15 Underrated Seasons from The Past 15 Years (2003-2004 to 2017-2018)

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Kobe and Steve Nash

As NBA seasons come and go, some are made more memorable than others by notable extraordinary performances from the best of the best, or even some flash-in-the-pan who just happens to catch lightning in a bottle. (That 2015-2016 season by Stephen Curry and the 73-9 Warriors makes that season a tiny bit more memorable.) Most of the time, when a superstar goes supernova, this usually translates to wins, and usually translates to winning the highly coveted MVP award.

However, there are also times when someone goes all out, only for it to be overshadowed by an even better season from another player. There are seasons when even the most impressive stat-lines get overshadowed by a greater narrative, or a player with a more stellar reputation leaguewide, which can be seen in the 16-17 and 10-11 seasons, respectively. (I’m not saying that Derrick Rose didn’t deserve it, it’s just that someone else probably deserved it more.)

It’s time to get those players more recognition than they have gotten. It’s time to look back at some of the most incredible seasons from players who didn’t win the MVP award in that particular season. Some MVP snubs are more egregious than others, and some seasons are not really that underrated, but there are some stellar individual seasons that tend to fly under the radar just because the player didn’t win the MVP award.

Note: I only included one individual season per player and one from each season, spanning from the 2003-2004 season to the 2017-2018 iteration of the NBA.

As a four-year pro at the time, even greater things were expected out of CP3, especially after a season where he averaged 17.3 points, 8.9 assists, and 4.4 rebounds per game. However, the Hornets weren’t able to do much in the 06-07 season, finishing with a mediocre 39-43 record.

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