Regular season awards

It's been a few days since i've posted, sorry about that, i've been a bit busy with some things. so i'm going to give my predictions for all the regular season awards: MVP, ROY, COY, MIP & DPY.
MVP-
Kobe Bryant, hands down, has been the most important player on his team, except LeBron James, but i'm excluding him because of missed games. Kobe has trusted his teammates this year, gotten them involved, and now Jordan Farmar, Ronny Turiaf, and Sasha Vujacic all look like promising young guys. Andrew Bynum and Luke Walton were already in the middle-ground area, and Kobe has trusted them to score, rebound, pass and work the offense. Kobe's been mature, active and deserves every bit of that MVP trophy. Runner up: Chris Paul

ROY-
My interpretation of ROY is that everything is about stats: minutes, points, assists, and rebounds. the basics, essentially. Kevin Durant is averaging more points than any other rookie by 7.5, more minutes by 3.2, 3rd in assists, and a not-so-impressive 10th in rebounding. He's had more activity on his team than any other rookie in the league. he deserves it. Runner up: Al Horford

COY-
Byron Scott deserves Coach of the year because he's taken a mediocre team and turned them into an elite team. Chris Paul makes them a mediocre to a good team, and Byron Scott makes them elite. CP3 gets credit for most of the offense, but the credit for being ranked 5th in the league in defensive efficiency goes completely to Coach Scott, which is a big reason they win games and are going to end up in the top 2 of the regular season. Runner up: Maurice Cheeks

MIP-
This is one of the hardest awards to judge because what is most improved? if it's a comeback player, it's hedo turkoglu, if its improved since the all star break, it's Leon Powe, who was used as a if we're up or down by 20 points with less than a minute left player to when can we get this guy on the floor player. But, the award goes to Rudy Gay who is averaging about 10 more points and 2 more rebounds than last year plus he's shooting 4% better with 7 more attempts per night. he shoots from the FT line 7% better, making at least 1 more a game, and has started every single game playing 10 more minutes per contest than last year. Runner up: Hedo Turkoglu

DPY-
Kevin Garnett has taken the Celtics and become a defensive beat. The Celtics are defensive oriented, and hands down have the best defense in the league. The spurs & pistons, who have been known for defense in the past, have been nowhere near where the Celtics have been. Averaging 1.2 blocks and 7.4 DRebounds, Kevin Garnett has exploded to give the Celtics this amazing season. Runner up: Shane Battier

There you go ladies and gentleman, let's see what the "experts" say at the end of the regular season, but these are my awards. congrats to those mentioned.

First Clinchings in the West

In honor of the first 2 clinchings in the west, I would like to congratulate the Hornets and Lakers, who I would love to see meet in the Western Conference Finals this year, however I doubt this circumstance due to the fact that the Hornets have ZER0 playoff experience together. The Hornets clinched last night after narrowly defeating the New York Knicks 118-110 after scoring 8 more points over the knicks in the 4th quarter alone, while the Lakers came back from being down 10 at halftime to defeat the Mavericks 112-108. ESPN columnist J.A Adande wrote recently that if the Hornets win the west, Coach Scott deserves Coach of the Year, when many people are saying the same thing about Chris Paul, but please everybody: be reasonable. The Hornets have been great this year, but the MVP and COY should not come from the same team, there have just been too many great players and coaches this year to award one team: especially the one that just hosted the All Star game.

ESPN hatred

How racist of ESPN to post such a derogatory image of Isiah Thomas! He isn't the best GM ever, possibly one of the worst GM's to ever walk the planet, but when ESPN decides to post an African American man in the dark and have Donnie Walsh, a complete white person (if you couldn't notice) in the light as if he's the savior of the very African populated New York City, I can't bear to look. I am disgusted at how there is still racial prejudice in such a prestigious company as ESPN and such a well known organization as the NBA. Isiah Thomas needs to stick up for his rights and complain to ESPN about racial prejudice because this whole situation has gone too far. Maybe MSG can earn some of the money back that Isiah Thomas lost in his sexual assault case by suing ESPN for racial prejudice. If he did that, and resigned as the Knicks coach, the terrible situation he put the knicks in could be resolved. If Donnie Walsh does his job well, he'll make note of this picture, and tell Isiah that he'll either be fired or he can take one for the team and earn MSG some more money to spend on players and renovations. Before this picture, I was extremely excited about Donnie being hired, but now i'm afraid it will just be a place for white players to come in and be surrounded by a bunch of white things because that's what white people do. Isiah Thomas has done one thing right: he's kept in the black players out of all fairness and equality. Thank you Isiah.

NBA standings

Best under 23

In spite of the roundtable of espn columnists saying who the best players under 23 are, I decided to make my own under-23 list. this is the article:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?page=Under23-Intro

1. Obviously, LeBron James. Argueably the best player on the planet right now, it's fair to say that he's the best under 23.
2. Chris Paul. He's a beast if he wants to score, and a beast if he wants to get 1000 assists every night.
3. Dwight "superman" Howard. poor shaq getting his superman reign taken from him, but the best big man in the league right now can grab 20 rebounds and if you're building a franchise, big men have proven to be helpful.
4. Carmelo Anthony. He's a great scorer, and you can't put Raja Bell or Bruce Bowen on him anymore-he'll tear them up. his rebounding stats have gone up too in the past couple years
5. Deron Williams. Behing CP3, he's battling for the second best PG in the league, and the high pick and roll he has with Boozer is one of the most single best plays in the league right now.
6. Andrew Bynum. The beast on the Lakers is proving himself better than Jason Kidd and Bryant should agree. Bynum will average 20/10 a night next year easily.
7. Kevin Durant. I'm not sold on Durant, but he's a scorer and will probably get ROY award
8. Brandon Roy. The underserving all star led a team to 16 straight W's which is impressive for anybody, especially a team many thought would struggle without Oden under their belt.
9. Monta Ellis. I'm waiting for him to break Bryant's scoring record and going for 90, but that won't happen for a few years. He's not a spectacular defender, but his offensive skills are too good to overlook
10. Al Jefferson. In 2 years, he should be an all star, and if the T-Wolves can land a good scorer like O.J Mayo or Eric Gordon to play the 2, Big Al could lead this team to an 8th seeded playoff spot in 2 or 3 years.

I left Oden out because i've seen him play in one game: Florida vs. Ohio State national championship and I can't determine his NBA play by one game.