NBA playoff MVP race: LeBron or Steph at No. 1?

— -- With the NBA Finals getting underway on Thursday night (9 ET, ABC/WatchESPN), who has been the most important superstar in the playoffs so far? We have a top five -- plus two.

The East finals teased us for a spell before settling into the expected, as Cleveland eased into another LeBron Finals appearance.

The West finals took a different, winding route, delivering high drama and fantastic play from Game 1 to Game 7 as Golden State survived an incredible challenge from Oklahoma City.

And now we have our rematch, featuring four of the five best players this postseason.

1. Stephen Curry

Warriors
PG
2016 playoff stats:
26.7 PPG | 6.1 APG

If we didn't know better, we'd think he actually preferred his team to have to overcome a 3-1 deficit in the West finals just to prove he was even more capable than we thought.

Losses always cause us to speculate about what's wrong. We speculated about Curry's health, about rust, about the length and athleticism of his opponents, about whether he might be exhausted mentally and physically. Whatever the case, he didn't seem good enough to beat Oklahoma City.

And then in three elimination games he scored 98 points on 66 shots against team of long athletes focused on stopping him. The shots he made were of such a high degree of difficulty that it only served to help his teammates truly believe they were still going to win the series, even when Game 6 was going badly.

Yes, Klay Thompson surely helped. But Curry's last few games are prime evidence we are watching something incredibly rare.

Two seasons ago, I said the Spurs' final three games against Miami were the greatest display of basketball in the history of the sport.

Likewise, from opening night to Game 7 against OKC, has anyone played better for a season than Curry this year?

2. LeBron James

Cavaliers
SF
2016 playoff stats:
24.6 PPG | 8.6 RPG

If there were any doubt James would bring his full effort and attention to Toronto for Game 6, with the series seemingly already in hand, one possession was enough to quell the concern.

He raced up the left wing hoping to get a dunk, then went to the corner for a potential 3. Kevin Love didn't make the swing pass to the corner, and the Cavs instead ran their offense. LeBron made a hard cut down the middle but didn't get the ball.

He ended up with the ball late in the clock in isolation against Bismack Biyombo, a great paint presence but an overeager defender out in space. LeBron calmly faked a jumper and got Biyombo to bite; he got the call and three free throws.

So in one possession we saw his great physical effort twice and then a great mental play. More generally, we've seen him lead his team to a fantastic 12-2 playoff record. You can even see his great focus in the postgame news conferences.

This is a huge part of his success the past six postseasons. He almost always demonstrates his best effort and best focus. He let his guard down in 2011, and Dallas stole the Finals. Since then, he has never lost a series to a lesser team.

3. Klay Thompson

Warriors
SG
2016 playoff stats:
26.2 PPG | 45.0 3P%

When the Thunder seemed to have the series in hand, dominating Game 6 in front of their fans, it wasn't Curry who kept his team in striking distance, it was Thompson. And that was before the fourth quarter even began. Once he really got going, he buried the Thunder with 19 fourth-quarter points and 41 overall, with 11 3-pointers.

He made as many 3s in the first four minutes of that fourth quarter as OKC made for the game (3) and quite literally saved the season for the champs. His defensive effort was strong, as we have come to expect from him, and I was struck with his excellent effort to use his whole body when necessary to grab defensive rebounds, an issue for his team in every game this series.

Klay raised his game to new heights in this West finals and could very well be the pivotal player against the Cavs, both as a shooter and on defense in Kyrie Irving matchups.

4. Russell Westbrook

Thunder
PG
2016 playoff stats:
26.0 PPG | 11.0 APG

Conventional wisdom suggests that when a player improves, the old version is gone and the new version is the only one left. But we can see that's not the case, in basketball as in life.

Westbrook's Game 5 effort seemed a step backward, as he forced shots and drives that might have kept the Thunder from ending the series. Yet, as always, his will to fight and win is also what helped them hang around despite his shooting woes and Durant's.

We've mostly seen a better version of Westbrook this postseason, perhaps more than ever before. Heading into his Game 6, his assist-to-turnover rating was better than LeBron James' in the postseason despite 10 games against the best and fourth-best defenses in the NBA. He was his team's best player as it stood on the precipice of pulling off perhaps the most significant playoff upset in NBA history.

Sadly, the story took a bad turn and the exact same questions about Westbrook have arisen. He finished 28-of-76 from the field in the Thunder's three losses when they needed only one win. And he was part of very poor late-game execution in Game 6 when OKC had control of the game.

That they took the incredible Warriors machine to the brink of elimination is impressive, for sure. Still, when a team is that close to ending the series but ends up losing it, trouble lurks.

5. Kevin Love

Cavaliers
PF
2016 playoff stats:
17.3 PPG | 44.6 3P%

We know history is written by (and about) the winners. That's why no one remembers Kevin Love was a 25-and-12 guy for a top-10 team in the league (by scoring margin) his last season in Minnesota. As every metric showed, Love was a dominating player inside, outside and on the glass.

It was good to see Cleveland, in Game 5, allow him to go to work against Luis Scola. Early post-up buckets got Love going, then he attacked Biyombo from the perimeter to draw fouls. This was the old Love from that Minnesota team, especially when he knocked down 3s en route to his huge 25-point effort (in 24 minutes) in the Cavs' rout. He closed the series with a beautiful game, taking only 11 shots while netting 20 points with 12 rebounds and no turnovers.

He looks the most comfortable he has been as a Cavalier, though we can be sure the Finals will once again drudge the same silly criticisms of him if the Cavs lose or he plays a subpar game. Until he wins the last game in June, the typical reaction toward him will be based on what he hasn't done rather than what a great player he is.

Next in line

Kevin Durant | SF | Thunder

The Thunder-Warriors series had a lot of storylines, none centered on the energy Durant brought to the defensive end. Golden State's defense had something to do with his poor shooting in parts of the series, for sure, but so did the effort he expended on the other end trying to stop the Warriors' great offense.

His overall maturity as a player and perhaps his desperation to win allowed him to play with that kind of intensity. It's not atypical for an elite scorer who is struggling to make shots to let that affect his defensive focus. That didn't happen with Durant.

Steven Adams | C | Thunder

Draymond Green has been the star that no one saw coming for two years now, and before him there was Kawhi Leonard. Move over, guys, because Steven Adams has arrived, and you need to give him some elbow room.

We've seen him make tough paint shots that required a soft touch, and we have seen him establish his dominance in the paint through force of will and physical play. Adams is making his move into the elite level of NBA centers as the rarest of guys who can do the dirty work of being a post player while not being a big minus on offense.