Julius Randle is Getting MVP Chants At Madison Square Garden And I'm Loving it

[Herbert]

Julius Randle is getting MVP chants almost every night now at Madison square garden and it is awesome!(Full disclosure I'm a big Julius Randle fan, I think Luke Walton nearly destroyed his career)

Last night, there was a moment right at the end of the 4th quarter, against the Bulls when Julius drove to the basket, got fouled and layed it up. He just got mauled by the Knicks bench, you love to see the enthusiasm. It was a picture perfect moment, you know he's the guy for the Knicks.

There is no coach saying this other guy is the best player on the team, and there aren't two other guys that you are rotating in at PF all at near equal minutes, "trying to figure out your rotation". This is the first time in his career where he hasn't had to compete with somebody else for minutes and has a coach that is just as gritty and detailed oriented as he is. One thing about coach Thibs that we all know is that if you play hard and compete you are going to get consistent minutes.

Now I know this is unlikely but what if the Knicks went on another winning streak and finished with the 3rd seed in the east? Which would theoretically put him above Giannis. Right now the Knicks are about 4 games back from Milwaukee so it is absolutely conceivable that this could happen.

You would then have a scenario where Julius Randle is the best player, on the team with the number one defense in the NBA. In addition to that Julius has the #1 plus/minus defensive rating at power forward in the NBA(I heard this stat 2 weeks ago). And leads his team in points per game, rebounds per game and assist per game. His only competition would be Jokic which you could argue has benefited from way more offensive firepower in Jamal Murray, Michael porter Jr and Aaron Gordon.

When you combine that with the fact that almost every other MVP candidate has missed significant time due to injury(Julius hasn't) is it possible he could get most improved player and MVP at the same time? That would be sensational and a story in and of itself.

With only 12 games left its gonna be hard for this to happen. But the Knicks are the best story in the NBA right now and sports writers love a good story. Julius has the numbers to make this a legitimate argument. All the Knicks need to do is to just keep on winning!