A ‘pass-first’ man takes MVP honors
Phoenix Suns point guard Steve Nash was the deserving recipient of the NBA’s Most Valuable Player award. Forget race being a factor in his selection.
Nash was at the controls of the league’s most successful team this season. The Suns had a 33-game turnaround, going from 29 wins in 2004 to 62 this season. They were 60-15 in the games that Nash played and 2-5 in the games he missed with injuries.
He put the ball on the money every time for the many stars in Phoenix to shine. Emerging All-Stars such as Amare Stoudemire, Shawn Marion, Quentin Richardson and Joe Johnson played the entire season free and easy knowing that they did not have to worry about any ball handling responsibilities. Nash took care of everything. All they had to do was to get into their scoring areas, and Nash would do the rest – just like Magic Johnson did for those great Lakers’ “Showtime” teams of the 1980s.
It is great to see the league’s highest individual award presented to a pass-first player who exemplifies team play. Watching Nash running that clock-busting show in Phoenix every night was similar to watching Kurt Warner run the St. Louis Rams’ “Greatest Show On Turf” all the way to the Super Bowl in 1999. Whether Phoenix can run and gun its way to a world title remains to be seen (history is against them), but they were clearly the most entertaining team to watch during the regular season.
Nash and Jason Kidd of the New Jersey Nets are the two guards in this league who think “pass first” ALL the time and dominate games with the pass. Waiting in the wings behind these two is Shaun Livingston of the Los Angeles Clippers, who is the league’s best passer in waiting.
While Shaquille O’Neal was truly outstanding, he joined a Miami Heat team that not only advanced to the playoffs last year, it won its first-round series and played tough in the second round. Scoring is up this year because assists are up this year. Funny how that worked out, isn’t it?
Nash’s season is a testament to team play and overall success. Should the Suns face the grab-and-clutch Detroit Pistons in the finals, the nation will get a glimpse of what took place in the 1980s between the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers. Now, that would be entertaining.