San Antonio Spurs: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly from 2020 NBA Awards voting

The final ballots for the 2020 NBA Awards have been released to the public and even though the San Antonio Spurs aren’t involved, there’ a lot to discuss.

It’s not very often that a season goes by without a single San Antonio Spurs player involved in the NBA Awards. This marks the second season in a row without a player from the silver and black representing in the outcome. However, it’s interesting to see the full outcome and responses including LeBron James’ response to only 16 voters picking him for first place in MVP rankings.

"Out of 101 votes I got 16 first place votes. That’s what pissed me off more than anything."

– LeBron James

pic.twitter.com/OG8U6LMZbl

— NBA Central (@TheNBACentral) September 19, 2020

What back-to-back MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo did this season was unprecedented, doubling down on his amazing run a year ago. Still, LeBron has the right to be underwhelmed with the results after leading the league in assists and bringing the Los Angeles Lakers to the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference. However, this was only the start of the intriguing results.

From the San Antonio Spurs’ perspective, it was revealed who gave starting point guard Dejounte Murray his two All-Defensive team votes. Yahoo’s Chris B. Haynes and NBA.com’s Shaun Powell each selected Murray for the All-Defensive second team. These were the only votes for a San Antonio Spurs player throughout the entire NBA awards — An outcome that shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone involved.

The national media doesn’t care much for the Spurs. Being that the organization is considered very straight and narrow, there’s a consensus that its a boring team. The group that took over during the Orlando restart would beg to differ, but ultimately, San Antonio’s not going to get much recognition until they force people to vote for them. That wasn’t the case in a losing season.

appreciate you ? i’m not gonna do too much , ima let everybody else do dat . i just wanna know why lol ???

— Ja Morant (@JaMorant) September 19, 2020

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Beyond the San Antonio Spurs themselves, there were plenty of interesting results from the ballots. One voter catching a lot of flack is Newsday’s Greg Logan, whose picks include Andre Drummond for both All-NBA second team and the All-Defensive first team. There are some calling for Logan to have his vote revoked starting next year for insincere and biased selections, though I’m sure Drummond is ecstatic to see someone in the media vouching for him.

Rookie of the Year Ja Morant took exception with the Chicago Sun-Times’ Joe Cowley — The lone voter who ruined Morant’s unanimous selection for the award. A humble and hardworking kid, Morant reacted on Twitter by ‘@-ing’ Cowley to open up a discourse about his decision.

The last issue we’ll touch on is the Most Improved Player debate. Many have taken exception with Charlotte Hornets breakout candidate Devonte’ Graham placing fifth with only 50 votes. A second-year point guard from Kansas, Graham leaped +13.5 points per game while becoming one of the game’s deadliest playmakers and sharpshooters. If Graham doesn’t get serious consideration for the award, then what actually are the criteria?

It’s something to ponder as the San Antonio Spurs prepare for a 2020-21 season in which any number of their players could compete for the award.