The great Shaquille O'Neal had a bit of a heated debate with fellow Hall of Famer Tracy McGrady on a recent episode of The Big Podcast with Shaq. The pair started off a healthy conversation about what it takes to be an MVP, but Shaq and T-Mac quickly disputed each other's statements once the topic centered around San Antonio Spurs legend Tim Duncan.
Shaq kicked off the discussion by saying that the MVP should not be determined by his team's ranking. McGrady agreed with Shaq's argument and then took it a step further. T-Mac used his 2002-03 campaign as an example of being overlooked as the MVP simply because his team was not one of the top seeds in the conference. However, once Shaq realized that it was Duncan of the Spurs who bagged the MVP title that year, he quickly shut down T-Mac's claim:
For what it's worth, McGrady averaged a league-leading 32.1 points, 6.5 rebounds, 5.5 assists, and 1.7 steals that season. He carried his Orlando Magic to the playoffs that year as the eighth seed, where they ended up losing to the top-seeded Detroit Pistons after a hard-fought seven-game series. In his mind, T-Mac believes that he should have bagged the MVP award that year.
Shaq's argument, however, stems from the notion that the Spurs would not have been a playoff team without Tim Duncan. He believes that without The big Fundamental, guys like Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili would not have strived as much as they did playing alongside Duncan.
Does T-Mac have a point here? Was he robbed of the MVP crown in 2003?
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