The nominees for the NBA’s season-long awards were revealed on Monday night, and there weren’t many major surprises. Nikola Jokic was nominated for the MVP Award, as he vies to win for the fourth time in his career against Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Giannis Antetokounmpo.
Jokic also got a nod in the category of Clutch Player of the Year, where he was nominated along with Jalen Brunson and Anthony Edwards. Seeing Jokic honored with these nominations is just another day at the office for him, and nothing was shocking about this at all. We know he’ll have a solid chance to win each award and will certainly be first-team All-NBA.
But it was somewhat disappointing to see that no other Nuggets were honored by making the top three for any of the other awards. They weren’t expected to dominate awards season, and most of the complementary players to Jokic had pretty pedestrian seasons, but there was one player who deserved some love.
Christian Braun should have been nominated for Most Improved Player
Christian Braun put together a great season in Denver, his first as a starter. He was promoted to the starting lineup after the departure of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, and he rose to the occasion, at least doubling his stats across the board while taking on a large defensive role.
Braun stepped it up big time, averaging 15.4 points, 5.2 rebounds, and 2.6 assists per game. He did that with shooting splits of 58/40/83 and was one of the best transition players in all of basketball. His stability and production were big reasons why the Nuggets were able to tread water all season and stay in the mix for a top seed in the Western Conference.
But apparently, that wasn’t enough for Braun to be recognized as one of the final nominees for the league’s Most Improved Player Award. Braun made a massive leap in his third year, playing almost 14 more minutes per game and being better in just about every possible way night in and night out for a contending team.
The three players nominated were Cade Cunningham of the Pistons, Ivica Zubac of the Clippers, and Dyson Daniels of the Hawks. All of those players are great and have made big leaps, but Cunningham and Zubac were already very good. Cade and Dyson were lottery picks, expected to be stars in the league.
Braun was a late first-round pick who had to fight for minutes in the league and has now earned a major role on a team with title aspirations. If that’s not a great story of year-to-year improvement in the NBA, I’m not sure what is.