The competition for the league’s 15 All-NBA spots was fiercer than ever in 2020/21, with tens of millions of dollars up for grabs for certain players based on the voting results. Since the NBA has already started to announce its end-of-season award winners, we want to give you an opportunity to vote on the All-NBA rosters for 2020/21 before they’re officially revealed.
We’re starting today with the First Team before moving onto the Second Team on Friday and the Third Team early next week.
Because we want to essentially put you in the position of the media members who had All-NBA votes, we’re going to make certain players eligible at multiple positions, as they were on the official ballots. Here, via Howard Beck of SI.com (Twitter links), are the most notable multi-position eligible players:
Players eligible at both center and forward:
Players eligible at both forward and guard:
- Devin Booker
- Jaylen Brown
- Jimmy Butler
- Luka Doncic
- Paul George
- LeBron James
- Zach LaVine
- Kawhi Leonard
- Khris Middleton
- Ben Simmons
- Jayson Tatum
Frankly, I find some of these classifications a little ridiculous — if the NBA is going to play this fast and loose with positional designations, why not just remove them altogether and let voters pick the 15 best players?
I don’t think it makes any sense to vote, say, Booker as a forward or Leonard as a guard. And Basketball-Reference’s data suggests Embiid has never played a single minute at forward in his entire NBA career.
Of course, making Embiid and Jokic eligible at two positions allows voters to put those two MVP finalists on the First Team. Beware if you decide to go that route though — placing Jokic and Embiid on the First Team may result in a fourth center making the Third Team over a more deserving guard or forward.
A couple more notes before we move onto the polls:
- If there’s a player you believe deserves All-NBA consideration who isn’t named below, be sure to mention him in the comment section — if I agree, I’ll make sure he’s included in our Second and Third Team polls.
- Be sure to take advantage of the opportunity to select two players apiece in both the guard and forward polls.
Vote for your All-NBA First Team below, then take to the comment section to explain your picks!
Guards
(choose two)
Trade Rumors app users, click here to vote on the All-NBA First Team guards.
Forwards
(choose two)
Trade Rumors app users, click here to vote on the All-NBA First Team forwards.
Center
Trade Rumors app users, click here to vote on the All-NBA First Team center.
I don’t understand why the NBA doesn’t just eliminate the positions on the All-NBA Teams. Jokic and Embiid as Forwards is laughable. Just eliminate the positions if you want to see both of them on the First Team instead of making fools of yourselves.
100%.
Forward
LeBron has 7% votes so far
1:30pm East
Yeah, the way this is set up is pretty ridiculous. Case in point, the top three in voting as I type this are not forwards at all in Giannis, Embiid and Doncic.
How is Giannis not a forward? He originally started out at SG/SF until he put on enough weight to move to PF. Maybe when he’s older he will move to center like Tim Duncan did.
The 2nd first team forward spot is the hardest one for me. I grew up in Philly. I love the Sixers. I think a healthy engaged Embiid is the most dominant player in the league right now. I can’t put him on 1st team this year. He is a center. Full stop. Same with Luka. He deserves to be first team also, but at the right position, guard. Problem is there is 2 guards who had a better season. So I went with Butler. Since he came back Miami has outscored opponents by almost 6 points per, they are 34-20 which is 3rd best in the East over that time. And Butler had an under the radar really good season. So he gets my vote.
Curry, Dame, Giannis, Butler, Jokic. First team
Now if the league did what they should, and did away with positions for first team, it would be Embiid, Jokic,Giannis, Curry, and Doncic
It’s a popularity contest…smdh
Curry, Kawhi, Giannis, Jokic, Embiid
My 1st Team:
Giannis
Embiid
Jokic
Doncic
Curry
Only one player born in the USA…
the world has officially caught up.
Except they haven’t.
No, they haven’t. The rest of the world will catch up when their Olympic rosters have NBA all-star caliber guys as the 4th or 5th guy off the bench.
It really is great isn’t it with the whole world thing …I kinda agree
odd but If I was able to start a team w 2 guys today it would be 2 white guys Luka and Joker . Nothing meaningful or significant; just odd
The world has officially caught up… these aren’t the days when you had a good foreign player here or there… Drazen, Arvydas, Yao, etc…
These players are now taking multiple spots on the All-NBA Teams all at one time.
Officially caught up!
This year is tough to me. Good players missed time and gm management with back to back gms and all. Luka – Curry – Giannis – Jokic – Randle
Tatum, Kawhi, AD can probably replace Randle. Kawhi and AD missed gms as did Bron. Tatum yes I can see that. But Celtics did worse than Knicks. Randle led NBA in mins played. Knicks not in playoffs without him. Celtics without Tatum, team healthy still in playoffs. So I go with Randle ….
Why are casuals putting Embiid and Jokic in the same team. Both are centers. It’s 1st All NBA Team – Not best 5 players. Make a choice.
Jokic is a point center, which equals forward. 1+5÷2=3. Anyway, it’s the best way to get both Jokic and Embiid first team.
The categories will have to be set aside this year.
Not a great year for forwards; picked James; if I did it again, I might pick three guards and two centers.
Also Curry, Doncic.
Embiid and Joker were the best 2 players this year and should be first team regardless of position. KAT should be on the 2nd or third team but I can’t think of another center worthy of all nba so this makes the ballot weird. If AD had a better year I’d say no issue but I feel like throwing him there over a guard is a cop out
A player leading a team to 20 something wins…should not be on the 2nd team or be barley even considered for the 3rd…
First team
Westbrook – Curry – Butler – Giannis – Jokic
First team (position-less)
Westbrook – Curry – Giannis – Embiid – Jokic
Just because a player leads him team in assists doesn’t automatically make him a PG. Is Nikola Jokic a PG? Of course not. Draymond has led the Warriors in assists for 6 years in a row, is he a PG? No. Just because Giannis, Doncic, LeBron, Simmons, and Tatum get a bunch of assists doesn’t make them PG’s. These guys are all point forwards (like Scottie Pippen), a position that has existed for decades.
People getting caught up in the semantics…it’s not a real team. It’s an arbitrary, subjective award to begin with. No promises, no guarantees.
Westbrook barely got named to the 3rd team in each of the last two seasons. Now he gets all bent out of shape because some Sixers fan dumped popcorn on him. Cry me a river. He acts like the popcorn was covered with molten butter and he suffered second degree burns going after the guy and needing 4 or 5 others to hold him back.
Russ is a punk, so glad the Rockets got rid of him for a class act like John Wall.