Marcus Thornton for SEC Player of the Year
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Robert B. writes:
C'lay,
Undoubtedly, Meeks will win SEC POY. However, Marcus Thornton is the MVP of the league. Despite how putrid the SEC is this year, people fail to realize just how bad LSU was last year. Thornton's numbers historically are up there behind Pistol Pete and Chirs Jackson--who would be on most All-Time SEC teams. As an SEC fan, and more importantly, someone who attempts to bring UK fans back to reality, I'd llike to see you advocating a Marcus Thornton for POY/MVP of the league. Meeks had good numbers today, but most of his buckets were on uncontested lay-ups, while Thornton went to the basket again and again, shot well-defended threes, and made the clutch free throws. Apologies for the rant, I'm just tired of listening to UK fans purport that Meeks has had this wrapped up for weeks.
Great, great point. I'll admit that I've been slow to come to the Marcus Thornton party. Probably because he didn't hang 54 on my team. But as the season has progressed, I've come around. I agree, Marcus Thornton should be SEC Player of the Year. I think there are three pretty strong arguments (this is like one of those five paragraph essays that we all had to perfect in 10th grade English).
First, Marcus Thornton's team has been much better than Jodie Meeks's team has. I know, I know, this isn't a team award, but right now Kentucky is set to go 9-7 on the season. If that happens they may or may not make the NCAA Tournament. Scan the list of past player of the year honorees in the SEC, for the past twenty years every winner except Ron Slay (who split honors with Keith Bogans) has led his team to the NCAA Tournament. Meeks may or may not. It likely will come down to the game at Gainesville. If Kentucky finishes 9-7, what is Meeks's value to the team in terms of wins and losses? I'm actually interested in what people think the answer is. Without Jodie Meeks is Kentucky 6-10? If so, that's only a three-game swing. Can you really argue that Meeks is worth more than three games for Kentucky? I ask because LSU is probably going to finish at least five games better in conference than Kentucky.
Second, LSU has been the dominant team in the SEC this year and Thornton has been their best player. I'm not always a proponent of rewarding the best player on the best team, but when a team is as dominant as LSU has been, I think you have to consider it when there isn't a clear statistical discrepancy between the best player on the best team and any other player on a lesser team. Let's look at Thornton's stats: He's averaging 21 points a game, 5.5 rebounds, 2.1 assists per game, 1.6 steals per game, making 48.1% of his shots from the floor, and shooting 40% from three. Compare that to Meeks, who is averaging 25.1 points a game, 3.6 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 1.3 steals, 46.7% from the floor, and shooting 41.9% from three. What's more, Meeks doesn't protect the ball that well for someone who has the ball in his hands as often as he does. He has a negative assist to turnover ratio. Just 38 assists to 83 turnovers. That's truly awful. It means Meeks hasn't involved his teammates very much or made teams pay for doubling him. Thornton has a positive assist to turnover ratio: 62 assists to 51 turnovers. Looking at all these numbers, are you telling me they aren't a virtual wash? Especially when you consider the fact that Meeks has taken 47 more shots from the floor on the season. Equalize shots and the points per game figure is virtually equal as well. As is Thornton has been more productive rebounding, assisting, in overall shooting from the floor, in getting steals and has turned the ball over much less than Meeks. Meeks has scored more points and shot a bit better from three. Also, Meeks has more made free throws. Again, these are equal stats. In order for a player on a lesser team to win the award, I think he has to be drastically better than all competition.
Finally, Meeks is beginning to tire out. Since the Arkansas game on February 14, Meeks is just 22 for 68 from the field. (That's just 32% shooting and a full 14 percentage points below his yearly average.) Worse, he's just 9-33 from three in that timeframe. In those four games since February 14th his team is just 1-3. Now you can certainly argue that Billy Clyde has been driving Jodie Meeks too hard and this has contributed to the problem. About a month ago, I wrote that Meeks' jumpshot was going to suffer down the stretch because he was playing too many minutes. Now that's happened. In 14 SEC games Meeks has been on the bench for just 45 total minutes. That's 515 of 560 potential minutes--92% of the time. If this trend continues than Meeks is going to be a drastically inferior player in the final 6 conference games than he was in the first 10. How you finish should count. Thornton's team has won 13 consecutive games.
Now Meeks scored 54 against Tennessee and that soaked up all the air for individual accolades in the league. Combining that performance with the Arkansas game, there's no doubt that Meeks has had the more spectacular individual games. But the numbers and the team records dictate that Thornton has had the more spectacular season. And for that reason he should be SEC Player of the Year. Labels: marcus thornton for sec player of the year
Posted by Clay Travis at 11:01 AM
 
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No consideration for Devan Downey?
No Devan Downey? 3rd in scoring, 3rd in assists and 1st in steals. Furthermore, without Downey, Carolina is probably under .500, overall.
I think it's a two-horse race, Meeks or Thornton. Primarily because Meeks has gotten all the publicity. Now, can you argue that Downey is a more viable #2 player of the year option than Meeks is?
Yeah, I think you can provided South Carolina wins the east. Particularly because South Carolina beat Kentucky twice head-to-head.
LSU's going to be 14-2 at the absolute worst. They can finish 15-1 pretty easily, which would be the best in conference performance by a team in a decade. It's hard to ignore that accomplishment.
C'lay,
I know Kentucky has been rather crap at basketball for about four straight seasons now, but 2003 and 16-0 are hardly a decade away.