The MVP race

The MVP award isn’t decided by one 52-point night. It’s decided over six months, by a hundred media members, using criteria nobody writes down but everyone applies: produce a lot, win, be indispensable, and be there. Since 2023, you even have to be there at least 65 times.

So we ran the exercise. Every week, we go back through every box score of the season and rank the players on those criteria. The result is called the OBX, short for Off-Ball Index. It doesn’t predict the vote: it tells you who would deserve it today, if we took the criteria seriously.

Week 4 · through November 13

A check-in before Monday night's weekly ranking. Dončić (97) stays on top without playing since rolling his ankle in Milwaukee: the Lakers haven't played since Wednesday. Wembanyama (92.5) slips a little, with 12 points and 12 rebounds in 21 minutes on Friday, because the Spurs led Golden State by 43. Eleven straight wins all the same. The big jump comes from Houston: 43 points on 17-of-24 shooting for Alperen Şengün, who climbs from 9th to 3rd. Stephen Curry (4th) is likely to slide: an oblique tear, out at least two weeks. Deni Avdija, absent from last Monday's ranking, is 6th after scoring 34 on 11-of-13 shooting in Sacramento.

• ▲ 6Şengün, biggest climber
• ▼ 1Curry, biggest drop
• InAvdija, Jokić, Cunningham
• OutGilgeous-Alexander, Jerome, Flagg

The standings, week by week

In October, everyone is the MVP for about eight days. The race below replays every week of the season from the start: watch who holds on, and who was just passing through.

The OBX, week by week

W1W2W3W4Replay

Through Nov 13

ReavesLAL

JeromeMEM

ŞengünHOU

DončićLAL

LillardPOR

Gilgeous-AlexanderOKC

EdwardsMIN

FlaggDAL

MaxeyPHI

CurryGSW

WembanyamaSAS

AvdijaPOR

CunninghamDET

TatumBOS

MurrayDEN

The candidates

For each candidate, a grade from 0 to 100 on each criterion: 100 for the best of the players logging at least 26 minutes a game, 0 for the worst. The OBX is the weighted average of those five grades.

What makes an MVP

On paper, the vote is simple. A hundred media members rank five players: 10 points for first place, 7 for second, then 5, 3 and 1. The rules say nothing more, and that’s the whole problem: everyone puts whatever they like behind “most valuable player”. Vote after vote, though, a doctrine has taken hold. We turned it into five criteria.

How much each criterion weighs in the OBX

35%Production25%Winning20%Impact10%Efficiency10%Avail.

The full calculation, criterion by criterion, with every candidate’s numbers: how the OBX is calculated.

Production first. An MVP produces more than everyone else, and not just in scoring. We use John Hollinger’s Game Score: everything that helps the team counts, missed shots and turnovers cost. It is the heaviest criterion.

Winning, but the boss’s wins. In forty years, no MVP has come from a team seeded lower than 6th in its conference. But a winning team doesn’t turn all its players into candidates: in the OBX, the boss gets all the wins, his lieutenants only a share.

Impact. What happens to the team when he sits? We blend the point differential with him on the floor and the difference with his minutes on the bench. Shaky in November, very telling in April.

Efficiency, with volume. 70% shooting on five shots a game is nice. 62% on twenty-five shots is an MVP. So we count the points gained compared with an average shooter taking the same number of shots.

Availability. Since 2023-24, a player needs 65 games of at least 20 minutes to win. Joel Embiid, the 2023 MVP, paid the price in the very first year. So every candidate has 17 games to spare, and not one more.

The 65-game rule

Early in the season, the threshold looks far away. It isn’t: a player who misses one game in five finishes right at the limit. We’re tracking it from now on.

The 65-game rule

1. Dončić15 to spare
2. Wembanyama17 to spare
3. Şengün15 to spare
4. Curry13 to spare
5. Maxey17 to spare
6. Avdija17 to spare
7. Murray17 to spare
8. Tatum16 to spare

What the OBX can’t see

Defense, mostly. Blocks and steals show up in the box score. The shot nobody dared take because Wembanyama was waiting at the rim does not. An elite defender is probably underrated here, and impact only makes up part of the gap.

The narrative. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is chasing a third straight MVP. Only Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain and Larry Bird have done it. Voters know it, and history will weigh one way or the other: some will want to see it written, others will think it’s time for a new name. The OBX has no memory.

The calendar. A season is 82 games. The standings will move, and that’s the whole point of following them every week.

Method: every regular-season box score, read from ESPN and recalculated every day; the weekly standings are locked on Monday night. Ranked players: at least 26 minutes a game and half of their team’s games. A player who is already ineligible has his OBX cut in half.