James Harden had a rough ending to the postseason, but his regular season effort was enough to nudge him just above other potential MVP candidates in a significant category.
Harden was the only unanimous first team All-NBA selection, the league announced on Thursday. The Houston Rockets point guard earned a perfect 500 points, making every voter’s first team squad, the third time in the last four seasons he’s been given first team honors.
Also appearing on the first team with Harden is LeBron James, who matched an NBA record with his 11th first team selection. Karl Malone and Kobe Bryant are the only other players in league history to have as many first team appearances.
Oklahoma City guard Russell Westbrook got 99 first team votes along with LeBron James and made the team for the second time in his career. You have to wonder who didn’t vote for Russ and James on the top team, as one had a statistically outstanding regular season and the other is the game’s most dominant player.
San Antonio Spurs forward Kawhi Leonard (96 First Team votes, 490 points) and New Orleans Pelicans center Anthony Davis (45 First Team votes, 343 points) round out the first team, their second time making the list each. Here’s the list in full.
James Harden, Houston
LeBron James, Cleveland
Russell Westbrook, Oklahoma City
Kawhi Leonard, San Antonio
Anthony Davis, New Orleans
The battle for the fifth spot was close between Davis and Utah’s Rudy Gobert, as the Pelicans star also got 34 second team and 16 third team votes. Here’s the second team list:
Rudy Gobert, Utah
Stephen Curry, Golden State
Giannis Antetokounmpo, Milwaukee
Kevin Durant, Golden State
Isaiah Thomas, Boston
Stephen Curry netted his fourth All-NBA selection on Thursday, while forward Kevin Durant made his seventh All-NBA list. Perhaps surprisingly, Gobert got 43 first-team votes, the most out of any player not on the top list. Not everyone, however, thought the Jazz forward should be on the list at all.
Rudy Gobert over Paul G and Gordon..they should pick the teams according to who is really nice and had a good year and not based on stats.
— Baron Davis (@BaronDavis) May 18, 2017
The third team is as follows:
Draymond Green, Golden State
John Wall, Washington
Jimmy Butler, Chicago
DeMar DeRozan, Toronto
DeAndre Jordan, LA Clippers
Cury, Durant, Green, and Jordan all got a few first-team votes, but as always there were some surprising picks for first-team honors as well. Karl-Anthony Towns, Marc Gasol and DeMarcus Cousins got two votes each, while Nikola Jokic managed to get a vote.
Perhaps the most notable thing about these teams, however, is who isn’t on them.
With Paul George, Gordon Hayward left off All-NBA teams, Pacers and Jazz lose chance to re-sign them to 5-year, $207M super-max contracts.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) May 18, 2017
That sets up an interesting offseason for sure. But first we have the rest of NBA awards season to get through. The list of finalists for all the important awards comes out Friday, May 19 on TNT at 7 p.m. ET.
