undoubtedly was among the best seasons by a guard since that time. But Paul George believes it was the single greatest season by a guard since the Jordan era. He appeared on his podcast and had major praise for the 26-year-old Thunder star.
“But I think that same year, what MJ did, he won the defensive–First Team All-Defense as well. So he’s missing that–That’s the only thing you’re missing. So you can’t give them–But I think like it’s 1A, 1B, you know what I mean? Like, I think you can put them in, not that you’re putting him in a conversation with MJ, but you’re, from a season standpoint, you’ve got to put them in that conversation. Like that’s a hell of a year.”
“Especially in the league today, it’s tough as a small, smaller guard. You know the way he plays, especially the analytics like, they despise the way SG plays more now than they did in any other year, right? Because you want threes and layups. Well he gets to the free throw line, which is great, but he doesn’t shoot threes.”
“For him to be able to do that, and I think it just you know it should you know put a ton more emphasis on the players that can operate in a mid-range game. Because you see like it’s important when you’ve got guys that can operate in that area. So they’re trying to lose that part of the game with ‘we want to trade twos for threes’.”
He completely discounted the likes of Allen Iverson, Derrick Rose, Kobe Bryant, Stephen Curry, and even James Harden, who have also had legendary seasons since the Jordan era. However, in terms of individual accomplishment, maybe there is some merit in what he is trying to say.
Michael Jordan averaged 28.7 points, 5.8 rebounds, and 3.5 assists in 1997-98 when he won the regular season MVP Award and the scoring title. He was selected in the All-NBA First Team as well as the All-Defensive First Team that year. He averaged 33.5 points, 4.0 rebounds, and 2.3 assists in the NBA Finals that year to get the Finals MVP Award as well.
Allen Iverson was the scoring champion on multiple occasions and won the MVP award in 2001 before he almost single-handedly carried the 76ers to their last NBA Finals appearance. Derrick Rose was the youngest MVP in the NBA, but he couldn’t win anything beyond that with the Bulls.
Kobe Bryant won five championships while leading his team alongside the likes of Shaquille O’Neal and Pau Gasol. But in three of those seasons, he didn’t win the Finals MVP over O’Neal, and in the remaining two, he wasn’t the scoring champion or the league MVP.
Stephen Curry won the regular season MVP and the NBA championship in 2015 but failed to get the scoring title and Finals MVP award. James Harden won multiple scoring titles in his career, as well as the league MVP award in 2018, but he never won a Finals MVP or a championship.
Therefore, while these players may have stood out in single categories, they never accomplished all of this in a single season like Gilgeous-Alexander. He averaged 32.7 points, 6.4 assists, and 5.0 rebounds this season to win the Michael Jordan regular season MVP award as well as the scoring champion.
In the Finals, he averaged 30.3 points, 5.6 assists, and 4.6 rebounds and secured the Bill Russell Finals MVP award while the Thunder won their first championship. This was clearly the best season as a guard has had since 1998, Michael Jordan, but I would not put them on par as Jordan was also named to the First Team All-Defense in 1998.
