Sport
LeBron James awarded 2013 MVP award
LeBron James (c) receives the 2013 MVP trophy. PHOTO/jesse D. Garrabrant/Getty Images
LeBron James was named the 2013 Most Valuable Player (MVP) on Sunday May 5. This is the fourth time he has won the award during his career.
James became the fifth player with at least four MVP awards, joining Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Michael Jordan, Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain.
He averaged 26.8 points, 8.0 rebounds and 7.3 assists this season, shooting a career-best 56 percent. It was absolutely no surprise that he won the award, and given the timetable for Miami’s next game — the Heat don’t open Eastern Conference semifinal play until Monday night against Brooklyn or Chicago.
James won the award in 2009 and 2010, only got four first-place votes in 2011, his first season with the Miami Heat, then reclaimed the award last season.
“The other day I was sitting there with him, a week or two ago and it dawned on me,” Heat guard Dwyane Wade told reporters. “I said to him, ‘Do you know you’re about to get four MVPs in five years?’ And he’s like, ‘Man, I’m just a kid from Akron.’ He could have gotten five in five. You know how crazy that is? This is crazy.”
The “kid from Akron” has truly entered rarefied air now.
James finally got his first NBA championship last season, followed that up by helping the U.S. win a gold medal at the London Olympics, and then vowed to come back this season even better.
“We’re all in unison: We think he has earned it,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “He has had an even more historic season than last year. The beauty of that, if he does in fact earn it, is the fact that probably most people didn’t necessarily think he could go to a different level, a higher level, after last season. Yet he reinvented himself and showed that he could.”
James’ effective field goal percentage – a metric that takes into account 3-pointers being worth more than 2-point shots, this season was a career-best 60.3 percent, and he shot just over 40 percent from 3-point range, another career mark. The league handed out six Eastern Conference player-of-the-month awards this season, and James won five of them.
“There’s not a better player in the NBA than LeBron and he should win every year,” Boston Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. “There are guys who had great years. Carmelo’s had an amazing year and so has Durant. But there’s no one that’s had the year that LeBron has when you figuring in rebounding, defense, everything, passing. And we’re going to be saying that until someone else comes along and takes the mantle. I don’t see that happening.”
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press