Three times in NBA history has one player won both MVP and Defensive Player of the Year awards, most recently two seasons ago when Giannis Antetokounmpo was Mr. Everything for Milwaukee. Michael Jordan netted both the MVP and DPoY in 1988. Six years later, Hakeem Olajuwon completed the same feat and won the first of back-to-back titles with the Rockets.
If you don’t have one player that embodies, well, the Greatest Basketball Player Ever, two might even be better — shared responsibilities and all. That’s even more rare. Allen Iverson and Dikembe Mutombo repped the 76ers in The 2001 NBA Finals as the Maurice Podoloff Trophy winner and four-time winner of best defensive finger-wagger. In 1987, Magic Johnson and Michael Cooper raised the Larry O’Brien, completing the triumvirate.
This season, the Celtics have an outside chance to complete the trifecta that The Dream and Showtime Lakers did for basketball immortality with Jayson Tatum and Marcus Smart vying for both awards. However, they’re not the only young dynamic duo tearing up this season and paving a way to promising futures for their franchises. The Suns’ Devin Booker and Mikal Bridges and Memphis’ Ja Morant and Jaren Jackson Jr. should be dual candidates for seasons to come, too. For all three teams, that recipe has catapulted their youth movements to the top of their respective conferences and leaders in both offensive and defensive efficiency.
We’ve written extensively at CelticsBlog about Tatum and Smart and their respective candidacies. Adam Taylor didn’t just campaign for Smart to win DPOY, but waxed poetic about how he was ushering in a newfound respect for defensive guards:
The 28-year-old has built a career on blood, bruises, and a relentless will to compete at the highest level. He’s a culture setter, a leader, and the Boston Celtics warrior in chief. Those are all personality traits, they’re teachable trains of thought – if you’re hungry enough.
That’s why…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CelticsBlog – All Posts…