Leaning against a wall inside T-Mobile Arena on Monday afternoon before facing Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Milwaukee Bucks in the NBA Cup final in Las Vegas, Oklahoma City Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander delivered a message to this season's MVP voters.
"Nothing matters in this game if you don't win," Gilgeous-Alexander, the leader of the top team in the Western Conference, told ESPN. "And the award is finished being selected before the playoffs are finished, so those games don't go into it. So I think it should matter a lot.
"There's so many talented guys in the league, so many guys that can put up numbers, but winning is what sets you apart, and it's been that way in the past. It's what's made the greats the greats -- because they win. And the guys that don't win, it's always a knock on them."
As the season unfolds, winning -- something Gilgeous-Alexander and the Thunder are likely to do plenty of between now and when media submit award ballots in mid-April -- could certainly play a key role in determining another tightly contested race for the NBA's top individual honor.
But as ESPN's first NBA MVP straw poll reveals, OKC's loss to Antetokounmpo and the Bucks in Tuesday's Cup final showed how quickly voters can change their minds and how narrow the margins could become.
