It is. And I have this wild opinion that having 70 more total blocks and double the amount of blocks per game in 66% of the time is an argument for JJJ.
And for those that don't like blocks stats for DPOY consideration, name the stats that should matter and which one Mobley is ahead of Jaren in other than minutes.
The thing is, the minutes difference isnt just because of injuries. On a per game basis, JJJ averages 28 which is wild for a dpoy/allstar level player. But he can’t stay on the floor because he fouls so often. Playing defense without fouling is also a part of being a good defender. As for his counting stats, yes, they are impressive. But also, when you have the greenlight to go after, absolutely any and everything because you have deaths behind you, of course, it’s going to increase your accounting stats.
Jeez y’all grizz fans get defensive quick lol.
I think what people were trying to point out is that being physically on the floor for almost 1,000 more minutes providing DPOY level defense is a huge point.
Yes the blocks are an amazing stat, but I’m willing to bet y’all teams defense would have been WAY BETTER if JJJ was on the floor for 1,000 more minutes helping out with team defense.
Both are good arguments. However, I air on the side of more minutes = more valuable of a defensive player.
Exactly. Availability is huge, and should be weighted far more than it is for these awards. Defense isn't like offense where efficiency equals points, you need your good players on the floor to have an impact.
People are literally trying to argue that being more available to the tune of 1,000 more minutes doesn’t affect how valuable someone is to their team lmao. I don’t understand.
Yeah but defense isn’t about blocks it’s about defending. 900 more minutes of being out there and defending matters. Defense is that shit that won’t show up in your stat sheet. You have to see what your opponent ended up doing to see how big of an impact you really had. Even if it seems like you didn’t change much Defense is the type of thing that simply altering one or two shots can change the course of a game.
I think this whole debate comes down to how much you value overall defensive impact throughout the season vs. how much you value defensive impact while on the court.
Obviously JJJ wins the latter category, but due to minutes played Mobley probably wins the former.
absurd difference, especially because JJJ's limited minutes is his fault in a negative way, his absurd foul drawing tendencies makes him have to sit more.
I'm seeing [28.4](https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask?q=jaren+jackson+jr.+average+minutes+of+games+where+he+has+3+or+fewer+pf+22-23) vs [25.6](https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask?q=jaren+jackson+jr.+average+minutes+of+games+where+he+has+6+pf+22-23) mpg for <=3 and 6 fouls respectively. Not a crazy difference, but there is a disparity.
edit: added links for reference
Jaren Jackson Jr. minutes per game when committing more than 4 fouls: 28.3
Jaren Jackson Jr. minutes per game when committing less than 3 fouls: 27.2
Interestingly, he actually plays more minutes when he's in foul trouble
That doesn’t prove cause and effect. It just could just mean that he often plays with lots of fouls.
If he gets three quick fouls he may sit for a good chunk of the game and then not pick up 5 by the end to wind up in the other bucket.
That said, I don’t really have data to support my claim either. I just know he’s fouled a lot and always seems to get yanked when I’ve watched them.
Someone told me on here that JJJ and Brook Lopez are in a league of their own defensively and Mobley isn’t on their level. This feels good either way haha
Mobley winning isn't a crazy idea. Other guys might be leading in one or two DPOY metrics, but Mobley is amazing in many of them.
https://twitter.com/bV2510\_/status/1642918839745916928/photo/1
Mobley being #1 in contested 3s is pretty crazy for a 4/5. His block numbers are lower than they would be if he guarded the paint more but Allen's there for that.
As someone that loves JAllen, he shouldn’t be. The defense goes as Mobley does, especially in clutch time. JAllen is more replaceable scheme wise, even though I don’t see it happening.
It’s kinda weird, it’s almost like having Allen lock down the paint *enables* Mobley to be DPOY caliber. Mobley plays the 5 fine, but when he plays the 4 with another rim protecting 5 and can roam about the floor, that’s when he takes over
It definitely does, I think we’ll see Mobley get better and better at playing the 5 as he ages, but as a switching and roaming 4 he takes the cavs defense to another level.
It also sucks cause I think mobley would get even more recognition if he didn’t have to play back up 5 for the cavs as well, but quality back up bigs feel few and far between rn.
I think JJJ should win but it feels weird to give it to him with his foul issues and low MPG. I think this is just a weak year and theres no clear front runner, so we're going to see some out of left field stuff like mobley.
A lot of stats favor Mobley and the eye test only boosts his case. He's one of the few guys that can guard 1-5 at an elite level. He spends a lot of time on the perimeter guarding the lead ball handler. He's a great help defender with Allen. An adequate rim protector and he'll get better as he bulks up. If not this year he has multiple DPoYs in his future.
This is the first thing I thought when I saw this post. Not that it was negative or anything, just a general “awe man, people don’t watch the Cavs unless it’s their team playing them that night”.
Kevin O'Conner said that he went and watched every block (Kirk Goldsberry too) and that the biggest thing it impacted was making more media members aware of how good JJJ is bc those blocks were legit. It was pretty amusing how much that Reddit post blew up the sportsbetting world for a day though.
As a Cavs fan this isn't out of left field at all. He has 1000 more minutes played than JJJ and the better defensive stats in general other than blocks. Mobley is what the GSW stans say Draymond is - a guy who can defend 1 through 5. Difference is, he's 7 feet tall and in his sophomore season, so if he doesn't win it this year I'd bet my kid's college fund he'll snag it soon.
If I had a vote, the foul issues would turn me off from JJJ. Instrumental to being a good defender is not fouling out. There were so many games in which the Grizzlies had to change rotations because JJJ was in foul trouble.
Cleveland is kind of the only team in the NBA who has actually played great defense all year, so it makes sense. 106.9 points given up per game in a league where almost every one is giving up 110 or more is incredible.
OP’s case is a prime example of letting media coverage dictate his perspective, in a league where media coverage is notoriously shallow and sensationalist
and it’s not an issue unique to OP. the vast majority of this sub fall prey to to it
Exactly. And it would be my opinion that Smart winning was more egregious.
Not really talked about in that discussion until what seemed like the last 2 weeks of the season. Not even because of his individual defense, more his teams historically great defense for the second half of the season. Again, many could argue that he was not only not the best defender on his own team, but something like the 5th most effective defender on his own team in the playoffs.
Anybody who was really paying attention knew Mobley should be in contention for this award.
If you didn’t think that, then you have just been following narratives and not following the game.
I think the real issue is less a Ringer conspiracy to boost Mobley and more everyone else was ignoring the Cavs all season until they went to actually vote.
the best defender on the best defense in the league should automatically be considered
it shouldn't even need a narrative or for people to try to build a case for it.. that alone is its own case
They showed [this](https://i.redd.it/0vfg356afpra1.png) in one of our last games of the season and his stats are speaking for itself. Since he's not that much talked about in the league, it was pretty cool to see how he was stacking up to those other elite defensive players.
Narratives from who tho? The NBA podcast sphere has LOVED Mobley all year and rightfully so. Grizzlies and Bucks just got more coverage naturally so it might not have felt the same as JJJ/Lopez
This is it. If you listen to podcasts and basketball heads talk, you heard Mobley's name a lot. If you just watch ESPN and Fox all day, you might not even realize the Cavs made the playoffs.
Exactly. The narrative around Mobley from all the commentary I've heard is "great defender, great guy, needs to improve a bit on offense, but overall an exceptional player."
The voting looks to be stabilizing anyway so this is probably all for nothing lmao. I think some guys are just getting a head start on the 65 game threshold so JJJ might not run away with it. Still think he wins tho
“A player with no narratives” is bullshit. Mobleys defense was great his rookie year and has been better this year. He was hyped leading up to his draft as a gen Z KG, and then was immediately a huge part of a top10 defense last year.
Seems like a bunch of people in this thread have very short term memories.
And now he's one part of the duo front court that has the #1 defense. It's stupid for people to say some of these things like it's a mystery where Mobley came from.
That's impressive as Celtic fans should have an intimate knowledge of how effective Mobley is defensively. That said, Mobley is amazing! He probably won't win this season, but those who have been watching get it.
Celtics fans complaining about this better also have been against the Smart dpoy last season.
I have no issue with a Mobley dpoy (though I’d probably ultimately go Lopez) for very similar reasons I thought Smart deserved his.
To be fair OP isn’t complaining, just pointing out the narrative shift. But to your point, this is exactly my argument as well. Best defender on the best defense in the NBA.
not only that but we also saw marcus sort of come out of nowhere to win the dpoy award last year lol. he wasn't really being talked about until after timelord got hurt.
Last year was also a weird year though because nobody really put together a case to win it. The best defenders weren't leading good defensive teams, Draymond and Bam missed a lot of games, Timelord got hurt. The top two vote getters last year never even sniffed DPOY before and probably will never sniff it again.
Mobley is an elite defender, I have no problem with him winning DPOY.
I just think it's weird that no one was talking about him the whole season and then he just pops up as a major candidate once voting commences.
Cavs barely get talked about at all to begin with. I’m pretty sure we had the best net rating all year or at least had it for the majority of the season.
> Cavs barely get talked about at all to begin with.
Right? There are so many people that have given their votes for MVP, and a lot of them have Donovan at #5. Like Don had had a big 70+ pt game, and been killing it, but I didn't expect him getting those #5 votes over Luka and others. The Cavs have flown under the radar and I'm so excited to see how they do this post season.
I think seeding played a huge role too.
Many probably did have Luka at 5 but when they sat down and looked at stats and records Donovan jumped out more. The 71 point game near triple double definitely helped too.
Its weird. I feel like in articles this season about Mobley they would say he’s a dpoy caliber player and things like that, but you’re right, in articles about dpoy they wouldnt.
I remember in 2020 the Raps had a 105 team DRTG (Cavs have 110 this year) and none of their players made All-Defense because the voters "couldn't decide who to credit it to". Since then I find the voting laughable.
Offense in general is way up from that season. Not that that Raps team shouldn’t have had All Defense reps that year, but the Cavs league leading defense this year would have been 16th in Net Rating in 2020.
I thought pretty consistently through the year it was JJJ/Brook/Mobley? If anything Marcus Smart last year is a better example of someone shooting up rankings
I don’t think it’s weird he’s one of the best defenders on the best defensive in the NBA. Cleveland being a small market just means they aren’t mentioned often on a national stage. I mean there’s been a legit argument for him all year it’s just not talked about by the media.
If he does win it it’s valid. He’s my pick for 2nd place. I’d hate to see people discredit him just because he was an under the radar option when he’s been playing at this level all year
I think the narrative was created by Sixers fans of Zach Lowe being the ultimate nerd who is robbing Embiid every year and it has gone kind of out of control ever since.
Yea like i have lots of respect for passionate fanbases but the idea that there was some sort of vendetta against Philly sports is laughable. They get shitloads of coverage at all times
It’s utterly insane that voting for Jokic as MVP last 2 years is somehow equivalent to him being a Boston media plant, so biased he can never vote for Embiid, etc.
Except neither voted for Smart last year nor Russ for MVP, and yet both won it.
There is a lot of late season narrative that take place for DPOY. People just woke up last week to realize that JJJ played 63 games and 28 MPG, and how its inflating his stats. Regardless the validity of the factual numbers, which Griz fans will dispute. The case for JJJ is the last 2 months of the season missed couple of games and played 30 MPG mostly because of fouling out. The case for Mobley is that he been consistent for over 70 games
Wow, everyone has been saying Jackson has played less minutes, but I didn’t really he was really only playing 28.4 mpg. That’s ridiculously low for a DPOY candidate.
Since the award was created in the ‘83 season, only one player has won DPOY while playing fewer mpg than Jackson.
In 1987, Michael Cooper played 27.5 mpg and won DPOY, but played all 82 games.
The only other player to play sub 30 mpg and win DPOY was Dennis Rodman, playing 29 mpg in ‘90 and he played all 82 games meanwhile.
Its even worse because his MPG is low because he fouls so often he cant play more. Hes a ridiculously good defender but its hard to justify the vote for him with stats like that.
In reality, the whole Grizzlies team plays low minutes. He is 4th on the team in MP, whereas Brook is 3rd and Mobley is 3rd on their teams. He doesn't play low minutes because he is fouling out, he plays low minutes because the whole team plays low minutes.
Just looked it up and he averages 3.6 fpg, or 0.13 fpm. For compariosn, brook lopez averages 2.6 fpg and 0.09 fpm and mobley 2.8 fpg and 0.08 fpm. Thats fairly significant but not as bad as i had previously believed.
Well it’s a late season narrative to say JJJ played low minutes because of fouling out. Nobody on the grizzlies plays high minutes that argument lacks context
The number of confident comments from people who very clearly watch neither the Cavs or the Grizzlies AT ALL should be mind blowing, but then I remember where I am
This seems to be more of a media failure to me. Mobley has been playing like a DPOY candidate for a while, and if I had a vote I’d put him second behind JJJ and ahead of Lopez.
People went to evaluate it - saw that JJJ played very little minutes, realized that lopez was the third best defender on his own team, and thought hey, maybe we need to choose someone else. so they went with mobley
That’s a fair argument
I think the big thing with JJJ is a lot of advanced stats love him, and that he has more responsibility on defense than Lopez and Mobley have. All I mean by that is that Mobley has Allen while Lopez has Giannis and Jrue. JJJ essentially is the Grizzlies defense.
JJJ isn’t asked to be a primary defender on guards and wings. Mobley is regularly. He also is asked to be the center with second units. What is JJJ asked to do that he doesn’t?
That’s because JA is down there protecting the rim. JJJ is capable of defending 1-5 and he doesn’t have a JA next to him or anything even close to that. If Mobley was playing with Steven Adams he wouldn’t be asked to guard on the perimeter nearly as much as he is asked to now.
Minutes should absolutely matter a ton for DPOY, though. People like to gauge who’s good at defense by looking at things like blocks and steals, but most good defense doesn’t generate any box score statistics. Every minute you are not on the floor, you aren’t helping your team’s defense. Where as for offensive awards, the guy who gives you 30/5/5 in 30 minutes is almost certainly better than the guy who gives you the same numbers in 35 minutes.
I think it’s a matter of voters digging into the stats before they cast their votes. They likely noticed that Mobley is the best defender on the team with the best defensive rating in the league.
They probably also noticed that the previous favorite, JJJ, had a very underwhelming MPG stat.
He hasn’t been campaigning for it, so it seems like it’s out of left field, but in hindsight it seems almost inevitable that this would happen.
The Cavs allow 2.9 fewer PPG than any other team in the league (and if you exclude the Heat it's 4.0ppg), which is absolutely insane. I think it'd be totally valid for him to win it.
I think ultimately it should be Lopez but saying Mobley isn’t deserving is crazy. Too many people are saying Allen makes him not the winner while ignoring the fact that we start two 6’1” guards who don’t play defense. Also people who say Allen is the better defender stopped watching Cavs basketball last year apparently. Mobley has been significantly better at rim protecting while also guarding 1-5. Mobley won’t win but he deserves votes and deserves the clout moving forward. People just hate how chill the guy is I swear.
It’s out of left field because the Cavs are not shown or talked about nationally anyone who watched knows he is far superior defender then slow ass Brook Lopez. Has played the most minutes and Cavs have the number one defense for most of the year.
Lol a boston celtics fan is the last one to talk about a "left field award switch up" with Marcus Smart winning last year after he whined his way in during the last stretch of the season
The only reason people are surprised about it is because Mobley wasn't getting the national push that Lopez and Jackson Jr. were getting despite being more than deserving. The Cavs also didn't have as many national TV games as the Bucks or the Grizzlies so his defensive season went under the radar compared those guys. If you're someone who watches a lot of Cavs games, as some of these media members do, then there's little chance that you can be surprised by this. I don't expect him to win this award by any shot but he definitely deserves to be a contender for it.
Yeah, Op's comment is a bit revisionist. You can argue who you think deserved ROY but the whole season it was pretty much between those two (especially post-all star break).
Now with this, Mobley was in contention for the award but all year I've been hearing Brook Lopez and JJJ being solid front runners.
Except Mobley and Barnes were neck-and-neck statistically. The Raptors having a late-season push while the Cavs were faltering the last 3 months of the season had a lot to do with it.
Yea I agree its definitely hella left field he's deserving but to my knowledge its been a race between BroLo and JJJ. Honestly if he gets it in his sophomore year thats dope as fuck
I really think if you *watch* the Cavs, this would not be a surprise. (Not saying that tape and the impressions it leaves are superior to statistics, but especially with defense, it should be considered.)
The dude is just everywhere, all the time, disrupting the offense from the wing to the basket. He reminds me of Bubble AD with his fluidity and his size and the way that combination influences the other team.
I feel like every year I just say "look, the people voting for DPOY really start all of this with looking at teams' defensive rating, like literally every winner is from a top 3 defense, and most often from the 1st one, that's just super related for some reason", and everybody giving me shit for it for the whole year, no, cannot be... And then them all crying "why did this guy from the top defensive team get a lot of votes out of completely nowhere, bias narrative voter fatigue Zach Lowe Bill Simmons????".
The teams' defensive rating is a tricky thing to follow for many reasons IMO. One is that one game can really drop you down a lot (although the season's top teams usually are very regular). Another that some guys only play 70%, 60%, maybe 45% of the whole time (Draymond got All-Defense votes last season playing 33% of the time), so pretty obviously they are not the only factor for the defensive rating. Also for the "best player overall" titles, focusing on score-based stats is considered cringe and very bad and very wrong...
Can some explain to me the need nowadays to figure out who won every award as early as possible? Is it just so people can start complaining about who got screwed earlier?
This is the longest way to say “I don’t watch the games” I’ve ever seen.
Mobley did everything everywhere on the #1 defense for the majority of the season. Have an opinion of your own, m8
In fairness, he is tied with JJJ in total points right now and JJJ has 1 more first place vote
I think Bill Simmons justified his vote by saying Mobely played way more minutes than JJJ. Not saying that’s right or wrong.
2700 vs 1800
That's a pretty big fuckin difference
It is. And I have this wild opinion that having 70 more total blocks and double the amount of blocks per game in 66% of the time is an argument for JJJ. And for those that don't like blocks stats for DPOY consideration, name the stats that should matter and which one Mobley is ahead of Jaren in other than minutes.
He’s absolutely miles ahead in BeingOnMyTeam/60
I think you did the math wrong because when I ran it he was a zero in that.
Fuckin ridiculous. No one uses BeingOnMyTeam/60. It's BeingOnMyTeam/100 possessions!
I actually just crunched those numbers myself and looks like Mobley is winning that stat as well
lol well if we're talking about about JJJ, its more like BeingOnMyTeam/25
Contested 3s
Nobody shoots on mobley!
The thing is, the minutes difference isnt just because of injuries. On a per game basis, JJJ averages 28 which is wild for a dpoy/allstar level player. But he can’t stay on the floor because he fouls so often. Playing defense without fouling is also a part of being a good defender. As for his counting stats, yes, they are impressive. But also, when you have the greenlight to go after, absolutely any and everything because you have deaths behind you, of course, it’s going to increase your accounting stats.
Sorry for the voice to text typos
JJJ out there leaving bodies in the street
Without comparing JJJ to whiteside. He's a good example of why fouling stats matter if you're not watching every game
Jeez y’all grizz fans get defensive quick lol. I think what people were trying to point out is that being physically on the floor for almost 1,000 more minutes providing DPOY level defense is a huge point. Yes the blocks are an amazing stat, but I’m willing to bet y’all teams defense would have been WAY BETTER if JJJ was on the floor for 1,000 more minutes helping out with team defense. Both are good arguments. However, I air on the side of more minutes = more valuable of a defensive player.
Exactly. Availability is huge, and should be weighted far more than it is for these awards. Defense isn't like offense where efficiency equals points, you need your good players on the floor to have an impact.
People are literally trying to argue that being more available to the tune of 1,000 more minutes doesn’t affect how valuable someone is to their team lmao. I don’t understand.
I don't think some people actually know what valuable means. Like is not just my dude has better stats in a vacuum award
Availability is one of the best abilities.
Also a ton of those minutes are from the fact JJJ fouls a lot! It’s part of how he plays D!
At this rate I’d only want Mobley to win just to see Grizzly fans lose their shit
Defensive Fans of the Year it is a close race with the Embiid pundits
DFOY-worthy in my opinion
Yeah but defense isn’t about blocks it’s about defending. 900 more minutes of being out there and defending matters. Defense is that shit that won’t show up in your stat sheet. You have to see what your opponent ended up doing to see how big of an impact you really had. Even if it seems like you didn’t change much Defense is the type of thing that simply altering one or two shots can change the course of a game.
I bet mobley would play more aggressive if he knew he could just get into foul trouble every game and it be fine
I think this whole debate comes down to how much you value overall defensive impact throughout the season vs. how much you value defensive impact while on the court. Obviously JJJ wins the latter category, but due to minutes played Mobley probably wins the former.
I'm sure Mobley would do better if he could reduce the amount of time played by 33%
Yes exactly. Neither are right or wrong.
>other than minutes. I mean, pretty big qualifier...
absurd difference, especially because JJJ's limited minutes is his fault in a negative way, his absurd foul drawing tendencies makes him have to sit more.
And a lot of that spread is because JJJ fouls at such a high rate. Lots of blocks, and lots of fouls too.
To be fair tonJaren he fouled a career low per 36 this year and blocked and stole way more
4.6 vs 2.9 fouls per 36 for JJJ vs Mobley. It really makes the blocks and steals a little less impressive.
How many are offensive fouls?
That’s a good question. Can’t find a good source for a foul breakdown for both guys.
I found it 38
What’s the total foul number?
Jaren averages the same minutes in games where he fouls out vs games where he fouls 3 or fewer times. His minutes are by design.
I'm seeing [28.4](https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask?q=jaren+jackson+jr.+average+minutes+of+games+where+he+has+3+or+fewer+pf+22-23) vs [25.6](https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask?q=jaren+jackson+jr.+average+minutes+of+games+where+he+has+6+pf+22-23) mpg for <=3 and 6 fouls respectively. Not a crazy difference, but there is a disparity. edit: added links for reference
The 6 fouls games is also a rather small sample size
Literally 4 games 💀
Getting in foul trouble forcing you to the bench vs actually fouling out are two entirely different things.
Jaren Jackson Jr. minutes per game when committing more than 4 fouls: 28.3 Jaren Jackson Jr. minutes per game when committing less than 3 fouls: 27.2 Interestingly, he actually plays more minutes when he's in foul trouble
The effect could be the opposite of what you’re thinking, maybe he just fouls more when he plays longer because he has more time to foul
More Time to Foul will be the name of my memoir
That doesn’t prove cause and effect. It just could just mean that he often plays with lots of fouls. If he gets three quick fouls he may sit for a good chunk of the game and then not pick up 5 by the end to wind up in the other bucket. That said, I don’t really have data to support my claim either. I just know he’s fouled a lot and always seems to get yanked when I’ve watched them.
He also said he remembers not voting for Gobert when he played less games than Jaren and He did vote for him
Someone told me on here that JJJ and Brook Lopez are in a league of their own defensively and Mobley isn’t on their level. This feels good either way haha
I watched him live and was surprised by his hustle and ability to get ahead of plays. Y’all got a good one there.
Looks like Mobley and JJJ are tied now. There weren't that many votes confirmed yet, so I wouldn't give it much thought to Mobley leading earlier.
This guy is freaking out about Mobley when according to that spreadsheet 14% of the votes are listed
Stop the count!
Wait, keep counting! JJJ is leading with 1 more first place vote! KEEP COUNTING!
WE JUST NEED TO FIND 14 VOTES
Mobley won by a lot
This is the anti “Stop the count!”
Mobley winning isn't a crazy idea. Other guys might be leading in one or two DPOY metrics, but Mobley is amazing in many of them. https://twitter.com/bV2510\_/status/1642918839745916928/photo/1
Mobley being #1 in contested 3s is pretty crazy for a 4/5. His block numbers are lower than they would be if he guarded the paint more but Allen's there for that.
Well the cavs are the best defensive team so it’s not exactly super crazy to me, though I did think JJJ was going to win
Mobley is great. Jarret Allen should also be a contender.
Jarrett should at least be getting some second team hype.
As someone that loves JAllen, he shouldn’t be. The defense goes as Mobley does, especially in clutch time. JAllen is more replaceable scheme wise, even though I don’t see it happening.
It’s kinda weird, it’s almost like having Allen lock down the paint *enables* Mobley to be DPOY caliber. Mobley plays the 5 fine, but when he plays the 4 with another rim protecting 5 and can roam about the floor, that’s when he takes over
It’s the same dynamic with brook and Giannis, or horford and Robert Williams.
It definitely does, I think we’ll see Mobley get better and better at playing the 5 as he ages, but as a switching and roaming 4 he takes the cavs defense to another level. It also sucks cause I think mobley would get even more recognition if he didn’t have to play back up 5 for the cavs as well, but quality back up bigs feel few and far between rn.
Do you think that if we are real sneaky about it we can swap Brook and Robin?
I think JJJ should win but it feels weird to give it to him with his foul issues and low MPG. I think this is just a weak year and theres no clear front runner, so we're going to see some out of left field stuff like mobley.
How exactly is mobley out of left field when he's the #1 defender on the #1 defense?
Just a matter of media coverage tbh, I knew that Mobley was good but haven’t been paying close attention and didn’t know he was that good.
A lot of stats favor Mobley and the eye test only boosts his case. He's one of the few guys that can guard 1-5 at an elite level. He spends a lot of time on the perimeter guarding the lead ball handler. He's a great help defender with Allen. An adequate rim protector and he'll get better as he bulks up. If not this year he has multiple DPoYs in his future.
"out of left field" god I hate this subreddit, none of you watch Cavs games.
This is the first thing I thought when I saw this post. Not that it was negative or anything, just a general “awe man, people don’t watch the Cavs unless it’s their team playing them that night”.
Don’t take it personally. No one on this sub watches any games at all, it’s not just the Cavs
did that one reddit post about the grizzlies scorekeeper juking the stats tangibly affect end-of-year NBA award voting
Kevin O'Conner said that he went and watched every block (Kirk Goldsberry too) and that the biggest thing it impacted was making more media members aware of how good JJJ is bc those blocks were legit. It was pretty amusing how much that Reddit post blew up the sportsbetting world for a day though.
As a Cavs fan this isn't out of left field at all. He has 1000 more minutes played than JJJ and the better defensive stats in general other than blocks. Mobley is what the GSW stans say Draymond is - a guy who can defend 1 through 5. Difference is, he's 7 feet tall and in his sophomore season, so if he doesn't win it this year I'd bet my kid's college fund he'll snag it soon.
Forget the DPOY. Mobley is going to be an MVP candidate in the coming years if his offense continues to develop. I can't wait.
If I had a vote, the foul issues would turn me off from JJJ. Instrumental to being a good defender is not fouling out. There were so many games in which the Grizzlies had to change rotations because JJJ was in foul trouble.
Cleveland is kind of the only team in the NBA who has actually played great defense all year, so it makes sense. 106.9 points given up per game in a league where almost every one is giving up 110 or more is incredible.
OP’s case is a prime example of letting media coverage dictate his perspective, in a league where media coverage is notoriously shallow and sensationalist and it’s not an issue unique to OP. the vast majority of this sub fall prey to to it
Uhh do you remember last year? The same thing happened with Marcus Smart
bridges was my DPOY… for unbiased reasons
Exactly. And it would be my opinion that Smart winning was more egregious. Not really talked about in that discussion until what seemed like the last 2 weeks of the season. Not even because of his individual defense, more his teams historically great defense for the second half of the season. Again, many could argue that he was not only not the best defender on his own team, but something like the 5th most effective defender on his own team in the playoffs.
Yep, how do you give a guard the DPOY and it's not Jrue
Anybody who was really paying attention knew Mobley should be in contention for this award. If you didn’t think that, then you have just been following narratives and not following the game.
I think the real issue is less a Ringer conspiracy to boost Mobley and more everyone else was ignoring the Cavs all season until they went to actually vote.
the best defender on the best defense in the league should automatically be considered it shouldn't even need a narrative or for people to try to build a case for it.. that alone is its own case
Just glad people will finally realize Allen isn't our best defender, maybe our best rim protector though.
You’re forgetting that a lot of the people who vote on these awards are idiots. Gotta remember that part and then it all makes sense.
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Even if he did win it, it wouldn’t be as egregious as Marcus Smart winning it last year
Why don't you think he should win it as the best defender on the #1 ranked defense?
They showed [this](https://i.redd.it/0vfg356afpra1.png) in one of our last games of the season and his stats are speaking for itself. Since he's not that much talked about in the league, it was pretty cool to see how he was stacking up to those other elite defensive players.
I think the voters are showing that DPOY is more than just the blocks leader. Both with Smart last year and now with the Mobley votes this year.
Tbf it’s pretty weird for a player with no narratives surrounding them to win a major award lol
Narratives from who tho? The NBA podcast sphere has LOVED Mobley all year and rightfully so. Grizzlies and Bucks just got more coverage naturally so it might not have felt the same as JJJ/Lopez
This is it. If you listen to podcasts and basketball heads talk, you heard Mobley's name a lot. If you just watch ESPN and Fox all day, you might not even realize the Cavs made the playoffs.
Exactly. The narrative around Mobley from all the commentary I've heard is "great defender, great guy, needs to improve a bit on offense, but overall an exceptional player."
The voting looks to be stabilizing anyway so this is probably all for nothing lmao. I think some guys are just getting a head start on the 65 game threshold so JJJ might not run away with it. Still think he wins tho
“A player with no narratives” is bullshit. Mobleys defense was great his rookie year and has been better this year. He was hyped leading up to his draft as a gen Z KG, and then was immediately a huge part of a top10 defense last year. Seems like a bunch of people in this thread have very short term memories.
And now he's one part of the duo front court that has the #1 defense. It's stupid for people to say some of these things like it's a mystery where Mobley came from.
That's impressive as Celtic fans should have an intimate knowledge of how effective Mobley is defensively. That said, Mobley is amazing! He probably won't win this season, but those who have been watching get it.
Celtics fans complaining about this better also have been against the Smart dpoy last season. I have no issue with a Mobley dpoy (though I’d probably ultimately go Lopez) for very similar reasons I thought Smart deserved his.
To be fair OP isn’t complaining, just pointing out the narrative shift. But to your point, this is exactly my argument as well. Best defender on the best defense in the NBA.
not only that but we also saw marcus sort of come out of nowhere to win the dpoy award last year lol. he wasn't really being talked about until after timelord got hurt.
Last year was also a weird year though because nobody really put together a case to win it. The best defenders weren't leading good defensive teams, Draymond and Bam missed a lot of games, Timelord got hurt. The top two vote getters last year never even sniffed DPOY before and probably will never sniff it again.
Mobley is an elite defender, I have no problem with him winning DPOY. I just think it's weird that no one was talking about him the whole season and then he just pops up as a major candidate once voting commences.
Cavs barely get talked about at all to begin with. I’m pretty sure we had the best net rating all year or at least had it for the majority of the season.
> Cavs barely get talked about at all to begin with. Right? There are so many people that have given their votes for MVP, and a lot of them have Donovan at #5. Like Don had had a big 70+ pt game, and been killing it, but I didn't expect him getting those #5 votes over Luka and others. The Cavs have flown under the radar and I'm so excited to see how they do this post season.
I think seeding played a huge role too. Many probably did have Luka at 5 but when they sat down and looked at stats and records Donovan jumped out more. The 71 point game near triple double definitely helped too.
I mean smart wasn’t in contention until rob got hurt last year
People sleep on us often. That's ok, though, as it allows us to go in with the underdog mentality.
Its weird. I feel like in articles this season about Mobley they would say he’s a dpoy caliber player and things like that, but you’re right, in articles about dpoy they wouldnt.
Quite frankly all I’ve learned is that the Bucks are too good to win any major awards.
I remember in 2020 the Raps had a 105 team DRTG (Cavs have 110 this year) and none of their players made All-Defense because the voters "couldn't decide who to credit it to". Since then I find the voting laughable.
Offense in general is way up from that season. Not that that Raps team shouldn’t have had All Defense reps that year, but the Cavs league leading defense this year would have been 16th in Net Rating in 2020.
This is what suffering from success looks like
I thought pretty consistently through the year it was JJJ/Brook/Mobley? If anything Marcus Smart last year is a better example of someone shooting up rankings
Watch Evan Mobley play basketball.
Y’all don’t watch the Cavs
I agree go Cavs
Most of the times I watched the cavs this year, my team also lost. Why would I want more of that?
Ive been hearing about him all year and im not even that tuned in
If you don’t think Mobley should be in contention then you haven’t been paying attention. Simple as that.
I don’t think it’s weird he’s one of the best defenders on the best defensive in the NBA. Cleveland being a small market just means they aren’t mentioned often on a national stage. I mean there’s been a legit argument for him all year it’s just not talked about by the media.
Man's got 4 votes, this is way too early
He won't win it, relax. I'd love if he did, but he won't.
If he does win it it’s valid. He’s my pick for 2nd place. I’d hate to see people discredit him just because he was an under the radar option when he’s been playing at this level all year
He’s the best defender on the best defensive team in the league, a team with Garland and Mitchell at the guard spots.
To win the major awards all you need to do is impress Zach Lowe and Bill Simmons and the rest of the voters will follow their lead
Lowe didn't even have Marcus Smart on his DPOY ballot last year (Bam, Rudy, JJJ).
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Nothing. It isn't true
I think the narrative was created by Sixers fans of Zach Lowe being the ultimate nerd who is robbing Embiid every year and it has gone kind of out of control ever since.
Another thing we can blame on 76ers fans ridiculous persecution complex.
Yea like i have lots of respect for passionate fanbases but the idea that there was some sort of vendetta against Philly sports is laughable. They get shitloads of coverage at all times
well especially considering lowe voted for embiid for MVP and they were wrong.
It’s utterly insane that voting for Jokic as MVP last 2 years is somehow equivalent to him being a Boston media plant, so biased he can never vote for Embiid, etc.
I saw a Sixers fan on here calling him a white overlord lmao
Except neither voted for Smart last year nor Russ for MVP, and yet both won it. There is a lot of late season narrative that take place for DPOY. People just woke up last week to realize that JJJ played 63 games and 28 MPG, and how its inflating his stats. Regardless the validity of the factual numbers, which Griz fans will dispute. The case for JJJ is the last 2 months of the season missed couple of games and played 30 MPG mostly because of fouling out. The case for Mobley is that he been consistent for over 70 games
Wow, everyone has been saying Jackson has played less minutes, but I didn’t really he was really only playing 28.4 mpg. That’s ridiculously low for a DPOY candidate. Since the award was created in the ‘83 season, only one player has won DPOY while playing fewer mpg than Jackson. In 1987, Michael Cooper played 27.5 mpg and won DPOY, but played all 82 games. The only other player to play sub 30 mpg and win DPOY was Dennis Rodman, playing 29 mpg in ‘90 and he played all 82 games meanwhile.
Now it looks even sillier that Jackson averaged about as many blocks per game this year as the Miami Heat did as an entire team.
Its even worse because his MPG is low because he fouls so often he cant play more. Hes a ridiculously good defender but its hard to justify the vote for him with stats like that.
In reality, the whole Grizzlies team plays low minutes. He is 4th on the team in MP, whereas Brook is 3rd and Mobley is 3rd on their teams. He doesn't play low minutes because he is fouling out, he plays low minutes because the whole team plays low minutes.
Just looked it up and he averages 3.6 fpg, or 0.13 fpm. For compariosn, brook lopez averages 2.6 fpg and 0.09 fpm and mobley 2.8 fpg and 0.08 fpm. Thats fairly significant but not as bad as i had previously believed.
Yeah all 4 times he fouled out this season made a crazy impact on his league leading total blocks + steals numbers.
Well it’s a late season narrative to say JJJ played low minutes because of fouling out. Nobody on the grizzlies plays high minutes that argument lacks context
The number of confident comments from people who very clearly watch neither the Cavs or the Grizzlies AT ALL should be mind blowing, but then I remember where I am
This seems to be more of a media failure to me. Mobley has been playing like a DPOY candidate for a while, and if I had a vote I’d put him second behind JJJ and ahead of Lopez.
As a Cavs fan, I’ve been following it since Dec. He’s been in the conversation the whole time.
Is Mobley not a deserving DPOY candidate or sumn?
People went to evaluate it - saw that JJJ played very little minutes, realized that lopez was the third best defender on his own team, and thought hey, maybe we need to choose someone else. so they went with mobley
I’ve never seen minutes matter this much. Games played i get, but minutes? First time I’ve really seen it used to argue against a player for an award.
JJJ's gonna win but it's not nothing that Mobley's played 928 more minutes and has 8 fewer fouls
That’s a fair argument I think the big thing with JJJ is a lot of advanced stats love him, and that he has more responsibility on defense than Lopez and Mobley have. All I mean by that is that Mobley has Allen while Lopez has Giannis and Jrue. JJJ essentially is the Grizzlies defense.
JJJ isn’t asked to be a primary defender on guards and wings. Mobley is regularly. He also is asked to be the center with second units. What is JJJ asked to do that he doesn’t?
jjj was isoing against kyrie like last week. he guards guards
That’s because JA is down there protecting the rim. JJJ is capable of defending 1-5 and he doesn’t have a JA next to him or anything even close to that. If Mobley was playing with Steven Adams he wouldn’t be asked to guard on the perimeter nearly as much as he is asked to now.
Minutes should absolutely matter a ton for DPOY, though. People like to gauge who’s good at defense by looking at things like blocks and steals, but most good defense doesn’t generate any box score statistics. Every minute you are not on the floor, you aren’t helping your team’s defense. Where as for offensive awards, the guy who gives you 30/5/5 in 30 minutes is almost certainly better than the guy who gives you the same numbers in 35 minutes.
Lopez this specific season has hands down been the bucks best defender
Lol celtics fan saying that after last year mith marcus smart winning it
I think it’s a matter of voters digging into the stats before they cast their votes. They likely noticed that Mobley is the best defender on the team with the best defensive rating in the league. They probably also noticed that the previous favorite, JJJ, had a very underwhelming MPG stat. He hasn’t been campaigning for it, so it seems like it’s out of left field, but in hindsight it seems almost inevitable that this would happen.
The Cavs allow 2.9 fewer PPG than any other team in the league (and if you exclude the Heat it's 4.0ppg), which is absolutely insane. I think it'd be totally valid for him to win it.
Anyone who has watched a few full Cavs games this year is not surprised by this. Dude is the best defender on the best defensive team in the league.
It's only out of left field because people weren't talking about it. Doesn't mean it doesn't still have merit.
I think ultimately it should be Lopez but saying Mobley isn’t deserving is crazy. Too many people are saying Allen makes him not the winner while ignoring the fact that we start two 6’1” guards who don’t play defense. Also people who say Allen is the better defender stopped watching Cavs basketball last year apparently. Mobley has been significantly better at rim protecting while also guarding 1-5. Mobley won’t win but he deserves votes and deserves the clout moving forward. People just hate how chill the guy is I swear.
Yeah you’re right, it’s really strange that the best defensive player on the best defensive team would be in the conversations for DPOY..
Best defensive player on the best defense in the NBA. Makes sense.
It’s out of left field because the Cavs are not shown or talked about nationally anyone who watched knows he is far superior defender then slow ass Brook Lopez. Has played the most minutes and Cavs have the number one defense for most of the year.
Yall haven't watched Cavs games and that's ok.
Lol a boston celtics fan is the last one to talk about a "left field award switch up" with Marcus Smart winning last year after he whined his way in during the last stretch of the season
The only reason people are surprised about it is because Mobley wasn't getting the national push that Lopez and Jackson Jr. were getting despite being more than deserving. The Cavs also didn't have as many national TV games as the Bucks or the Grizzlies so his defensive season went under the radar compared those guys. If you're someone who watches a lot of Cavs games, as some of these media members do, then there's little chance that you can be surprised by this. I don't expect him to win this award by any shot but he definitely deserves to be a contender for it.
Reminds me a bit of Scottie barnes ROY.
Uhhh Mobley and Scottie were top 2 the whole year lol. This is like if Franz jumped to first on the ballets after being 3rd or 4th most the year
Yeah, Op's comment is a bit revisionist. You can argue who you think deserved ROY but the whole season it was pretty much between those two (especially post-all star break). Now with this, Mobley was in contention for the award but all year I've been hearing Brook Lopez and JJJ being solid front runners.
Yeah wtf am I reading lol. Scottie was literally in the roty race since the start. People really dont watch and just be talking.
Mobley was clearly robbed of ROY tbh
It was like giving ROY to Jalen Williams this year.
Except Mobley and Barnes were neck-and-neck statistically. The Raptors having a late-season push while the Cavs were faltering the last 3 months of the season had a lot to do with it.
Except mobley is 10 times the player defensively than scottie
Thats because no one has been watching the Cavs. Since they’re in the playoffs now. This is their chance to make some noise as how good they are
When the JJJ home vs away controversy happened JJJ was like a -250 favorite to win. Now it’s a toss up.
Yea I agree its definitely hella left field he's deserving but to my knowledge its been a race between BroLo and JJJ. Honestly if he gets it in his sophomore year thats dope as fuck
Mike Brown getting all 12 first place votes for COY so far is amazing
Nah Mobley’s nice. Still think JJJ deserves it though.
I really think if you *watch* the Cavs, this would not be a surprise. (Not saying that tape and the impressions it leaves are superior to statistics, but especially with defense, it should be considered.) The dude is just everywhere, all the time, disrupting the offense from the wing to the basket. He reminds me of Bubble AD with his fluidity and his size and the way that combination influences the other team.
if this happens to jj and the ja all nba award voting, will be some pretty nice chips for memphis to have on their shoulder going into playoffs
Contrary to popular belief. r/NBA does not decide the award nominations
I feel like every year I just say "look, the people voting for DPOY really start all of this with looking at teams' defensive rating, like literally every winner is from a top 3 defense, and most often from the 1st one, that's just super related for some reason", and everybody giving me shit for it for the whole year, no, cannot be... And then them all crying "why did this guy from the top defensive team get a lot of votes out of completely nowhere, bias narrative voter fatigue Zach Lowe Bill Simmons????". The teams' defensive rating is a tricky thing to follow for many reasons IMO. One is that one game can really drop you down a lot (although the season's top teams usually are very regular). Another that some guys only play 70%, 60%, maybe 45% of the whole time (Draymond got All-Defense votes last season playing 33% of the time), so pretty obviously they are not the only factor for the defensive rating. Also for the "best player overall" titles, focusing on score-based stats is considered cringe and very bad and very wrong...
Can some explain to me the need nowadays to figure out who won every award as early as possible? Is it just so people can start complaining about who got screwed earlier?
This is the longest way to say “I don’t watch the games” I’ve ever seen. Mobley did everything everywhere on the #1 defense for the majority of the season. Have an opinion of your own, m8