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Sunday 9 May 2021 12:04, UK
Brooklyn Nets coach Steve Nash is in no doubt about who should win the NBA Most Valuable Player award this season.
Nash, who won the MVP award in 2005 and 2006 while running the point for the Phoenix Suns, led his Nets team to a 125-119 win over Jokic's Denver Nuggets team on Saturday night.
During the game, the Serbian scored 29 points, grabbed seven boards and dished out six assists.
The versatility in his game makes him a triple-double threat on a nightly basis, and he is averaging 26.4 points per game, 10.8 rebounds per game and 8.5 assists per game (per NBA stats).
Even more impressive than the numbers, though, is that the Nuggets still look like contenders despite the team's second best player, Jamal Murray, suffering a season-ending knee injury.
"Clearly, I think Jokic is the MVP this year," Nash said. "He's kind of gone wire-to-wire at this high level. He makes his teammates better and everything go. They lose Jamal Murray and they haven't really skipped a beat. That shows how good he is."
And Nash, an all-time great facilitator who recorded 10,335 assists in his Hall of Fame career, is impressed with how Jokic's prodigious passing and court vision functions as the fuel to make the rest of the Nuggets offense – which is rated sixth in offensive rating with the fifth-best assist ratio – work as a whole.
"He's such a willing and contagious passer. He can make the assist, but he can also make the right read. It becomes the hockey assist where the ball moves to one or two guys down the line, and they get open shots. He facilitates that style of play and that willingness to pass. He's able to knock down that first domino."
Jokic is favourite with the bookmakers to win the award after finishing ninth in MVP voting last season and fourth the year before.
The latest KIA MVP ladder, released earlier this week, saw him tighten his stranglehold on the top spot in the race and injuries to Joel Embiid and LeBron James appear to have made him the runaway leader for the award.
In a matchup against the New York Knicks and fellow MVP candidate Julius Randle on Wednesday, Jokic wasted no time establishing dominance by racking up a career-high 24 points in the opening quarter. Jokic connected on a scorching 8-for-9 showing from the floor and 8-for-10 from the free-throw line as Denver built an early 24-point lead en route to a 113-97 win.
He finished the game with 32 points, 12 rebounds and six assists, as well as two steals and two blocks in only 29 minutes. Dominant.
Although the Nuggets have suffered defeats to the NBA-leading Jazz and the Nets in the two games since, Jokic performed to his usual high standard. It's also worth mentioning that as well long-term absentee Murray, Denver are without another starter and their sixth man as well in Monte Morris (hamstring) and Will Barton (hamstring).
Jokic himself, who also leads in the league in double-doubles with 57 in 68 games, refuses to address questions of whether he believes he is deserving of MVP honours but Nuggets coach Michael Malone is nowhere near as coy.
"My argument of why Nikola is the MVP, for us to do what we have done, with all the injuries - especially to your second-best player (Jamal Murray) - really speaks to the impact that Nikola has in every facet of the game," Malone said.
"Offense, defense, leadership, culture, or whatever you want to call it. We've been able to weather the storm because of how well Nikola has played and his ability to make everyone around him better.
"For us to be doing what we're doing, you have to have a great player, and we have that."
