The NBA revealed three finalists for 2023-24 Defensive Player of the Year back in April. And on Tuesday, Rudy Gobert was named the winner of the honor for the fourth time in his career.
Gobert, Victor Wembanyama and Bam Adebayo made up the list of final candidates. Conspicuously absent, of course, was Anthony Davis, the anchor of perhaps the league’s highest-profile franchise.
Davis, after the nominees were announced, wasn’t shy about his omission with ESPN’s Dave McMenamin:
“I’ll never get [the award]. They’re not giving it to me. The league doesn’t like me. I’m the best defensive player in the league. I can switch 1 through 5. I can guard the pick-and-roll the best in the league, from a big standpoint. I block shots. I rebound.
“I don’t know what else to do. I’m over it. I’m just going to do what I got to do to help the team win and try to play for a championship. Accolades and individual awards, I’m done with those.”
Does The NBA Not ‘Like’ Davis?
Well, alrighty then. Bleacher Report’s tried and true “BS Meter” is going wild on that quote, and it’s hard to know where to begin.
We can probably safely move right past the “league doesn’t like me” sentiment. Davis has made nine All-Star teams, four All-NBA teams and four All-Defense teams. And perhaps more notable than all of those honors, he was one of the more controversial selections for the NBA’s 75th Anniversary Team revealed in 2021.
AD has plenty of accolades. And he’ll likely get plenty more between now and his retirement.
That doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll get the elusive DPOY, though. And if he finishes his career without one, it might feel a little strange (like Jerry Sloan or Erik Spoelstra not having a Coach of the Year).
Is Davis the ‘Best Defensive Player In the League’?
Much of what Davis said above, at least generally speaking, is true. It’s hard to definitively say he’s the best in an era that includes Gobert and Draymond Green, but he’s been one of the league’s premier frontcourt defenders since he was drafted in 2012.
Yes, he is more switchable than a lot of bigs. Yes, he defends the pick-and-roll quite well. And yes, he’s long been a dominant rim protector and rebounder.
For his career, Davis has averaged 8.0 defensive rebounds and 2.3 blocks per game. No one in league history matches or exceeds both marks. If we drop the qualifiers to seven and two, you add just 13 players, nine of which are in the Hall of Fame (and then Gobert, Hassan Whiteside, Marcus Camby and Elmore Smith are the four who aren’t).
Team Impact
Over the last eight seasons, Davis has never ranked lower than the 92nd percentile in Dunks and Threes’ defensive estimated plus-minus (one of the most trusted catch-all metrics in NBA front offices).
However, his dominant defensive career doesn’t necessarily prove AD’s been snubbed for Defensive Player of the Year in any individual season.
Let’s start with 2023-24.
The Lakers were in the bottom half of the league in points allowed per 100 possessions. That alone is usually disqualifying (though it wasn’t for Wembanyama, but we’ll get more into that later). Gobert’s Minnesota Timberwolves, on the other hand, allowed (by a wide margin) the fewest points per 100 possessions. Adebayo’s Miami Heat were fifth in that category.
And all three of the finalists had bigger impacts on their team’s defensive ratings (points allowed per 100 possessions) than Davis did this season.
The San Antonio Spurs allowed 8.5 fewer points per 100 possessions with Wembanyama on the floor (among players with at least 1,500 minutes, he led the league in defensive rating swing). The Heat allowed 5.1 fewer points per 100 possessions with Bam. The Timberwolves allowed 3.5 fewer points per 100 possessions with Gobert. The Lakers allowed 1.5 fewer points per 100 possessions with AD.
Defensive EPM points to the finalists, too. All three ranked higher there, but maybe Davis has more of a case with basic numbers.
Box-Score Analysis
As it turns out, even there, Wembanyama, who comes from the worst team defense of this foursome (San Antonio was 21st), led the league in stocks (blocks plus steals) per game. Davis was second, but the gap between his 3.5 and the Frenchman’s 4.8 is massive.
AD’s Case Is Present, and Debatable
Much of the subjectivity from Davis’ quote above could be applied to the three finalists, too.
In short, he’s a dominant, productive and versatile defender, but him not winning Defensive Player of the Year is far from egregious. And if you look at the rest of his career, it’s hard to pinpoint any other single season when he was robbed of the award.
When you filter out garbage time, he’s never led a team to the league’s best defense, but the Lakers were fourth and second, respectively, in 2019-20 and 2020-21.
In the first of those two campaigns, Giannis Antetokounmpo won the league’s top individual defensive honor and led the Milwaukee Bucks’ No. 1 defense with 1.0 blocks, 1.0 steals and 11.4 defensive rebounds per game. Davis’ 2.3 blocks and 1.5 steals that season were impressive, but his 7.0 defensive rebounds were well shy of Giannis’, his positional versatility wasn’t quite as obvious, and the Lakers actually allowed more points per 100 possessions when he was on the floor than they did when he wasn’t.
The next season, L.A. once again surrendered more points when Davis was on the floor. The Utah Jazz, who had the league’s best defense in 2020-21, allowed a whopping 12.1 fewer points per 100 possessions when DPOY Gobert was playing.
Again, there aren’t really any glaring examples of years when Davis should have secured the honor, and that includes 2023-24.
Was AD Snubbed of DPOY?
None of this means the NBA “doesn’t like” Davis. Most analysts, fans and people within the league would acknowledge he’s a dominant defender.
It’s just that things don’t always break your way. He happens to be in the NBA at the same time as one of the greatest defensive anchors of all time in Gobert, one of the most versatile defenders ever in Green and a rising phenom in Wembanyama. His career has also intersected with some of the most dynamic perimeter defenders, too, in Kawhi Leonard and Marcus Smart.
And honestly, the second half of Davis’ thoughts is what he should focus on. Individual honors are nice, but ultimate team success lasts longer. After a heated, controversial 2022-23 MVP race that ended with Joel Embiid being crowned, Nikola Jokić winning Finals MVP became the lasting impression of that season.
There’s still time for Davis to win a DPOY, but even if he doesn’t, him leading the Lakers to another title would mean so much more than the absence of that trophy.
Final BS Meter: Give AD his flowers; just not the hardware.
