NBA Awards Voter Who Chose Zion Williamson Over Ja Morant For Rookie Of The Year Is Revealed

Back when the NBA Rookie Of the Year award was announced, Ja Morant of the Memphis Grizzlies received 99 of a possible 100 votes. And Morant wanted to know who the outlier was.

Turns out it was Chicago Bulls beat writer Joe Cowley, a veteran sportswriter for the Windy City’s tabloid. And Morant had something to say, as did Cowley, on Twitter.

Cowley also was one of the 16 voters who selected LeBron James over Giannis Antetokounmpo for the Most Valuable Player award. The Greek Freak got the other 85 votes … and the 16 for LeBron did not sit well with him.

“It pissed me off, because out of 101 votes, I got 16 first-place votes. That’s what pissed me off more than anything,” James told reporters in the Orlando bubble. “You know, not saying that the winner wasn’t deserving of the MVP. But that pissed me off. And I finished second a lot in my career, either from a championship, and now four times as an MVP.”

Cowley did not return a phone call seeking comment.

The other voters who chose James over Antetokounmpo for MVP were Greg Anthony of Turner Sports, Diego Martinez of Reforma, Dave McMenamin, Steven A. Smith, Mark Jackson, Mark Jones and Ami Elhassan and Ramona Shelbourne of ESPN, Mark Medina of USA Today, Tim Reynolds of the Associated Press, Ric Bucher of Bleacher Report, Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports, Mirjam Swanson of the Orange County Register and Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe.

ESPN voters who chose Antetokounmpo were Brian Windhorst, Michael Wilbon, Royce Young, Maria Taylor, Jalen Rose, Kevin Pelton, Dave Pasch, Rachel Nichols, Jackie MacMullen, Zach Lowe, Cassidy Hubbarth, Marc Kestecher, Doris Burke, Mike Breen, Tim Bontemps, Jon Barry and Kevin Arnovitz.

Predictably, the award votes caused a day of trolling and criticism on social media, which is what happens every year in instances such as this.

Forbes.com did not have an MVP vote. The only news organization believed to prohibit its writers from voting on official rewards is the New York Times. The Associated Press had a similar policy years ago but changed it. Unlike Reynolds, the AP’s Brian Mahoney voted Antetokounmpo first.

James seemed to be gaining steam on Antetokounmpo prior to the suspension of the NBA season because of coronavirus as the Bucks had lost three straight games.

In the first five games of March, James had a triple-double of 23 points, 13 assists and 12 rebounds at New Orleans, 22 points and 14 assists in a home victory over Philadelphia, 37 points 8 rebounds and 8 assists in a home victory over the Bucks, 28 points, 9 assists and 8 rebounds in a victory over the Clippers, and then was one assist shy of a triple-double in a 2-0point loss to the Brooklyn Nets.

Had the season not been suspended, things may have turned out differently.

But when the NBA announced criteria for this season’s vote, it said only games played prior to March 11 should be taken into consideration, which meant that nothing any player did in the Orlando bubble should be taken into consideration.

Another award that inspired social media debate was the All-NBA team, as several players received first-team votes but did not make the first- second- or third-place All-NBA teams.

Joel Embiid of the Philadelphia 76ers was voted First Team by Greg Anthony and Dennis Scott of Turner Sports, and Ric Bucher of Bleacher Report. Embiid was named second team All-NBA on 14 ballots and third-team All-NBA on 22 ballots.

In Coach of the Year Voting, Nick Nurse of Toronto won the award and Mike Budenholzer of Milwaukee was second, with a single first-place vote going to Nate McMillan of the Indiana Pacers. That vote was cast by Seerat Sohi of Yahoo Sports.