OKC Thunder superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander has been playing at an astonishingly high level throughout these first few months of the 2024-25 season but has managed to up his game even more over the past few weeks.
Since December 3, the 26-year-old has been arguably the best and most dominant two-way player in all of the NBA, sporting sensational averages of 32.8 points, 5.9 rebounds, 5.5 assists, 2.4 steals, and 1.5 blocks on 55.7 percent shooting from the floor.
His on-court production has had plenty of residual effects such as him earning the league's latest Western Conference Player of the Week honor and Oklahoma City's ongoing 11-game winning streak.
However, quite possibly the most exciting impact his recent efforts have had relates directly to his standing in this year's MVP race, as the star's stock has risen to a point where he now leads all candidates in odds to take home the illustrious honor at +125, per FanDuel.
Though many basketball fans residing in and out of Thunder nation may view this rise in favoritism as highly deserving, plenty of naysayers out there still find their MVP allegiance elsewhere.
NBC's Drew Dinsick is one of these individuals, as the sports analyst described the guard's candidacy as a bit of a sham on a recent episode of Bet the Edge.
OKC Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander's MVP claim labeled 'flimsy'
"For me, at least, it's who deserves it. It's pretty obviously Jokic... SGA's candidacy is a little flimsy," Dinsick said.
Later on in the episode, Dinsick would elaborate further on his reasoning for why he'd put Jokic and even Giannis Antetokounmpo ahead of Gilgeous-Alexander on his personal MVP leaderboard, stating that people could realistically make the case that "I guess Shai should be favored... but these guys who are second and third are better players they're just not on as good of a team."
Now, outside of record, Dinsick's narrative about how the Thunder are the better team compared to both the Nuggets and Bucks is a tad bit subjective.
Frankly, from a technical standpoint, OKC should be less equipped to be top dogs in the association considering a team like Milwaukee has a legitimate superstar tandem in Giannis and Damian Lillard, while Denver has one of the most well-rounded rosters in the league and is just two seasons removed from literally winning the NBA Finals.
The fact that this Thunder team with their lacking experience (only one playoff bid since 2019-20) and at an average age of just 24.148 (the youngest team heading into the season) has been producing at such a high level is undeniably impressive, and is largely due to the efforts put forth by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
The advanced metrics only further back up this sentiment and, fortunately, Dinsick's co-host, Jay Croucher laid out the facts for him.
"I think Shai, even if the counting stats are always going to be a little bit of an issue for him because the rebounds and assists aren't going to stack up to Jokic, he's probably not going to be as efficient. The boxscore stats just aren't as loud for Shai but, I mean, Shai's team is 26-5, they have a +12 point differential, they're a +17 net rating when he's on the court and they're neutral when he's off. He's leading the league in EPM on the team that I think is most likely to finish with the best record in the game. I think it's close on merit between him and Jokic... but I just find it difficult to believe that we get to the end of the season, the Nuggets are 15 games behind OKC in the standings, the advanced stats are pretty close, and people are just going to vote for Jokic over Shai," Croucher said.
Hopefully, this logic will find its way to the vast majority of league award voters before casting their ballots and, in turn, make up for last year's highly controversial turnout.
Though Dinsick may not be high on Shai Gilgeous-Alexander's claim for the coveted MVP award, it appears that his own cohort in Croucher has joined Jalen Williams and plenty of others in believing he's on pace to take home the hardware come the conclusion of 2024-25.