National Basketball Association award
The Bill Russell NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Award (formerly known as the NBA Finals Most Valuable 😄 Player Award) is an annual National Basketball Association (NBA) award given since the 1969 NBA Finals.
The award is decided by 😄 a panel of eleven media members, who cast votes after the conclusion of the Finals.
The person with the highest number 😄 of votes wins the award.
[1] The award was originally a black trophy with a gold basketball-shaped sphere at the top, 😄 similar to the Larry O'Brien Trophy, until a new trophy was introduced in 2005 to commemorate Bill Russell.[2][3]
Since its inception, 😄 the award has been given 55 times to 34 players.
Michael Jordan is a record six-time award winner.
[4] LeBron James has 😄 won the award four times in his career, and Magic Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal, and Tim Duncan won three times each.
Jordan 😄 and O'Neal are the only players to win the award in three consecutive seasons (Jordan accomplished the feat on two 😄 occasions).
Johnson is the only rookie ever to win the award,[5] as well as the youngest at 20 years and 276 😄 days old.
[6][7] In 1985, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar became the oldest to win at 38 years and 54 days old.
[8] Andre Iguodala 😄 is the only winner to have not started every game in the series.
[9] In the 1969 finals, Jerry West, the 😄 first-ever awardee, is the only person to win the award while being on the losing team.[4]
Willis Reed, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar,[a] Larry 😄 Bird, Hakeem Olajuwon, Kobe Bryant, Kawhi Leonard and Kevin Durant won the award twice.
Olajuwon, Durant, Bryant, and James have won 😄 the award in two consecutive seasons.
James is the only player to have won the award with three different teams,[10] while 😄 he and Leonard are the only players to have won the award in both conferences.
[11] Johnson, Moses Malone, Durant, and 😄 Leonard are the only players to have been named Finals MVP in their first season with a team.
[12] Olajuwon of 😄 Nigeria (who became a naturalized U.S.
citizen in 1993), Tony Parker of France, Dirk Nowitzki of Germany, Giannis Antetokounmpo of Greece, 😄 and Nikola Jokić of Serbia are the only international players to win the award.
Duncan is an American citizen, but is 😄 considered an "international" player by the NBA because he was not born in one of the fifty states or Washington, 😄 D.C.
[13] Parker, Nowitzki, Antetokounmpo and Jokić are the only winners to have been trained totally outside the U.S.
; Olajuwon played 😄 college basketball at Houston and Duncan at Wake Forest.
Cedric Maxwell and Chauncey Billups are the only Finals MVP winners eligible 😄 for the Hall of Fame who have not been voted in.[14]
On February 14, 2009, during the 2009 NBA All-Star Weekend 😄 in Phoenix, then-NBA Commissioner David Stern announced that the award would be renamed the "Bill Russell NBA Finals Most Valuable 😄 Player Award" in honor of 11-time NBA champion Bill Russell.
[15]Winners [ edit ]
Jerry West, the inaugural recipient, is the only 😄 player to win the award while being on the losing team.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who won twice in 1971 and 1985, holds 😄 the record for the longest gap between awards
Magic Johnson is the only player to win the award as a rookie.
Michael 😄 Jordan has won the award a record six times.
Shaquille O'Neal is the only player other than Michael Jordan to have 😄 won the award three times consecutively.
Tony Parker was the second player born outside the US to win the award, joining 😄 Hakeem Olajuwon.
LeBron James (pictured) is the only player to win the award with three different teams.
Giannis Antetokounmpo (pictured) is the 😄 first player from Greece to win the award.
Nikola Jokić (pictured) is the first player from Serbia to win the award.
^ 😄 Denotes player who is still active in the NBA * Elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Bold 😄 Denotes player included in the NBA 75th Anniversary Team § Player's team lost the NBA Finals Player (X) Denotes the 😄 number of times the player had received the Finals MVP award Team (X) Denotes the number of times a player 😄 from this team has received the Finals MVP award
Multi-time winners [ edit ]Teams [ edit ]See also [ edit ]Notes 😄 [ edit ]
a b c [16] Before the 1971–72 season, Lew Alcindor changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
a b [17] 😄 Hakeem Olajuwon was born in Nigeria , but became a naturalized United States citizen in 1993.
a b c [18] he 😄 was able to play for the U.S.internationally.
[19] Because Tim Duncan is a United States citizen by birth, as are all 😄 natives of the U.S.
Virgin Islands,he was able to play for the U.S.internationally.
^ [20] Tony Parker was born in Belgium.
He holds 😄 French citizenship and plays for their national teamReferences [ edit ]General
