Denver Nuggets: Where do they stand in award races?

Most Improved Player Candidates: Jamal Murray and Malik Beasley

While they are both long shots to grab the award, Beasley and Murray are probably the Nuggets’ best candidates to snatch the prize. Let’s start with Murray.

Jamal Murray

While it isn’t fair to say Murray is having a disappointing season, he probably hasn’t lived up to most people’s expectations.

He was ranked as by NBA GMs before the start of the year as the player most likely to have a breakout year, and while he is still having a great season by pretty much every standard, his 2018-19 stats don’t pop off the page as much as some may have expected them to.

2017-18 Stats: 31.7 MPG,16.7 PPG, 3.7 RPG, 3.4 APG, 45.1% FG%, 37.8% 3P%, 2.1 TOPG

2018-19 Stats: 33.8 MPG, 18.8 PPG, 4.5 RPG, 4.9 APG, 43.3% FG%, 36.0% 3P%, 2.4 TOPG

Difference: + 2.1 MPG, +2.1 PPG, +0.8 RPG, +1.5 APG, -1.8% FG%, -1.8% 3P%, +0.3 TOPG

While he has healthily improved his points and assists per game averages, Murray hasn’t done enough else to warrant really even being considered for the award.

In many advanced categories, he has actually been worse than last season.

He has a lower TS%, OBPM, BPM, STL%, FTr, 3PAr, and PER, as well as fewer WS/48. Barring a significant improvement across the final 37 games, Murray will not even be among the top-10 candidates.

However, that doesn’t mean that he’s having a bad season; if anything it means he should have been considered for the award last year.

He currently has the 17th best odds at MIP according to Oddschecker.

Malik Beasley

Beasley is certainly a sleeper pick for the award, but he should definitely be in consideration.

2017-18 Stats: 9.4 MPG, 3.2 PPG, 1.1 RPG, 0.5 APG, 41.0% FG%, 34.1% 3P%, 0.4 TOPG

2018-19 Stats: 23.1 MPG, 10.3 PPG, 2.6 RPG, 1.2 APG, 48.4% FG%, 42.0% 3P%, 0.6 TOPG

Difference: +13.7 MPG, +7.1 PPG, +1.5 RPG, +0.7 APG, +7.4% FG%, +7.9% 3P%, +0.2 TOPG

His turnaround in his shooting alone should warrant him some looks from the voting committee. He went from a solidly mediocre 3-point shooter to one of the best in the league(17th best 3P% in the NBA as of 1/22/19).

His presence beyond the arc has been huge for the Nuggets this year as the bigger names on the team like Murray, Jokic, and Gary Harris have often struggled from 3-point range this season(average 34.3% 3P% among those 3 this season).

He has become an important part of the rotation recently, with all 7 of his starts this season coming in January. This month so far, he has averaged 14.0 PPG, 2.9 RPG, and 1.7 APG while slashing 54.5/47.0/100.

While those numbers probably aren’t sustainable for the rest of the season as players like Will Barton, Gary Harris, and Isaiah Thomas return to full health, if Beasley keeps shooting the ball well and putting up double digits in the points category every night, he should not only become a candidate for MIP but he will deserve to earn national recognition as one of the better role players in the league.

Beasley currently doesn’t have odds for MIP as far as I know, but that may change as the season goes on.

(Note: Monte Morris would have made this list; however, he featured in just 3 games last season for a total of 25 minutes, so this is essentially his rookie year. It simply isn’t realistic for Morris to win MIP based on the limited minutes he played last season.)

The Nuggets have several candidates who could potentially be in consideration for the award, but they are far from having any favorites to etch their name on a trophy, at least for now. However, these are not the awards the Nuggets should be focused on right now.

The team needs to be pouring their heart and soul into every game to make sure they grab a top-4 seed in the West.

They currently look like they have the best chance to take down the Warriors in the Western Conference(at least until Houston gets healthy), and they can’t have any distractions along the way like stat-padding for trivial individual awards.

The OKC Thunder have already seen how that can damage a season and playoff aspirations.