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If the Canadian election put you in the mood to read about more vote totals, I have good news. The NBA's General Managers recently completed their annual survey, and the results are interesting. They will certainly add to the expectations facing the 2015-16 Cleveland Cavaliers. A whopping 53.6 percent of GMs predicted that the Cavs will win the title.
Unfortunately, the GMs are not always correct. Heading into last season, the favorites were the Spurs at 46.2 percent, while only 3.8 percent of GMs predicted the Golden State Warriors would win it all. The year before that, the Miami Heat were the overwhelming favorites at 75.9 percent, but that was the year they lost to San Antonio in the Finals.
Not surprisingly, the Cavs were picked as the nearly-unanimous choice to win the East, at 96.6 percent (they were also the favorites last year, but with "only" 70.4 percent of the vote).
LeBron James was chosen as the favorite to win the MVP, at 39.3 percent, ahead of Anthony Davis, Kevin Durant, and James Harden. LeBron has four MVPs, but he hasn't won one since 2012-13. Given that he'll likely get a lot of rest during the regular season, I think it's pretty hard to imagine him winning it this year, but I am not a GM so what do I know?
Some other survey results:
- Only 6.9 percent of GMs would take LeBron if they were starting a franchise today and had their choice of any player. Eighty-six percent would prefer the younger Davis.
- LeBron was still the overwhelming choice as the league's best small forward, beating out Durant 89.3 percent to 8.9 percent.
- LeBron also received 7.1 percent of the vote as the league's best power forward, tying him for second with Blake Griffin.
- Tyronn Lue finished second to Golden State's Ron Adams as the league's best assistant coach.
- LeBron was chosen as the best leader, but Chris Paul beat him out in the category of highest basketball IQ.