Jimmy Butler wins Most Improved Player Award

[Scoot26]

NEW YORK — The Chicago Bulls' Jimmy Butler, who earned his first All-Star selection and set career highs in scoring, rebounding and assists, has won the 2014-15 Kia NBA Most Improved Player Award, the NBA announced today. Butler becomes the first player to win the award with the Bulls.

The award is designed to honor an up-and-coming player who has made a dramatic improvement from the previous season or seasons. Butler, 25, received 92 of 129 first-place votes and 535 total points from a panel of sportswriters and broadcasters throughout the United States and Canada. Draymond Green of the Golden State Warriors (11 first-place votes, 200 points) and Rudy Gobert of the Utah Jazz (12 first-place votes, 189 points) finished second and third, respectively. Players were awarded five points for each first-place vote, three points for each second-place vote and one point for each third-place vote.

Butler, in his fourth NBA season, averaged 20.0 points (15th in the NBA), 5.8 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.75 steals (11th in the NBA) in a league-leading 38.7 minutes for a Chicago team that went 50-32 and secured the third seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs. The 6-7 guard shot 46.2 percent from the field and 37.8 percent from three-point range. He also ranked seventh in the league in free throw attempts with 463 and converted a career-high 83.4 percent from the foul line in 65 games.

Last season, Butler averaged the same number of minutes and scored 13.1 points per game on 39.7 percent shooting from the field. His 6.9-point increase from 2013-14 to this season was the highest among all players who appeared in at least 40 games in each season, and his 6.5-percent improvement in field goal accuracy ranked second among players with at least 600 attempts in each season (Golden State's Harrison Barnes improved by 8.3 percent).

As part of its support of the Kia NBA Most Improved Player Award, Kia Motors America (KMA) will donate an all-new and more capable than ever 2016 Kia Sorento LX CUV to a charity of Butler's choice on his behalf. Kia Motors presents a Sorento to the charity of choice of each of five 2014-15 year-end award winners as part of the Kia NBA Performance Awards. After this season, Kia Motors will have donated a total of 38 new vehicles to charitable organizations since its support of the NBA's prestigious honors began in 2008.

The 2014-15 Kia NBA Most Improved Player Award is part of the Kia NBA Performance Awards, a series of oncourt performance awards. The series, in its eighth season, is part of a multiyear marketing partnership between KMA and the NBA, and includes five of the league's most prestigious year-end honors: Kia Most Valuable Player, Kia Defensive Player of the Year, Kia Sixth Man Award, Kia Most Improved Player and Kia Rookie of the Year. The series also includes the Kia NBA Eastern and Western Conference Rookies of the Month and the Kia NBA Eastern and Western Conference Players of the Month during the regular season. Kia Motors is the Official Automotive Partner of the NBA, and the Kia Optima is the league's Official Vehicle. For more information, please visitwww.kia.com/NBA.

For the second year in a row, complete media voting results for each NBA annual award will be posted on NBA.com/official after the announcement of each winner. Click here for those results.

Below are the voting results for the 2014-15 Kia NBA Most Improved Player Award. The balloting was tabulated by the independent accounting firm of Ernst & Young LLP.

2014-15 Kia NBA Most Improved Player Award Results

Name / Team 1st (5 pts) 2nd (3 pts) 3rd (1 pt) TOTAL Jimmy Butler (Chicago) 92 23 6 535 Draymond Green (Golden State) 11 43 16 200 Rudy Gobert (Utah) 12 32 33 189 Hassan Whiteside (Miami) 5 12 27 88 Klay Thompson (Golden State) 2 8 8 42 Anthony Davis (New Orleans) 4 2 1 27 Giannis Antetokounmpo (Milw) 1 3 8 22 Donatas Motiejunas (Houston) -- 1 4 7 Dennis Schröder (Atlanta) -- 1 3 6 DeMarre Carroll (Atlanta) 1 -- -- 5 Tyler Zeller (Boston) 1 -- -- 5 DeMarcus Cousins (Sacramento) -- 1 1 4 Khris Middleton (Milwaukee) -- -- 4 4 Kyrie Irving (Cleveland) -- -- 3 3 Victor Oladipo (Orlando) -- 1 -- 3 DeAndre Jordan (L.A. Clippers) -- 1 -- 3 Jae Crowder (Boston) -- 1 -- 3 Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (Detroit) -- -- 2 2 Nikola Vucevic (Orlando) -- -- 2 2 Robert Covington (Philadelphia) -- -- 1 1 Tyreke Evans (New Orleans) -- -- 1 1 Derrick Favors (Utah) -- -- 1 1 Marc Gasol (Memphis) -- -- 1 1 Tobias Harris (Orlando) -- -- 1 1 Gordon Hayward (Utah) -- -- 1 1 George Hill (Indiana) -- -- 1 1 Enes Kanter (Oklahoma City) -- -- 1 1 Brandon Knight (Phoenix) -- -- 1 1 Kawhi Leonard (San Antonio) -- -- 1 1 Meyers Leonard (Portland) -- -- 1 1

http://www.nba.com/2015/news/05/07/...oved-player-award-official-release/index.html

 

[clonetrooper264]

https://twitter.com/KCJHoop/status/595986294485983233

Interesting note of concern:

The Bulls have lost every playoff game since Michael Jordan that they've had a award presentation at.

2005- BG wins 6th man of the year - Bulls lose Game 5 to Wizards
2009 -Rose wins Rookie of the Year - Bulls lose Game 3 to the Celtics
2011 -Rose wins MVP/Thibodeau win Coach of the Year - Bulls lose Game 1 to the Hawks
2014 -Noah wins Defensive Player of the Year Award - Bulls lose Game 2 to the Wizards

Well crap...guess we're losing both home games then...

 

[Scoot26]

Well crap...guess we're losing both home games then...

 

[Scoot26]

Its now official

 

[clonetrooper264]

Kyrie and Marc Gasol got votes...interesting. Also kinda surprised by the landslide victory. Thought Draymond would be right up there.

 

[Crystallas]

Writers think Green's hiding on a stacked team, thus makes it easier for him to make an impact and get stats. I would have voted for Green myself. But still, congrats to Jimmy!

 

[zack54attack]

Presser now.

 

[Delly4MVP]

Rightly so, and back when LeBron won his MVP's in CLE we always played very poorly, him specifically.

 

[knoxville7]

what i wanna know is, what bean eating boston **** gave tyler zeller a first place vote??? :lol:

 

[clonetrooper264]

what i wanna know is, what bean eating boston **** gave tyler zeller a first place vote??? :lol:

LOL I didn't even notice. He did improve though.

 

[Diddy1122]

Writers think Green's hiding on a stacked team, thus makes it easier for him to make an impact and get stats. I would have voted for Green myself. But still, congrats to Jimmy!

You would've voted for Green??

Jimmy lead the team in scoring, was an all-star, and should be named 1st team all NBA this year. Green IS hiding on a stacked team. Sure, he's improved his shooting tremendously, however he did not produce anything near the level of what Jimmy has done and will likely be exposed more when he leaves the team after getting a massive payday in the off season. To me, Green is Brandon Bass with a 3 point shot, which isn't a knock really but he seems quite overrated to me.

 

[Crystallas]

You would've voted for Green??

Jimmy lead the team in scoring, was an all-star, and should be named 1st team all NBA this year. Green IS hiding on a stacked team. Sure, he's improved his shooting tremendously, however he did not produce anything near the level of what Jimmy has done and will likely be exposed more when he leaves the team after getting a massive payday in the off season. To me, Green is Brandon Bass with a 3 point shot, which isn't a knock really but he seems quite overrated to me.

Yes, MIP. Most improved player. I think Butler has shown in the last few seasons that he's capable of what he did this year and he did improve. Green took a much bigger leap IMO.

 

[Diddy1122]

Yes, MIP. Most improved player. I think Butler has shown in the last few seasons that he's capable of what he did this year and he did improve. Green took a much bigger leap IMO.

Jimmy took the biggest leap in scoring (6.9 ppg), and 2nd in FG% (39% to 46%), while still improving his All-NBA defense. That's the definition of being the MIP. That's why it was a landslide victory.

I dare say a single person on the planet thought that Jimmy would be this good. 15-17 ppg maaaaybe but 20+, leading the team in scoring, and becoming an All-Star? No one saw that coming at all. Even Jimmy admitted as much in his speech.