Last season Kevin Durant prevented LeBron James from winning this third straight MVP award. The Spurs prevented ‘Bron from taking home his third straight NBA championship. This season, James is the overwhelming favorite to win MVP (5/6), and the Cavs are the favorites to win the title (5/2). But who is the best bet to win the MVP award based off the odds? We got you covered.
Quick preface: It goes without saying, but gambling is restricted in the United States, so make sure you’re not breaking the law before putting your money down.
Right now you can bet $6 to win $5 if James takes home the Maurice Podoloff trophy. So, like Tiger Woods before his marriage dissolved on that fateful Thanksgiving, LeBron is favored over the rest of the field.
While you might wanna play it safe and bet on LeBron, what fun is that — especially when you consider the skimpy payout you’ll receive should he win it for the fifth time in his career?
Without further ado, here are the top 3 best bets for MVP, which is to say these are terrific odds for the player(s) in question:
3. TIE Kevin Durant (4/1) – Russell Westbrook (12/1)
You can quadruple your bet simply by putting some cash down on KD to repeat as MVP. This isn’t as crazy as it sounds even though KD will be missing the first month of the season (at least) with a Jones fracture. He’s at the top of his game, and he didn’t play for Team USA in Spain, so he’s at least partially rested. True, without much of training camp or the preseason to shake the rust off, Durantula could take a while to get into MVP form. But, what if the Thunder stumble out of the gate without their best player, and then he comes back to lead them to the top seed in the West? That’s an MVP narrative that could gain traction in the latter portion of the season, too, when players have been known to surge ahead in MVP talk. If there’s anything we’ve learned over the years with the media voting on these awards, it’s that nothing is as irresistible to a media member with a MVP vote than an archetypal story arc that’ll make easy copy for them to file.
Conversely, if the Thunder rattle off a historic winning streak in the first month without KD, then Russ is going to get pegged as the front-runner by a lot of media reps. All he has to do then is keep winning when Durant comes back. He’ll also have to keep his assist tally high to assuage those cantankerous older media members who think he’s ill-suited to lead the Thunder as their point guard. Traditionalists still get votes for the MVP, so sharing the ball with KD and his teammates will have to take priority, but if Russ can start strong and act as a partner with KD when he comes back, he could possibly sneak in for the win under the star shares the ball for the betterment of the team trope.
2. Kobe Bryant (30/1)
The story writes itself. This also doubles as a wet dream for Laker fans, but Kobe might somehow shoulders the burden of being a marked man on a terrible defensive team without much star wattage. If he also gets the 2014-15 Lakers into the playoffs, some will vote him as No. 1. Also, there’s been a tendency to retroactively award players an MVP award if they weren’t properly compensated with hardware earlier in their careers. Kobe has one MVP to his name, which is crazy when you remember his current teammate, Steve Nash, has two. One MVP award for Kobe Bryant doesn’t seem right, and we’re guessing there are a lot of media members who feel the same way. If Mamba somehow leads this Lakers incarnation to a playoff berth in one of the most stacked conferences in recent NBA history, then he might even get our vote (though we highly doubt he’ll do any of those things).
Click to see which player is the best bet to make for MVP…
1. Anthony Davis (25/1)
You can watch his performance last night against a Rockets team without Dwight Howard, read his former Wildcats coach wax poetic about him becoming the best player in the world, read Nene‘s apt video game comparison, hear about his added strength, or listen to the current NBA MVP proclaim Brow as “the next in line.” These are astounding odds when you consider how good he keeps getting.
(All odds via Bovada; H/T Los Angeles Times)
Who is the smartest BET to win the MVP award?
Follow Spencer on Twitter at @SpencerTyrel.
Follow Dime on Twitter at @DimeMag.
Become a fan of Dime Magazine on Facebook HERE.
