In baseball, one player from the American League and one player from the National League get an MVP award which gives them the recognition of being the best player in their respective leagues. In 2018, Mookie Betts of the Boston Red Sox who play in the American League East division won the American League MVP award and Christian Yelich of the Milwaukee Brewers who played in the National League Central division won the National League MVP. The NBA should follow MLB's lead and have an MVP award for each conference.

Too many players worthy of MVP

Basketball is filled with superstars with almost every team having at least one player who is superstar caliber.

There are even teams that have multiple superstars on their rosters like the Warriors, 76ers, and Rockets. Some teams have great players on their roster who are overshadowed by a better player on their team like Eric Bledsoe and Khris Middleton of the Bucks, Kyle Lowry of the Raptors, and Jamal Murray of the Nuggets.

The Eastern conference has plenty of names that are worth being talked about in the MVP race and the Western conference is loaded with superstar caliber players. The Eastern Conference has Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kawhi Leonard, Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons while the Western Conference has LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Steph Curry and James Harden.

With the exception of Simmons, all the players mentioned are averaging more than 25 points a game while Simmons is fairly close to averaging a triple-double with 16.5 points, 9.5 rebounds and 8.1 assists.

Those guys are all fantastic players, they are the reasons why their respective teams are at the top of the standings and they're all competing for one MVP award which could be won by any player in the NBA. While everyone knows who the favorites are to win the award [VIDEO] before the season starts, everyone has an equal chance to win the award when everyone's averages are 0 points, 0 assists and 0 rebounds before anyone plays a game.

As said before, everyone knows who the favorites are but you never know who might break out and be a surprise player.

Players have a better chance of winning MVP if awarded to best player per conference

If the NBA had an MVP award for each conference, players would have a better chance of winning the award -- which goes a long way for guys who are great players but don't get the recognition they deserve.

With an awards show now the way the NBA announces the award winners for each award, if they had an MVP award for each conference, they could announce the top three candidates from each league from the award, giving players more recognition for their play.

If the NBA were to change to giving out MVP awards to the best player in each conference, this would help get more recognition for a player like Damian Lillard. Lillard plays on the small market Trail Blazers. Lillard is averaging 26.1 points, 6.2 assists and 4.5 rebounds and is a huge reason why the Trail Blazzers are currently fourth in their conference.

Despite being one of the more marketable players in the league, Kyrie Irving would benefit from having a MVP award for each conference as he is a remarkable player but has yet to come anywhere close to winning an MVP award as he is competing with other top players in the league.

Irving is averaging 23.5 points, 6.9 assists and 4.8 rebounds. If there was a MVP award that was given out to the best player from each conference, he'd have a much better shot of winning and could eventually one day win the award.

Last season, the MVP finalists were James Harden, LeBron James and Anthony Davis, but everyone knew that the winner would be either Harden or LeBron with most people predicting that LeBron would walk away with the award. Turned out that Harden won the award. In 72 games, Harden averaged 30.4 points, 8.8 assists and 5.4 rebounds while averaging 35.4 minutes a game but LeBron didn't miss a single game all year and averaged 27.5 points, 9.1 assists and 8.6 rebounds while averaging 36.9 minutes a game.

As a member of the Cavaliers last season, LeBron was the only reason why the team was good. LeBron carried his team all the way to the finals only to be swept by the Warriors who had two-time MVP winner Steph Curry and one-time MVP winner Kevin Durant.

If there were awards given out to the best player from each conference last year, LeBron would have had his fourth MVP award and would have inched closer to being considered the greatest player of all time and besting Michael Jordan, who won five MVP awards as the greatest to ever play the game of basketball. Also if MVP awards were given out to the best player from each conference, the finalists could have been as follows:

Eastern Conference: LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo, DeMar DeRozan

Western Conference: James Harden, Anthony Davis, Damian Lillard

Both Lillard and DeRozan are players who have called out their lack of recognition and giving out the MVP award to the best player in each conference would give players like Lillard and DeRozan more recognition for their on-court performance. Even though neither would have won the award, the fact that they were a nominee would go a long way for them and other players in the league.
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