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Oklahoma City Thunder: Midseason Team Awards

By Jake Fielder

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May 25, 2014; Oklahoma City, OK, USA; Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook (0) goes up for a dunk against the San Antonio Spurs in game three of the Western Conference Finals of the 2014 NBA Playoffs at Chesapeake Energy Arena. Oklahoma City won 106-97. Mandatory Credit: Alonzo Adams-USA TODAY Sports

Most Valuable Player: Russell Westbrook

Honorable Mention: Kevin Durant

This was almost as tough as deciding Rookie of the Year, but for totally opposite reasons. Despite the fact that both Durant and Westbrook have missed significant time this year, their value to the team was only further reinforced during their time off. Ultimately, it’s hard to go against the current reigning MVP…but if you’ve watched even a second of Russ this year, you know why we had to be the one.

Westbrook is averaging an absurd 25.1/7.4/6.1/2.3 line and has just been absolutely obliterating opposing defenses. Only 10 players have recorded a triple double this season, Russ being one of them. His triple double line? A 17/17/15/4 masterpiece against the Golden State Warriors.

Point guards shouldn’t be able to do things like that. Heck, human beings shouldn’t be able to do things like that. Fortunately for Oklahoma City, Russell Westbrook is hardly human.

If you polled all of Oklahoma City, you probably wouldn’t get Russ as the unanimous choice, if he was the choice at all. He still has questionable shot selection and makes some head-scratching cross court turnovers. I’m sure everyone can think of a time where Russ probed the defense all the way to block, attempted to kick out all the way back to the top of the key, only for the pass to hit the opposing team’s power forward square in the chest.

However, Westbrook’s good more than makes up for the bad. As Grantland’s Bill Simmons puts it, Russ is the ultimate 90/10 player. 10% of what he does is mind numbingly errant but the other 90% of excellence that we’ve all grown accustomed to more than makes up for it. Whether it’s from one of his ferocious dunks or his tenacious, honey badger defense, Westbrook has been about as excellent as a NBA player could possibly be.

There’s no question that he’s been the team’s most valuable player and as the season rolls on, he may be interjecting himself more and more into the overall MVP race.

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