Most Improved Player of the First Trimester
Wesley Matthews, Portland Trail Blazers
Can't remember a season where so many of my colleagues have tossed elite names into the MIP discussion. Also can't blame 'em.
Just to name a few: Chicago's Derrick Rose, Oklahoma City's Russell Westbrook, Memphis' Rudy Gay and, of course, Minnesota's Kevin Love.
So many of the kiddies from last summer's Team USA squad have made such noticeable strides, as detailed here recently, that it's tough to be a stickler about our usual policy suggesting that top-five picks like the Fab Four above aren't so much improving as they are developing at the rate you'd expect and demand from guys drafted in franchise-player territory.
Yet I still struggle to stifle my inner romantic when the MIP debate starts, especially so early in the season. Significant production that we didn't see coming? Always gets me in Trimester 1.
The list, furthermore, is plenty long even if you exclude the deserving likes of Love, whose bid to become the first 20-and-15 man since Moses Malone in 1982-83 -- while also solidifying himself as a floor-stretching threat who makes 43.2 percent of 3s -- is undeniably hard to resist. Let's be real: Love is the first guy since Dennis Rodman, with apologies to Ben Wallace, to make board work cool enough for regular "SportsCenter" run.
Arguments can likewise be made for any and all of the following: Utah's Paul Millsap, New York's Raymond Felton and Wilson Chandler, Golden State's Dorell Wright, Dallas' DeShawn Stevenson, Washington's JaVale McGee, Philadelphia's Jrue Holiday, Indiana's Roy Hibbert (at least until his December dip), Denver's Arron Afflalo and Eric Gordon of the Los Angeles Clippers ... who has responded to his perceived snub from yours truly and the high standards laid out in the aforementioned Team USA piece by shooting 43 percent on 3s in December and playing the best all-around ball of his life.
(Minnesota's Michael Beasley and Atlanta's Al Horford, for the record, are two more upper-crust draftees who are deservedly in the conversation with all the potential MIPs mentioned already.)
However ...
Some slight recent slippage from Matthews can't keep me from singling him out of this crowded group. The five-year, $34 million contract he snagged from the Blazers in the summer, which so many of us loudly questioned at the time, made total sense by Christmas thanks to the undrafted Matthews' fearlessness and productivity when asked by Portland to do some of the things Brandon Roy's knees aren't letting him do these days.
The responsibility Matthews has been forced to shoulder for a franchise in crisis has been immense. Had to find a way to recognize his largely unforeseen ability to handle all that, as evidenced by his 15.4 points in 31.3 minutes per game.
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