Welcome to theScore's 2016-17 NBA preview, where you'll find comprehensive coverage of all 30 teams and storylines to watch this season.
Several Vegas books have hitched their wagon to Russell Westbrook winning his first NBA MVP award this season, and it's easy to see why.
Abandoned by Kevin Durant, the Oklahoma City Thunder are now all his, and Russ is primed to manifest his basketball rage upon the world.
It's going to make for (whatever's left of) "appointment viewing" and spawn many League Pass alerts - especially when the Golden State Warriors are his opponents - but capturing his first Maurice Podoloff Trophy is far from a given for Westbrook.
Related: Westbrook says he still hasn't spoken to Durant
With the exception of the lockout-shortened seasons of 1998-99 and 2011-12, no NBA MVP has played on a team that won fewer than 50 games and finished lower than third in its conference since the Houston Rockets' Moses Malone in 1982 - six years before Westbrook was born.
If healthy, the Thunder should make the playoffs in 2016-17, but 50 wins and the No. 3 seed might be a stretch. That, of course, doesn't mean Russ winning the award can't happen. The literal definition of MVP is most valuable player, something Westbrook undoubtedly is to OKC. Whatever the Thunder do - whether they win 52 games and finish third or 45 and finish sixth - it'll be on his back.
The closest point of reference we have to what Westbrook could do this year is his electric 2014-15 performance, when Durant missed 55 games with foot ailments. There was a stretch during that campaign when Westbrook playing basketball was more dangerous from a flammability standpoint than smoking at a gas station.
Between Jan. 16 and the end of that season, he averaged 30 points, 9.4 assists, and 8.2 rebounds per game. Included in that stretch were each of his league-leading 11 triple-doubles and 15 of his 17 games of 35 points or more.
However, unleashing Russ didn't get the Thunder to the postseason, as a 4-7 finish left Oklahoma City on the wrong end of a tiebreaker with the New Orleans Pelicans for the West's final playoff spot.
It's partly for that reason he didn't get a single first-place vote in MVP balloting that year, finishing a distant fourth behind Stephen Curry, James Harden, and LeBron James. The Pelicans' Anthony Davis had the 12th-best player-efficiency rating of all time that season and finished behind Westbrook.
What should help Westbrook's case in 2016-17 is the fact that his competition for the award is essentially those same players (plus Durant); and each contender comes with a catch when considering their MVP candidacy.
Durant and Curry may well form one of the greatest duos in basketball history, but could cancel each other out statistically for MVP. Like Westbrook, Harden and Davis are on teams that probably aren't top-three material. James' title as best current NBA player is safely intact, but he'll play his 1,000th regular-season game in November and turn 32 a month later.
Related: 2016-17 NBA Season Preview: Oklahoma City Thunder
Conversely, there's the reality of Westbrook's game and the various knocks on his efficiency. Beyond being a whirling dervish of basketball explosiveness, he's not a consistent 3-point threat and has only shot above than 44 percent from the floor three times in his eight-year career.
In the last 50 years, only Derrick Rose (2011) and Allen Iverson (2001) won the NBA MVP award with a sub-45 percent field-goal percentage, and both were catalysts for No. 1 seeds. Westbrook comes into this season with a career mark of 43.5, including a 42.6 percent clip during his unconscious 2014-15 campaign.
Still, betting on Westbrook doesn't feel overly risky. In a league that experienced the shift the NBA did this offseason, cases perhaps can be made for other MVP candidates like Harden, Davis, and Paul George - who all feature on teams that aren't currently considered championship contenders.
And when it comes to Russ, never doubt a motivated person.
