When Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid was announced as the winner of the 2022-23 NBA MVP award, everyone was curious to see how voting shook out compared to other notable candidates like Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokić and Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo.
Given that the results for the award include a breakdown of how many first-, second-, third-, fourth-, and fifth-place votes each player received, it was easy to get a sense of how everyone cast their ballots.
It was also very easy to notice that two-time defending MVP Nikola Jokić did not receive a Top-5 vote on one MVP voter’s ballot. It would have been one thing to find out that someone placed Jokić, who averaged 24.5 points and 11.8 rebounds this season, in the fourth or fifth spot. But to see that he didn’t even make the top five seemed wild.
So much so that TNT’s Charles Barkley said last week that the voter who didn’t include Jokić in their top five “shouldn’t get a vote.”
Now, the voting tallies have been released and we know that the voter in question was ESPN’s Mark Jackson.
Per the voter selections sheet, Jackson’s top five were, in order, Embiid, Antetokounmpo, Boston’s Jayson Tatum, OKC’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and Cleveland’s Donovan Mitchell. Not only was Jackson the only voter not to include Jokić in their top five but he was the only voter to put Tatum as high as third.
It’s notable given that Jackson is calling NBA Playoff games on ESPN and could very well be calling Nuggets games soon if they advance over the Phoenix Suns. It wouldn’t be above co-analyst Jeff Van Gundy to call out his broadcast partner over the voting snub, so we’ll have to keep an eye on whether or not Jackson is asked to comment on his vote at some point.
[NBA.com]
