Three more wins.
Had the Oklahoma City Thunder squeezed just three more W's out of the past 170 days, our suspicion here at Stein Line HQ is that the 2016-17 MVP race would be -- if not quite a rerun of last season’s unprecedented unanimous coronation of Stephen Curry -- firmly in the grasp of Russell Westbrook.
But they didn’t.
So it isn’t.
Media members have been voting on the NBA’s Most Valuable Player award since the 1980-81 season. The last time media types awarded the Maurice Podoloff Trophy to a player from a sub-50-win team in a full NBA season came in just their second year of voting.