Jim Souhan: After a historic season, why not MVPhee?

Jim Souhan, The Minnesota Star Tribune on Sep 23, 2025

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

MINNEAPOLIS — Aren’t Minnesotans tired of seeing their best athletes get snubbed by voters who favor those coastal elite cities instead of flyover country?

Or, in this case, voters who favor fly-to-and-come-home-broke country?

A’ja Wilson is a great player. In the last week, the star of the Las Vegas Aces has crashed a party that should have feted the Lynx.

On Sunday, the WNBA revealed that Wilson was voted the league’s Most Valuable Player.

Last week, Lynx defensive ace Alanna Smith had to share the Defensive Player of the Year award with Wilson.

I hate sounding like a homer — someone who joins the cult of local fans in thinking that local athletes should be favored over all others.

I’m going to sound like a homer in this column. My apologies.

I think the voters took the easy way out. They gave another MVP trophy to Wilson because she represents the default position in competition for that award.

She led the league in scoring, outrebounded Lynx star Napheesa Collier, has been considered a great player much longer than Collier, and led her team on a 16-game winning streak to end the regular season.

Wilson is also an excellent defender. This is why, as of a year ago, Wilson was considered the best player in the world.

Maybe her late-season surge reestablished her in that role, after Collier spent most of this season seizing that particular title. But I think Collier had the better regular season.

Collier was by far the best player on by far the best team in the WNBA. She not only accumulated an impressive array of stats, her style of play and unselfishness also allowed Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve to build an overachieving basketball machine that relies on ball movement and defensive cohesiveness.

Last year, Collier was named the league’s Defensive Player of the Year. She probably could have won the award again, but she lobbied for Smith, her teammate, an act of generosity that surprised no one.

This was the best reason to vote for Collier over Wilson:

Wilson had another impressive season. Collier made history.

Collier became the second player in league history to finish with a 50-40-90 shooting line — 50% or better from the field, 40% from the 3-point line and 90% from the free-throw line. She is the first player in league history to do so while averaging 20-plus points per game.

Let’s wrap all of that in one big burrito of accomplishment: The reigning Defensive Player of the Year was historically good on offense in categories that require no subjective analysis.

If Wilson is going to be given the award every time she has a strong season, no one else will win it until she retires.

Collier was uniquely great this season and might never replicate the parameters of her current greatness. That’s why voters need to wear blinders when voting. Wilson’s past excellence should not have influenced anyone’s thinking.

There is one other way to measure these players. Stars influence winning in basketball more than any other major sport.

Wilson helped her team to 30 victories. Collier helped her team to 34 wins, tying a league record.

What’s interesting about these awards is that the standards seem to shift depending on the honor.

If Wilson was going to get the benefit of the doubt over a less-decorated rival who was historically good, why did the Coach of the Year award go to Golden State’s Natalie Nakase and not the future Hall of Famer who produced a record-tying number of victories with a roster filled with role players?

Reeve has reestablished herself, over the last two seasons, as the best coach in the league.

As a former voter of baseball awards, I recognize what happened in this case. The best baseball manager rarely wins Manager of the Year. The manager who is perceived to have sparked the most surprising success usually wins it.

I believe it’s easier to coach or manage an overmatched team to competence than it is to coach or manage a good team to greatness.

So, if I were voting, I would have looked like a homer. I would have picked Collier for MVP, Smith for Defensive Player of the Year and Reeve for Coach of the Year.

____