There doesn’t appear to be much lingering ill-will between Nikola Jokic and Jusuf Nurkic, which really sucks for people (like me, apparently) who want the NBA to be a WWE-like spectacle full of storylines and beefs and grudges. Plain old basketball is really sweet, but it is made sweeter when it has PERSONALITY. Or something. Actually, the way Jokic plays it, plain old basketball probably can’t be made a whole lot better unless he started doing free-throw line dunks.
Speaking of free-throw line dunks, the race for MIP hasn’t been talked about much compared to the other awards. Jokic is in the convo for that one, but is trailing a guy who does free-throw line dunks, Giannis Antetokounmpo. Magic Giannison does a lot of other things also, similar to Magic Jokson, but those shots where he takes off from around the free-throw line and throws it directly in the cylinder set him apart. You watch one of those, and then you watch one of Jokic’s “dunks”, and it’s like “whoa!”.
Add in the fact that second-year players hardly ever win the MIP award, and Jokic’s trophy cabinet will remain bare this year. Except for the “DTB’s Most Total View Generated” award that I just cobbled together out of empty Gatorade bottles and duct tape. I’ll send it to him once the season’s over, I’m sure he’ll appreciate the gesture.