The NBA will announce individual awards over the next several weeks and OKC Thunder guard Lu Dort is a contender for Defensive Player of the Year.

In a good year, there might three exciting awards races by the time we reach April in the NBA. There are often one or two. It's a function of the 82-game season. Favorites tend to pull away from the pack by the end of the season.

Awards voting is an inexact science. There’s no metric that makes the difference. Quantifying impact isn’t easy.