The NBA will soon be Luka Doncic’s league

There was ample evidence that Luka Doncic was the best player available in the run-up to the 2018 NBA Draft.

Doncic had trained Slovenia’s Cinderella for gold at EuroBasket 2017, and came out of a EuroLeague championship with Real Madrid, where he was named League MVP and Final Four MVP at 18 years old. This website had Doncic as the top prospect in the draft a year before it was held, and maintained that position throughout the season. It was a relatively popular piece of advice, even though it turned out to lack the worst franchises in the NBA which seems so completely self-evident.

Doncic would always be a stud in the NBA. He was just too good not to be too young of an age in one of the best leagues in the world. But someone thought it would happen this one?

This one feels like it’s defined with every brilliant performance, but here’s the quick version: at 21 years old, in his second season, Doncic has already proven that he’s one of the top five players in the NBA this season. At this point it is fair to ask if we are looking for someone who will eventually come down as one of the greatest basketball players ever.

Doncic played what on Saturday night was perhaps his best NBA game against the league-best Milwaukee Bucks. Opposite the no. 1-defense in the league and soon-to-be two-time MVP winner Giannis Antetokounmpo, Doncic recorded the kind of performance that has no parallel: 36 points, 19 assists, and 14 rebounds in a 136-132 victory.

It was, without hyperbole, one of the top individual performances of the season.

Doncic has not exactly lived up to his pre-draft hype – he has blown only 131 games in his career due to his expectations of his biggest supporters. He’s the most dominant player to enter the NBA since LeBron James, and he still has so much room to grow from here.

Doncic is the ideal lead initiator for the modern era

Design doubters of Doncic all had the same question about how his game would translate to the NBA: would he be athletic enough to consistently attack the biggest and fastest players in the world?

It’s a laughing stock critique at this point. Doncic has a lot of athletics, it just is not meant to be like Prime Minister Vince Carter. He never had to dodge the free throw line to shake off defenders effortlessly. Just look at how much separation he has placed between himself and Wes Matthews for this dribbling pull-up.

With the ball on the line and a supernatural understanding of how the defense gets out of balance, Doncic always seems to have the game in the palm of his hand. Combine his scoring ability at any given moment with elite vision, rare passing skills, and the moxie to believe that he can only be limited by his imagination, and you have the recipe for a whole lot.

When the game went into overtime, Doncic delivered a signature highlight of his career. Caught by Antetokounmpo and Eric Bledsoe from a pick-and-roll, Doncic throws a pass between the legs to teammate Maxi Kleber for a dunk and his 19th assist of the night:

Doncic does not seem to care about the point guards who perfected the position 30 years before he joined the league, but he provides the ideal template for how the position will be progressing. At 6’7 and 230 pounds, Doncic is in total control of the game, blessed with the size and vision to make every pass, the ability to put pressure on the defense as a scorer, and the IQ to constantly make the right decision. making with the ball in a split second.

For decades, the big man was always seen as the most valuable piece for any basketball team. No more. The first thing any NBA team needs right now is a dynamic offensive initiator. Doncic is the template for how the league will look for mid- and medium-sized teams in the future.

Doncic is already one of the best players in the NBA. He will only get better.

Doncic is one of the hottest players in the NBA by any measure. If he is not yet at the level of LeBron James and James Harden, then he is already afraid of a player who could not legally buy liquor until February.

For as dominant as Doncic is, there is still so much room for improvement in his game. Start with his three-point shot. Doncic is hitting just 31.6 percent of his three-pointers this year, an below-average number that does not capture the true impact of his shots. Because Doncic takes so many attempts – nine per game – for the most part with an immense degree of difficulty, his outside shot forces defenders to protect the bow, which only opens the rest of his game. It’s a similar idea to the one that made Harden one of the greatest shooters ever. Now imagine Doncic’s influence if he can get his three-point percentage up to 35 or 36 percent, where Harden has sat comfortably throughout his entire career.

Doncic’s conditioning can also be improved. If that happens, his defensive steps will be better, even as head coach Rick Carlisle says he plays better than ever at that end.

There has been this strange idea that Doncic is already a finished product that has followed him in his young career. All it takes is to look at his leap from his rookie season to his second year to see how wrong that is.

It’s no light for today’s current stars – most on the wrong side of 30 – to say that Doncic will run this league shortly. While Antetokounmpo has risen to become the best player in the NBA at just 25 years old, Doncic is right behind him as someone who could be the future face of the NBA.

Do not take my word for it. Listen to Giannis:

If the next superstar perspective hits the concept – whether incoming Oklahoma State recruits Cade Cunningham or whoever follows him – evaluators will ask different questions than those opposed to Doncic. Essentially: could this player be the next Luke?