Consistency matters.

Consistent brilliance delivers.

Milwaukee Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo was the league’s most consistently brilliant performer from the first whistle of training camp to the final buzzer of the 2018-19 regular season.

The product of “The Greek Freak” and his brilliant consistency was a league-best 60-win season that delivered the No. 1 overall seed in the playoffs to the Bucks.

Relive some of Giannis Antetokounmpo's best plays from the 2018-19 season!

Whether that is enough to deliver Antetokounmpo his first Kia MVP remains to be seen. But it was enough to secure the No. 1 spot on the final Kia Race to the MVP Ladder of this season.

Antetokounmpo edged out reigning Kia MVP James Harden in an epic duel and photo-finish, on the strength of Antetokounmpo’s versatility and dominance on both ends of the floor for what turned out to be the NBA’s best team.

But make no mistake, Harden’s case for the top spot is every bit as compelling as Antetokounmpo’s.

Harden’s encore season was nothing short of epic, a scoring spectacular that forced his name into conversations and statistical categories populated by the likes of Wilt Chamberlain, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant.

At one point in 2018-19, James Harden was on a 30-point scoring barrage.

* His nine 50-point games were the most in the league since Kobe Bryant’s 10 in the ‘06-07 season.

* His 32 consecutive games of scoring 30 or more points is the second-longest streak of all time to Wilt Chamberlain, who dropped 30 or more 65 straight times in ’61-62. (The Rockets went 21-11 during Harden’s 30-point tear as it helped resuscitate their season during an injury-riddled stretch.)

* Harden also became the first player in NBA history to score 30 or more points against all 29 other teams in the same season, the first player to accomplish that feat since Jordan scored 30 or more against all 22 other teams in ’86-87. Bird also did likewise in his ’84-85 MVP season, making them the only players to accomplish that feat since the NBA-ABA merger.

In his bid to become the 12th player in NBA history to win back-to-back MVPs, Harden operated with a usage rating (39.3%) that ranks second all-time to Russell Westbrook’s (40.0%) during his Kia MVP season (2016-17).

Hear the closing remarks to our 2018-19 Kia MVP debate.

So how, you might ask, did Antetokounmpo rise to the top of my ballot considering all Harden accomplished?

A more traditional argument -- the undisputed best player having a transcendent season for the league’s best team -- is what fueled Antetokounmpo’s campaign.

Sure, there’s a historical context for what he did this season as well. Even though he’s far from a traditional, dominant low-post big man, Antetokounmpo controls games in the manner that Shaquille O’Neal, Hakeem Olajuwon and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar did during MVP-winning seasons during their Hall of Fame careers. (O’Neal said so himself this season.)

Shaquille O'Neal offers up his praise for Giannis Antetokounmpo's season.

Compare Antetokounmpo’s raw numbers this season (27.7 points, 12.5 rebounds, 5.9 assists, 1.5 blocks and 1.3 steals per game) to Olajuwon’s during his ‘93-94 MVP season (27.3 ppg, 11.9 rpg, 3.6 apg, 3.7 bpg and 1.6 spg) or O’Neal’s ’99-00 MVP season (29.7 ppg, 13.6 rpg, 3.8 apg, 3 bpg and 0.5 spg) or Abdul-Jabbar’s ‘75-76 MVP season (27.7 ppg, 16.9 rpg, 5 apg, 4.1 bpg and 1.5 spg) for some context on just how historically dominant he has been.

Antetokounmpo could conceivably win MVP, Kia Defensive Player of the Year and Kia Most Improved Player awards all in the same season.

That’s how good and impactful his performance has been for a Bucks teams that reached new heights under first-year coach Mike Budenholzer.

The fact that he’s doing this – being a top three scorer behind Harden and Paul George, without the aid of anything close to a competent 3-point shot in a the 3-point era -- makes it even more remarkable.

Relive some of the best plays from Harden and Antetokounmpo in 2018-19!

The most frightening part of the rest of the league? That he’s already reached this level at 24, with a decade or more of continued improvement and sustained dominance surely ahead.

Consistent brilliance, it’s what delivered the Bucks to the top of the standings and Antetokounmpo to the top of the Kia Race to the MVP Ladder this season.

It’s also what will keep them both in that mix for years to come.