5 NBA Players You Won't Believe Got MVP Votes

For a player to receive votes in the MVP race, you'd have to imagine that they are among the top players in the league. After all, the award has been won by the best the NBA has to offer. Whether it be Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, or Kobe Bryant, the title of Most Valuable Player is a title only held by the upper echelon of the sport. However, sometimes players you'd never expect to even be in consideration for the award end up receiving votes, and that's what this list is all about. Just to clarify how MVP voting works for those who don't know, a panel of sportswriters and broadcasters cast votes for 1st through 5th place. The votes then translate to points like this:

1st place vote=10 points
2nd place vote=7 points
3rd place vote=5 points
4th place vote=3 points
5th place vote=1 point

So with that out of the way, these are five players you won't believe got MVP votes.

PJ Brown (2005)

While he was never a star-player by any means, PJ Brown certainly exceeded expectations over the course of his career. Drafted with the 29th pick in the 1992 draft, Brown would go on to play 15 seasons in the NBA with six different teams, during which he established himself as a solid role player and one of the league's better defenders. For his career, Brown would average 9.1 points, 7.7 rebounds and a block per game while shooting 46% from the field. During his career, Brown would also make the All-Defensive 2nd team three times and would win an NBA Championship in 2008 with the Boston Celtics. Again, a solid role player, but not an all-star and nowhere near an MVP-caliber player. One season, however, someone was impressed by Brown enough to give him an MVP vote. That season would be the 2004-05 season, during which a 35-year old Brown was playing for the New Orleans Hornets.

In that season, Brown would end up having actually ended up having one of the best seasons of his career, as he would average 10.8 points and 9 rebounds per game while shooting 45% from the field. Those are decent statistics, but nowhere near what you'd expect from an MVP caliber player. By comparison, that year's MVP Steve Nash would put up 15.5 points, 3.3 rebounds, a league-high 11.5 assists and a steal per game while shooting 50% from the field and 43% from three-point range. Still, Brown would receive one fifth place MVP vote, putting him in a three-way tie for 14th with Marcus Camby and Shawn Marion and two points behind Vince Carter. While MVP voting is anonymous, the man who voted for Brown actually revealed his identity. In a now deleted (but re-posted) post from nola.com, former Pelicans columnist Jimmy Smith called his vote "a symbolic gesture so that people would notice Brown's quiet contributions" and clarified that his vote didn't alter the outcome of the voting.

Alton Lister (1983)

Like PJ Brown, Alton Lister was never a star player but was able to carve out a 17-year career for himself thanks to his strong rebounding, shot blocking, and defensive abilities. Drafted with the 21st pick in the 1981 draft by the Milwaukee Bucks, Lister would play 16 seasons in the NBA with five teams and one season in Italy. For his career, Lister would average 6.6 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 1.5 blocks per game while shooting 51% from the field. Through the first eight years of his career, Lister was solid, reliable big man, averaging 8.2 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 1.9 blocks per game while shooting 52% from the field. Unfortunately, injuries would hamper Lister later in his career, causing him to miss over half the season in four of his last eight seasons. Lister is probably best known as the man on the receiving end of one of the most vicious posterizations in NBA history at the hands of Shawn Kemp. Despite never being great, however, a few people clearly thought highly enough of Lister to vote him in as an MVP candidate.

During the 1982-83 season, Alton Lister was 24 years old and in his second season in the NBA when he received five points in the MVP race, landing him in 15th place. That season, Lister would average 8.4 points, 7.1 rebounds, and 2.2 blocks per game while shooting 53% from the field, and would only start in 37 of the 80 games he played as a member of the Bucks. By comparison, the MVP winner Moses Malone would average 24.3 points, 15.3 rebounds, 1.1 steals, and 2 blocks per game while shooting 50% from the field. Lister would also rank last in scoring among vote-getters (23 in total) and just 13th in rebounding While it is possible that one writer actually considered Lister the third best player in the league, it's more likely he either received one-fourth place and two fifth-place votes or just five fifth place votes. Still, those votes put Lister ahead of players like Bernard King, Isiah Thomas, and Kiki Vandeweghe, all of whom would average over 20 points per game.

Quinn Buckner (1981)

Of course, Alton Lister wouldn't be the first Milwaukee Buck to receive a peculiar MVP vote. In fact, his former teammate Quinn Buckner would receive a vote just two seasons before Lister would. Drafted with the 7th pick in the 1976 draft by the Bucks, Buckner would have a relatively short 10-year career in the NBA. During his career, Buckner would average 8.2 points, 2.7 rebounds, 4.3 assists, and 1.9 steals per game while shooting 46% from the field. Like Lister and PJ Brown, Buckner was another player whose main contribution to teams was his defense, as he would be selected to the All-Defensive 2nd team four times during his career. Buckner would also win a single NBA Championship during his career as a member of the 1983-84 Boston Celtics.

Again, he was decent enough player, but not an MVP candidate by any means. However, one year he would actually receive an MVP vote one season. That season would be the 1980-81 season, during which Buckner would end up having the best season of his career. He would average 13.3 points, 3.6 rebounds, 4.7 assists, and 2.4 steals per game while shooting 49% from the field. Those are solid numbers, especially the steals, but not what you'd expect from an MVP candidate. Julius Erving, who won the award the year, would put up much better numbers that year, averaging 24.6 points, 8 rebounds, 4.4 assists, 2.1 steals, and 1.8 blocks per game while shooting 52% from the field. In a year where a staggering 31 players received MVP votes, Buckner's one fifth place vote landed him in a tie for 30th with Caldwell Jones.

Michael Cooper (1981-82)

Michael Cooper is a player that I've actually grown to be a big fan of...mostly because his card in NBA 2K17 MyTEAM was really good. But honestly, Cooper was, like the majority of the players on this list, a solid, reliable player and one of the best defenders of his time. Drafted with the 60th pick in the 3rd round of the 1978 draft by the Los Angeles Lakers, Cooper would spend his entire 12-year career with the Lakers. During that time, Cooper averaged 8.9 points, 3.2 rebounds, 4.2 assists, and 1.2 steals per game while shooting 47% from the field, 34% from three-point range, and 83% from three-point range. Along with that, Cooper would make an All-Defensive team eight times during his career (five first-team selections and three second-team selections) and would win the Defensive Player of the Year award in 1987. On top of that, Cooper would be a part of five championship-winning teams during his time with the Lakers. While Cooper was a top-notch defender, few would say that's enough to be considered the MVP. However, Cooper would receive MVP votes in not one, but two seasons.

The first of those seasons was the 1980-81 season. In what was just Cooper's third season in the NBA, he would average 9.4 points, 4.1 rebounds, 4.1 assists, 1.6 steals and a block per game while shooting 49% from the field. Cooper would make the All-Defensive 2nd team that year, but it still wasn't even close to an MVP-caliber season, especially compared to that year's winner Julius Erving. Cooper would receive three points in the MVP race, putting him in a six-way tie for 24th. The next year, Cooper would average 11.9 points, 3.5 rebounds, 3 assists, and 1.6 steals per game while shooting 52% from the field. Still not great, but enough to earn him not just an All-Defensive 1st team selection, but another spot in the MVP race. Cooper would again receive three points in the race, this time landing in a four-way tie for 17th. That year, Moses Malone would win the MVP after averaging 31.1 points, 14.7 rebounds, and 1.5 blocks per game while shooting 52% from the field. Clearly, those are much better stats.

Ty Lawson (2013)

Of all the players I talked about on this list so far, Ty Lawson is probably the one who you could most easily justify as an MVP candidate. That said, it's still a bit of a stretch to give Lawson a vote as one of the top players in the league. Drafted with the 18th pick in the 2009 draft by the Minnesota Timberwolves, Lawson has played a total of 8 seasons in the NBA so far over 9 years and has played for four different teams. For his career so far, Lawson has averaged 12.7 points, 2.7 rebounds, 6 assists, and 1.2 steals per game while shooting 46% from the field and 36% from three-point range. Lawson's best years so far would be his four year stretch between 2011 and 2015, during which he averaged 16.4 points, 3.2 rebounds, 8 assists, and 1.4 steals per game while shooting 45% from the field and 36% from three-point range. However, Lawson would fall off soon after, likely due to his frequent run-ins with the law. Still, for a while, Lawson was looking a perfectly good-to-great point guard. Good enough, it seems, to receive votes in the MVP race one season.

For the 2012-13 season, Lawson would have one of the strongest seasons of his career. For the year, Lawson would average 16.7 points, 2.7 rebounds, 6.9 assists, and 1.5 steals per game while shooting 46% from the field and 37% from three-point range. That's a pretty good stat line, one that any team would love to have from their starting point guard. But MVP-caliber? Well, compared to that year's MVP LeBron James, not really. James would average 26.8 points, 8 rebounds, 7.3 assists, and 1.7 steals per game while shooting 57% from the field and 41% from three-point range. As for Lawson, while they may not have been MVP-caliber numbers to me (or anyone else for that matter), one member of the voting panel clearly thought so, as he awarded his fifth-place vote to Lawson, putting him in a five-way tie for 12th.

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