Top 30 Most Valuable Players in the NBA [Rankings]

Discussing the NBA MVP race is a moot conversation at this point. Everyone knew Stephen Curry would be awarded that honor for the second straight year by the season’s midway point. After all, the guy unleashed the most soul-crushing offensive season in league history while leading the Golden State Warriors to a record 73 wins.

There are still plenty of other elite players who made the 2015-16 season a glorious culmination of talent, however. How they shake out behind Curry in the hierarchy of top-tier players is a worthy topic of discussion.

PointAfter created a metric called Player Value Index (PVI) to measure the importance of each NBA player to their team’s success. The sports visualization site, part of the Graphiq network, incorporated the following statistics into the PVI formula: Player Efficiency Rating (PER), Value Over Replacement Player (VORP), box plus-minus (BPM), win shares and usage rate.

These statistics are all at the forefront of the NBA sabermetrics movement, and are widely used in measuring a player’s efficiency and/or value to his team. In creating PVI, PointAfter aims to combine the strengths of other stats (PER measuring efficiency, usage rate measuring raw use in offense, win shares taking team success into account) to create one holistic number.

You probably won’t be surprised which player PVI pinpoints as the NBA MVP. However, it might spark some conversation about underrated players who deserve to be in the conversation for All-NBA teams.

#30. Kyrie Irving

Player Value Index: 96.6
Stock: Down


Irving’s shooting stroke was off all season, which contributes to his stock being lower than it was at the end of 2014-15. But he’s rounded into form through the first round of the postseason and appears primed to mature into Cleveland’s second consistent option on offense. He’s not second banana by much, though — Kevin Love was ranked No. 31 by PVI.

Article Source: http://www.business2community.com/sports/top-30-valuable-players-nba-rankings-01533574#wWdWSK1yPD4YRgk5.97