Luka Doncic Discussion: Lean Mean Slovenian Extension Machine

I'd argue there are bad possessions where he definitely becomes way too heliocentric. He's had games where it definitely leads to bad shots and TOs and it was a negative for the team

OTOH I do get annoyed that he doesn't take as many shots at the rim as I'd like. Really frustrating against Houston where in the post he's got a one on one and he passes it to 3 point shooter when that normally a shot he makes in his sleep.

I guess where I'm going with this is when it's free style I do think it's a problem but within the offense where the play is created and works to create an advantage I have the opposite feeling shoot more

 

Well, I am probably better than Luka, so he should just do what I say.

 

i'm here, and i'll repeat it's kobe deja vu. to read the discussions of his game, you'd think something very different than what happens. i don't think he takes more "bad shots" than most stars. nor does he make more bad passes than, say, the unassailable jokic (watch a jokic game now and then if you don't believe me). he's also not as bad a defender as he's made out to be. he's just a lightning rod for critics, for whatever reason. but hey, i guess that's how we were able to get him in the first place, so i'll stop complaining.

 

I think that last part is exactly it. I think his flaws have just been overly exaggerated and its part of what made Nico think he should trade him.

It's kind of insane to me because pretty much anytime I watch him play he looks like the best guy on the floor. But here we are.

Unfortunately for Luka, it will likely mean less accolades and awards like Kobe which is a shame.

 

i think one thing that hurts luka and hurt kobe was the amount of early success they had individually, much of it coming in the form of gut-wrenching losses delivered all over the league (like, luka just ended phx basically by himself). sportswriters are generally partisan fans these days, so they come to hate the guy that keeps killing them. in kobe's case, the backlash came in the form of him being shaq's robin and thus not very good, and in the immediate period following shaq's exit they used his lack of team success to "prove" their point (lol). in luka's case, they ignore that he's basically been as successful as lebron was early in his career with similarly limited supporting casts, going so far as to pretend that kyrie irving was some sort of awesome running mate and that dallas team should have beaten that boston team if only luka were a real star (lol again).

luka won't be able to pull a lebron and walk in free agency to join anthony edwards and evan mobley in the eastern conference, so hopefully he can scratch out a more organic ring like kobe did with pau in the coming years.

 

Not bad for a chubby balkan

 

His defense isn't even that bad. It's not great but it's passable. Definitely not worth complaining about when he provides so much value on offense. Get other guys to help him play defense because he can carry your offense tremendously.

Since the new year, Luka has been shooting 40% from three taking 10 shots per game. That is Steph Curry-like. If he can carry that in to the playoffs and LeBron also finds his shot, it's going to be tough to beat this Lakers team.