“Most Valuable Player,” is a tricky little phrase. “Most” and “Player” are clearly defined. “Value” is not so easy to pin down. Actually, value is so hard to pin down that we might as well not even

try. The term ought to be tossed in the same dusty storage locker as Ken Caminiti’s old MVP trophy. Still, the MVP “race” is never far from fan’s minds, and rarely, very rarely, a player will emerge who’s value is absolutely undeniable. As Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart once said of porno, “I know it when I see it.” Despite this, every year we try to force greatness upon players, rather than waiting for it to come to us.

Often, we attempt to infer something about player value from team success. This is based on the assumption that a truly valuable player will be on a good team. If his team is not good, then the player couldn’t be that valuable anyway.

This reasoning is flawed. The intangibles behind the success of a team are not necessarily and not usually due to some bonus uncharitable value that just happens to belong to the team’s statistically best player. Nevertheless, the perception that superstars are solely responsible for the achievements of their teams is still held as fact by the general public.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Look at the San Diego Chargers. For four or so years, the Chargers were a consistently successful team behind stud tailback LaDainian Tomlinson. LT put up some epic seasons from a scorekeeping point of view, and in 2007 the media eagerly bestowed LT with the title of MVP. Their rationale was that LT generated huge statistics on a good team, and the Chargers owed their achievements to him.

Lo and behold, LT has stunk it up for the past two years, but you couldn’t tell from the Chargers. The boys in blue have made the playoffs anyway, not skipping a beat. How valuable could LT have been if his drastic downturn didn’t effect his team’s results in any way?

Last year, Kobe Bryant was awarded the NBA’s Most Valuable Player Trophy. This was a mistake. Falling into the team success trap, the voters rewarded Bryant for his team’s jump to the top of the Western Conference. In doing so, they ignored the fact that, oh, I don’t know, the best offensive center in the league joined his team mid-season.

Still, there are rare occasions when an individual singlehandedly lifts his team, whether it is from craptastic to respectable or from mediocre to great. Two players are having such seasons in the NBA right now. In Miami, Dwyane Wade has taken a team that won only 18% of its games last year to the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference. The before and after is clear. Last year Miami either had a crippled Wade playing or an entirely disabled Wade watching from the stands. The presence of Dwyane Wade has tripled Miami’s winning percentage.

Meanwhile, in Cleveland, LeBron James is accomplishing something even more spectacular. Not only is he guiding a team to the playoffs all on his lonesome, he has thrust the Cavs to the best record in the league. One man has taken over the NBA.

Make no mistake, the other Cavaliers (minus Mo Williams) are truly awful. LeBron, and LeBron alone, is responsible for 66 wins against the best basketball players in the world. Jordan couldn’t do by himself in Chicago. Kobe couldn’t do it in LA. Wilt couldn’t do it in Philedelphia. If the Cavaliers end up winning the championship against the Lakers, LeBron’s season will rate as the greatest of all time.

When Lebron is announced as MVP later this week, the media will make a small commotion. Yet to LeBron himself, it will be as if nothing happened. The NBA playoffs feature the greatest athletes in the world, but one man will stand out. LeBron James is one of the few indisputable MVPs in history, and it is a remarkable privilege to be able to watch him.