All Ball Sports: Luka makes history
By Paul Teetor
By Paul Teetor
Luka Doncic for MVP.
I know, I know.
Just three weeks into a long, long season, it’s way too early to be nominating anybody as the Most Valuable Player of the NBA.
And twelve games in an 82-game regular season is too small a sample to proclaim anybody the best player in a league loaded with great players, from the youngest (Wemby) to the oldest (LeBron.)
And you’re absolutely right: it’s too soon and it’s too early.
But still…. have you watched the 27-year-old Slovenian sensation this season? He’s the main reason the Lakers have a 10-2 record.
If you haven’t had a chance to catch a Lakers game, make the time and you may not believe what you see from Luka.
Starting his ninth season in the NBA – it seems like just yesterday he was a rookie, the third pick in the 2018 draft, and now he’s a grizzled veteran – the Manhattan Beach resident with the floppy hair, non-stop trash talk and the mischievous grin has become simply unstoppable.
His step-back 3-pointer from anywhere has become the most entertaining shot in the league. He can get it off against anyone anywhere, and you’re amazed when it doesn’t go in. And when he does go down into the paint, his stop-start deceleration move never fails to yield an easy shot for him or a pair of free throws — and he’s deadly from the foul line too.
He’s averaging 40 points a game, 8 assists a game and eight rebounds: video-game numbers.
His scoring average is 7 points up from his league-leading 33 points per game last season.
Forty points a game is more points than any Laker star of the past has averaged — ever.
No one has ever done what Luka is doing.
Not LeBron.
Not Kobe.
Not Shaq.
Not Worthy.
Not Pau.
Not Magic.
Not Kareem.
Not Wilt, at least not when he was a Laker.
Not Jerry West or Elgin Baylor, the original Laker superstars.
No one has ever averaged more than Luka is currently averaging – except Wilt Chamberlain in the 1961-62 season, when the 7-foot man-mountain – and self-proclaimed greatest athlete in the world — was dunking on everyone and rarely took a shot further than five feet from the hoop.
The Don – as Lakers play-by-play guy Bill McDonald has taken to calling Luka – is rewriting the record books even as this is being typed.
So far this season, Luka became the third player in Lakers history to score at least 35 points in seven straight games, joining Kobe and Elgin Baylor.
Luka is just the fourth Lakers player to put up four straight 40-point games, joining Bryant, Baylor and George Mikan.
You’ll notice names like LeBron, Shaquille O’Neal, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson missing from these lists. Some franchise marks are oversold. Not when it comes to the Lakers.
Luka has made at least five 3-pointers in seven straight games. If he continues that streak for another five games, he will break James Harden’s NBA record of 12 straight.
Luka is currently averaging six made 3-pointers per game. He has played in 10 of the Lakers’ 11 games. If he stays on this pace of six 3s per game while playing in 90% of L.A. ‘s games, he will end up making 426 3s, which would break Steph Curry’s single-season record of 402.
Dončić also owns the non-Wilt Chamberlain NBA record with six 40-point games in his team’s first 10 games.
Luka has now logged seven straight games with at least 35 points, five assists and five rebounds, tying the great (and still living at 87) Oscar Robertson for the longest such streak in history.
Luka is currently attempting 13.7 3-pointers per game. If that volume holds up, it would break Harden’s NBA record of 13.2 attempts per game in 2018-19. But Harden only made 36.8% of his 3s that year. Luka is blowing that number out of the water.
The only other player in history to average 40 through the first nine games of a season is Chamberlain, who is basically a category unto himself in these statistical side-by-sides. The most Michael Jordan – sorry LeBron fans, but he’s the greatest player — ever averaged through the first nine games of a season was 38.6 in 1986-87.
Luka is shooting 42% from 3 to start the year. That isn’t likely to continue. Like Harden, he’s been a volume marksman to this point as a career 35% 3-point shooter. But right now, he is absolutely dialed in, particularly with his step-back, which, according to NBA.com shot tracking, he entered Friday night knocking down a Curry-like 43% clip.
All his career, the knock on Luka was that he couldn’t guard anybody and would always be a liability on defense. This year that has changed.
According to NBA.com stats, Luka is leading the league in two-point defense when guarding a man one on one as the primary defender. Opponents are making only 22 percent of their two-point attempts when guarded by Luka.
But his defensive leap is more than actually trying to guard his guy.
In a November 1 victory over the Toronto Raptors, Luka logged 5 steals and drew 3 charges. He is the first player to achieve those specific defensive milestones in a single game since tracking data began in 2013–14.
The numbers say his impact is real in terms of its impact on the team. The Lakers’ defensive rating has hovered around an excellent 109.7 when Luka is on the floor, compared to a heavily degraded 117.2 when he sits. [
When asked after the Toronto game by reporters if he would rather win the regular season MVP award or Defensive Player of the Year, Dončić simply smiled and replied, “Both.”
We second that. ER
Read this story on easyreadernews.com