I, along with several other SB Nation team bloggers, submitted a metaphorical ballot (I don't have an actual vote) for each of the 2012 NBA awards. The complete list of winners can be found here. Real quickly, here's my ballot:
Most Valuable Player: LeBron James. Love him or hate him, but he's the obvious choice here after submitting arguably the finest season of his career. My finalists (in order): Chris Paul, Kevin Durant, Tony Parker, Kobe Bryant.
Coach of the Year: I went with Tom Thibodeau of the Bulls for keeping his team atop the Eastern Conference despite missing Derrick Rose for half the year and not having Rip Hamilton and Luol Deng for stretches as well. In my mind, it was an even better coaching job than what he submitted in 2010-11, when he won the award. The majority of bloggers voted for Gregg Popovich just like the real voters did, and I don't have too many quarrels with that. My finalists (in order): Popovich, Lionel Hollins, Larry Drew, Ty Corbin.
Defensive Player of the Year: I went with Tyson Chandler, and I think it's pretty obvious. The Knicks went from being one of the worst defensive teams in the league to one of the best, and he was the most significant reason why. My finalists (in order): Dwight Howard, Kevin Garnett, Andre Iguodala, LeBron James.
Sixth Man of the Year: James Harden. Pretty obvious. My finalists (in order): Thaddeus Young, Lou Williams, Al Harrington, Taj Gibson.
Rookie of the Year: Kyrie Irving. Another pretty obvious pick. My finalists (in order): Isaiah Thomas, Kenneth Faried, Ricky Rubio, Kawhi Leonard.
Executive of the Year: I hate this award, but I went with R.C. Buford for his expert job retooling the Spurs' depth this year. Larry Bird ultimately won the award. My finalists (in order): Neil Olshey, Larry Bird, Chris Wallace, David Stern.
Most Improved Player of the Year: We didn't vote on this because it's a dumb award for all the reasons Ziller stated, but I threw a curveball and went with Kevin Durant. Here's why. My finalists (in order): Nikola Pekovic, Jeremy Lin, Goran Dragic, Ryan Anderson.