Nearly two months into the NBA season, surprise playoff contenders have emerged, shocking franchise drama has unfolded and a new class of rookies has already made an impact.
The top of the 2025-26 Most Valuable Player race, however, should look quite familiar.
For the sixth consecutive edition of ESPN’s NBA MVP straw poll — a poll of 100 media members that mimics the league’s postseason award balloting — voting has resulted in Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic leading the field.
And for the third straight time, Gilgeous-Alexander (57 first-place votes, 865 total points) holds a clear but narrow lead over Jokic (42 first-place votes, 822 total points) and 13 other stars who received at least one vote in the poll conducted Monday and Tuesday.
You can jump to the full voting breakdown here. But first, let’s examine the top-five selections — Gilgeous-Alexander, Jokic, Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic, Detroit Pistons guard Cade Cunningham and New York Knicks guard Jalen Brunson — and the biggest questions facing each MVP contender and their teams between now and the postseason.
2025-26 stats: 28.7 PTS | 6.4 AST | 3.3 REBResults: 106 points (appeared on 60 ballots)First-place votes: 0
Can the Knicks take advantage of the wide-open East?
While some pundits might discount the Knicks’ NBA Cup triumph this week, New York’s run through the in-season tournament was its first title in over 50 years. But while team owner James Dolan pushed back on coach Mike Brown’s proclamation to raise a banner to the rafters of Madison Square Garden, the Knicks hope their Cup experience provides a similar springboard to success that the Oklahoma City Thunder enjoyed last year, when their runner-up finish helped spark a run to the city’s first NBA championship. (Through three years of the NBA Cup, no team has won the in-season tournament and NBA title in the same season.)
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“I think it’s good we won this,” Brunson said after Tuesday’s victory in Las Vegas over the San Antonio Spurs. “I think the way we won it is special, as well.”
In the aftermath of New York’s victory, focus was on the play of reserves such as second-year guard Tyler Kolek, center Mitchell Robinson and guard Jordan Clarkson — all of whom Brunson praised in his postgame news conference after being named the tournament’s MVP. Depth shining through reflects Brown’s vision after replacing Tom Thibodeau in the offseason.
But make no mistake: If New York achieves its championship aspirations in June, it will be Brunson leading them there. And as he enters the top five in straw poll voting for the first time, his first-year coach continues to push for Brunson’s inclusion in MVP conversations.
“When you guys start talking about MVP candidates, [I hope] his name is one of the first that comes out of your mouth,” Brown said after the Knicks’ Cup title win. “Because on this stage, to go get it done while winning, is what in my opinion an MVP is all about.”
2025-26 stats: 27.2 PTS | 9.2 AST | 6.2 REBResults: 271 points (appeared on 91 ballots)First-place votes: 0
Is first-place Detroit for real?
As Detroit broke through for a playoff spot for the first time since 2019, Cunningham tied for seventh in the league’s official 2024-25 MVP voting. But as this season’s Pistons have skyrocketed to an East-leading 21-6 record — the NBA’s second best behind the Thunder — Cunningham has received deserved praise for leading the franchise behind career-best individual production.
Cunningham is just outside the league’s top 10 in scoring but is second in assists and seventh in total double-doubles, doing it all on a roster that doesn’t have a surefire bet for a second All-Star — center Jalen Duren is the leader there — with young talent still growing into their games such as Ausar Thompson and Ron Holland II.
For the Pistons franchise, which hasn’t won a playoff series since 2008 — going from a first-round exit to the NBA Finals is not a typical path. But there’s no doubt that the Pistons are ahead of schedule. And Cunningham, since coach J.B. Bickerstaff arrived on the sidelines in the 2024 offseason, looks every bit the player who can lead his team to a deep playoff run.
2025-26 stats: 35.2 PTS | 9.1 AST | 8.8 REBResults: 432 points (appeared on 95 ballots)First-place votes: 1
Can the Lakers be good enough defensively?
Doncic’s singular ability to generate offense for himself and others has driven massive successes for his teams. That includes this year’s Lakers squad, which sits third in the Western Conference despite the league’s 20th ranked defense.
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Whether the Lakers end the regular season in that upper tier — where the Thunder, Nuggets, Spurs and Houston Rockets currently reside — could depend on Doncic and the Lakers becoming a more cohesive unit on defense. One irony of Dallas trading Doncic was that the Mavericks had assembled a roster that fit his talents and his shortcomings: a backcourt co-star (Kyrie Irving); rangy 3-and-D wings (P.J. Washington, Derrick Jones Jr. and Naji Marshall) and rim-protecting, rim-running bigs who capitalize on Doncic’s elite pick-and-roll vision.
This year’s Lakers, as coach J.J. Redick has repeatedly said, are imbalanced. Wing Jarred Vanderbilt is perhaps the one truly above average defensive player on a roster built around the offensive-minded trio of Doncic, Austin Reaves and a soon-to-be-41-year-old LeBron James.
To his credit, Doncic entered his first full season in L.A. in shape and has played brilliantly — MVP straw poll voters have taken notice. But it’ll take more than that for Doncic and the Lakers to make a Finals run.
2025-26 stats: 29.6 PTS | 12.3 REB | 10.9 ASTResults: 822 points (appeared on 100 ballots)First-place votes: 42
Will Jokic’s supporting cast be good enough?
Jokic’s historic numbers have become a constant and so has his place in the top tier of MVP voting; he has finished first or second in five consecutive seasons. This season, Jokic leads the league in rebounds and assists while ranking fifth in points, which he’s getting by shooting 61.2% overall, 42.6% from 3-point range and 84.0% from the free throw line. No player has more triple-doubles (13) or double-doubles (24) than Jokic.
The question in Denver the past several years — and even during the franchise’s breakthrough run to the 2023 NBA title — has been whether the Nuggets could generate enough production when their All-Star center is off the court. Heading into Thursday’s games, Denver was minus-1.2 points per 100 possessions with Jokic on the bench, a massive improvement from the plummeting numbers of previous seasons.
2024-25: minus-9.3 points per 100 possessions
2023-24: minus-8.6 points per 100 possessions
2022-23: minus-10.4 points per 100 possessions
2021-22: minus-7.9 points per 100 possessions
This year’s improvement can be attributed, in part, to Jamal Murray’s career-best opening stretch that has buoyed the guard’s chances of his first All-Star selection. A notoriously slow starter, Murray is posting career highs in points (25.2), assists (6.6), field goal percentage (50.1) and 3-point percentage (45.6).
2025-26 stats: 32.4 PTS | 6.4 AST | 4.7 REBResults: 865 points (appeared on 100 ballots)First-place votes: 57
Can the Thunder really win 74 games?
Oklahoma City suffered another disappointing end to its NBA Cup run, but there is no team in the league better equipped to bounce back.
“I think an average team would probably be like, ‘Oh, it’s the Cup, whatever, we lost one,'” Thunder All-NBA guard Jalen Williams said after Saturday’s semifinal loss to the Spurs.
“We can look at it as a way to get better and understand that we played against a playoff team that beat us.”
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Thursday, Dec. 25Cavaliers at Knicks, 12 p.m.Spurs at Thunder, 2:30 p.m.Mavericks at Warriors, 5 p.m.Rockets at Lakers, 8 p.m.Timberwolves at Nuggets, 10:30 p.m.
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The Thunder, of course, are no average team. OKC still has a record-setting net rating of plus-16.9 points per 100 possessions — more than three points better than the 13.4 rating the 72-win 1995-96 Chicago Bulls set as the standard.
Oklahoma City, which owns the NBA’s stingiest defensive rating of the past six seasons, is lapping most of the field, so much so that the distance between the Thunder and second-place Pistons is as big as the gap from Detroit to the Brooklyn Nets in 25th. The defending champs have done all this with Jalen Williams missing the first several weeks of the season due to offseason wrist surgery, and with other key players shuffling in and out of the lineup.
The steadying force has been Gilgeous-Alexander, with his 32.4 points in just 33.0 minutes per game, helping to bolster his defense of the 2025 MVP and the Thunder’s title. If successful, OKC would snap a seven-year run without a repeat champ.
But while the Thunder never say things too loudly, they’re not running away from comparisons to the prior two teams to eclipse 70 wins — those 1995-96 Bulls and the 2015-16 Golden State Warriors, who went 73-9.
“If we get better than what we are now, that should take care of itself,” Gilgeous-Alexander said after Saturday’s Cup defeat.
“Goals, to me, are pointless [when you’re] trying to reach them when they are so far away.
“If we stack nights like we did tonight, we won’t even come close to it. So I think trying to focus on getting better than we just got in this 25-game stretch will help us, and all the goals and stuff will take care of itself.”
With our early snapshot of the MVP race predicting another razor thin margin between Gilgeous-Alexander and Jokic, the Thunder’s chase for 70 wins (and beyond) could be the determining factor.
Full NBA MVP straw poll results
Outside the top five…
Giannis Antetokounmpo, the only player who has received at least one vote in every straw poll dating to 2017, finished sixth, the first time he’s been outside the top five since 2021. But with Antetokounmpo on the sidelines with a calf issue, he could fall short of the 65-game threshold for MVP and All-NBA. Antetokounmpo has made the first team every year since 2019.
Victor Wembanyama, who finished eighth despite already missing 12 games with a calf strain, faces a similar dilemma. While he gained an extra game in the race for 65 by San Antonio reaching the NBA Cup title game, he can miss just six more games to remain eligible for end-of-season awards.
Tyrese Maxey (13 votes, seventh place) and Jalen Johnson (one vote, tied for 12th place) received their first straw poll votes.
