Nash reaping praise from peers

DENVER — He seems the least likely of candidates.

Listed quite generously at 6-foot-3 and 195 pounds, his dark, stringy, parted-smack-down-the-middle hair falling from his scalp with no care, Steve Nash gives new definition to gym rat.

But NBA MVP?

That's the case many around the league are making for Nash, who tonight will play in his third NBA All-Star Game — and yesterday wasn't worth, at least in the Dallas Mavericks' minds, paying what it would take to keep him around.

Ask reigning MVP Kevin Garnett his choice for the top potential award-winner at the All-Star break, and Nash's name — because of how the ninth-season point guard has turned the Phoenix Suns from an afterthought to one of the West's best — is the first from his mouth.

"Steve Nash has done a lot for the Suns," Garnett said Friday, "and has definitely impacted that team a lot."

That's right: The 31-year-old son of a soccer-playing printer from England and his wife from Wales, a lad born in Johannesburg, South Africa, but reared in Canada before going to college in California, has a shot at one of hoops' highest honors.

Even from the East, Boston All-Star Paul Pierce concurs.

"He's taking a team that didn't make the playoffs a year ago (to the postseason) and definitely has made a huge impact on them," said Pierce, keenly aware Phoenix is off to an impressive 41-13 start. "Obviously when he's on the court with them they're pretty much unbeatable. When he's not on the court, they're not the same."

Indeed, when Nash was sidelined for a short stretch this season the Suns went into a tailspin, losing all three of their January games without him.

"So," Pierce said, "he's definitely one of the top candidates."

Who are the rest?

Allow title-holder Garnett to set the field of contenders, each of whom will take part of tonight's Pepsi Center show:

"LeBron James is having a heckuva year," the Timberwolves All-Star said. "Amare (Stoudemire, one of Nash's two All-Star teammates in Phoenix) and his team are having a very successful year. And you can never forget about Shaq (Shaquille O'Neal) and Tim Duncan."