NBA MVP race 2025-26: Shai, Wemby and Jokić are trading haymakers in a season that refuses to pick one king

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official editorial policy or position of LiveScore.

The 2025-26 MVP race has turned into a three-lane drag race with the finish line still shimmering in the distance. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Victor Wembanyama and Nikola Jokić are the main contenders, with Luka Dončić lurking in the conversation but likely ruled out by the 65-game eligibility line because of injury. Poor Luka, after a super season it feels wrong, but rules are rules. This is not a year for polite nods and résumé nostalgia. This is a year where the numbers are loud enough to rattle the backboard. 

SGA’s case for MVP

Start with Shai, because his case has the cleanest shape. He is averaging 31.5 points, 4.4 rebounds and 6.6 assists, while NBA.com’s MVP Ladder notes that no guard has ever averaged 30 a night this efficiently. That is the sort of sentence that lands with a small explosion. Gilgeous-Alexander has the most 30-point games in under 30 minutes per game and the fewest turnovers per game by a 30-point scorer. In other words, he is not just piling up points. He is scoring with surgical neatness, squeezing maximum damage from every touch, every drive, every leaning mid-range dagger. 

And MVP races are never only about the arithmetic of the individual. They are about the geometry of team success too. The Thunder have spent the season near the top of the West, and Shai’s statistical profile fits the old MVP template beautifully: elite scorer, highly efficient, lead ball-handler, best player on one of the league’s best teams. There is no wasted motion in his candidacy. It is sleek, brutal and very hard to poke holes in. When a scorer is living above 30 a game and barely coughing the ball up, that starts to feel less like a hot season and more like a controlled demolition of defensive schemes. 

Wemby’s Lofty Heights

Then there is Wembanyama, whose case looks different because it stretches across both sides of the floor like a shadow at sunset. NBA.com’s MVP Ladder had him first in both the March 27 and April 3 editions, with his season line moving from 24.2 points, 11.2 rebounds and 3.1 blocks to 24.7 points, 11.5 rebounds and 3.1 blocks. That block number is the eye-catcher, but it is the context that really makes it sing. He was averaging nearly as many blocks as several teams were as a unit, and doing it while playing under 30 minutes a game. That is absurd production packed into a relatively small time slot, like someone fitting an entire action movie into a half-hour sitcom window. 

Wembanyama’s MVP push is powered by scarcity. There just are not many players who can anchor a defense, threaten Defensive Player of the Year territory and still post frontline offensive numbers on a playoff heavyweight. The Spurs’ rise has sharpened his argument because MVP voters love visible team transformation. The big Frenchman is not simply accumulating stats. He is bending games, detouring possessions and turning the paint into private property. If Shai’s case is velvet and precision, Wemby’s is a giant neon sign blinking at both rims. 

Jokić’s Consistency Shines

And then the old master lumbers in, somehow making genius look routine again. Jokić is averaging 27.8 points, 12.8 rebounds and 10.8 assists, which is cartoonishly good for anyone, never mind a center. He is poised to become the first player to lead the league in rebounds and assists in the same season while also finishing near the top of the scoring race. That is not an MVP case so much as a statistical hallucination. He remains the league’s great cheat code, a player who can control tempo, rebounding, creation and scoring without ever seeming to break into a sprint. 

Jokić’s challenge is not the quality of his season. It is voter fatigue and the inconvenience of competing against two campaigns that feel new in different ways. Shai has the sleek modern-guard dominance. Wemby has the futuristic two-way terror. Jokić, by contrast, is posting another season that would have felt impossible a decade ago, and doing it with such calm that it can look normal. It is not normal. A center averaging basically a 28-point triple-double while threatening to lead the league in both rebounds and assists is basketball alchemy. He is not your flashy, typical NBA star. Jokić has that Eastern European humbleness about him. He gets about his job. Frighteningly well, but often goes unnoticed as he is so underrated and allergic to the spotlight.

We have to talk about Luka Magic

Dončić deserves a mention because on pure production he belongs in this room. NBA.com had him at 33.6 points, 7.8 rebounds and 8.3 assists in its March 27 ladder, with 60- and 50-point eruptions helping to fuel his charge. Unfortunately, injury is likely to keep him from reaching the 65-game threshold, which turns his candidacy from live wire to lovely footnote. That is the cruelty of modern awards voting: the spreadsheet has a bouncer now. 

So where does that leave the race? Right now it feels like Wembanyama versus Gilgeous-Alexander, with Jokić still hovering like a genius plot twist nobody should dismiss. Wemby has the all-court distortion field. Shai has the cleanest blend of scoring volume, efficiency and team dominance. Jokić has the most ridiculous box-score footprint of the lot. Any one of them would be a worthy MVP. This season’s argument is not about finding the one obvious winner. It is about deciding which version of greatness has been the hardest to ignore.