{"id":484667,"date":"2026-02-20T14:55:56","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T13:55:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/?p=484667"},"modified":"2026-02-20T14:55:56","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T13:55:56","slug":"espn-nba-mvp-straw-poll-gilgeous-alexander-leads-jokic-as-cunningham-wembanyama-chase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/espn-nba-mvp-straw-poll-gilgeous-alexander-leads-jokic-as-cunningham-wembanyama-chase\/","title":{"rendered":"ESPN NBA MVP Straw Poll: Gilgeous-Alexander leads Jokic as Cunningham, Wembanyama chase"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-start=\"1518\" data-end=\"1810\"><strong data-start=\"1518\" data-end=\"1545\">Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/strong> sits atop ESPN\u2019s latest <strong data-start=\"1570\" data-end=\"1588\">MVP Straw Poll<\/strong>, collecting 930 points and 78 first-place votes ahead of <strong data-start=\"1646\" data-end=\"1662\">Nikola Jokic<\/strong> (720 points, 18 first-place votes).<br data-start=\"1698\" data-end=\"1701\" \/>Per Tim Bontemps, it\u2019s Shai\u2019s fourth straight poll lead\u2014something that hadn\u2019t happened in the poll\u2019s history.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1812\" data-end=\"2075\">Jokic remains a clear No. 2, but ESPN\u2019s read is that <strong data-start=\"1865\" data-end=\"1886\">Victor Wembanyama<\/strong> is the most likely alternative if Shai doesn\u2019t win.<br data-start=\"1938\" data-end=\"1941\" \/>That hinges on Wembanyama\u2019s surge after an early-season injury and the possibility the Spurs could jump OKC for the West\u2019s No. 1 seed.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"2077\" data-end=\"2362\">Only Shai, Jokic, <strong data-start=\"2095\" data-end=\"2114\">Cade Cunningham<\/strong> and Wembanyama received at least one first-place vote, with Shai the only player on every ballot.<br data-start=\"2212\" data-end=\"2215\" \/>The full list of vote-getters also includes Don\u010di\u0107, Jaylen Brown, Donovan Mitchell, Kawhi Leonard, Jalen Brunson, Tyrese Maxey and Anthony Edwards.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"2364\" data-end=\"2436\"><em data-start=\"2364\" data-end=\"2393\">Source: ESPN (Tim Bontemps)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Shai tops Bontemps\u2019 latest poll with 78 first-place votes to Jokic\u2019s 18, extending a four-straight run as No. 1<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":371897,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_spbk_hide_featured":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[399],"tags":[],"rumors":[],"typology":[],"posizionamento":[],"class_list":["post-484667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nba"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2024\/02\/Oklahoma-City-Thunder.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484667\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/371897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484667"},{"taxonomy":"rumors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rumors?post=484667"},{"taxonomy":"typology","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/typology?post=484667"},{"taxonomy":"posizionamento","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posizionamento?post=484667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}