Luka Doncic

[XTraderXL]

I actually dont think he is an early bloomer. He is naturally big boned, has a big frame and is quite strong but that doesnt mean he is an early bloomer. He needs to add meat on his bones and if he was fully developed or close to it, he would be more muscular already. Take a look at his shoulders, arms, chest and back. There is almost nothing there. He will add muscle naturally over the next few years and that will make him even better.
He also doesnt have full control of his body and thats why he is having balance issues from time to time. You can see it when he is under contact, he easily gets pushed out of balance while he is in the air. Thats pure lack of muscle and strength, nothing else and its easily fixable.
In my opinion, he just has so much more talent than anyone else in his class in Europe. He was dominating U18 competition at 15/16 and if you look at the videos, you will see how much smaller and even more unathletic he looks in those clips. He was physically dominated by most of the players there but he used his smarts and skills to be the best player in every U18 competition he participated in since he was 15 years old. And those were not just some local tournaments, those were top level tournaments in Europe. He won Youth EL MVP title barely turning 16, while having a below average tournament (by his standards) but he took over in the 4th both games that were close. One was against the French team in group round when he had a really bad game but hit 2 threes in a row and made a few assists when the game was on the line and the other game was in the finals. Especially that game against Zvezda showed how he can play against superior, older athletes and he again took the game over when he needed to.

Someone wrote that Real would be on F4 this year without Doncic but not without Llull. I disagree strongly. Yes, they would not qualify with just Doncic and no Llull but they would not qualify without Doncic as well. They would never have gotten into top4 in the reg season without him. I can remember at least 6 games they would have lost if Doncic was not on the team. When Llull plays bad and there is no Doncic, Real has no chance of winning a game in the EL against top teams and he plays bad about 35% of the games. If there was no Doncic in those games, Real would loose many of them and they would have at least 5-6 more losses and no way they beat one of the top 4 teams in the PO especially not having a home court advantage. Someone also mentioned he is a role player on Real. If that is a role player, then what are Ayon and Randolph?

[juanc]

:) keep hanging on those 2 extra years.

And hope that in 2 years time when he is 20, and likely still in madrid, that he averages alot more then this years stats. If he goes at 13, 8, 7, his mozart prodigal status will slowly fade, then you will kinda have to accept those becirovic, saric, fotsis, rubio 20 year old comparisions.

If he goes 13,8,7 he will be easily be the MVP

Cmon guys get serious about Dragič,,, He is at the moment without a doubt the best european PG. Yes Teo is great and a magician, but he just istn't in the same leage as Dragič. And I just can't wait for the eurobasket to start! To see Dončič and Dragič play together..

[SportsGuy8]

some trolls here explaining hes an average shooter?

Watch on YouTube

To be fair, doing this in practice isn't THAT special. I remember when we were like 15, a bunch of amateurs, nobody talented enough to later go pro, almost every single practice at least someone hit at least 10 threes in a row.

[SportsGuy8]

I actually dont think he is an early bloomer. He is naturally big boned, has a big frame and is quite strong but that doesnt mean he is an early bloomer. He needs to add meat on his bones and if he was fully developed or close to it, he would be more muscular already. Take a look at his shoulders, arms, chest and back. There is almost nothing there. He will add muscle naturally over the next few years and that will make him even better.
He also doesnt have full control of his body and thats why he is having balance issues from time to time. You can see it when he is under contact, he easily gets pushed out of balance while he is in the air. Thats pure lack of muscle and strength, nothing else and its easily fixable.
In my opinion, he just has so much more talent than anyone else in his class in Europe. He was dominating U18 competition at 15/16 and if you look at the videos, you will see how much smaller and even more unathletic he looks in those clips. He was physically dominated by most of the players there but he used his smarts and skills to be the best player in every U18 competition he participated in since he was 15 years old. And those were not just some local tournaments, those were top level tournaments in Europe. He won Youth EL MVP title barely turning 16, while having a below average tournament (by his standards) but he took over in the 4th both games that were close. One was against the French team in group round when he had a really bad game but hit 2 threes in a row and made a few assists when the game was on the line and the other game was in the finals. Especially that game against Zvezda showed how he can play against superior, older athletes and he again took the game over when he needed to.

Someone wrote that Real would be on F4 this year without Doncic but not without Llull. I disagree strongly. Yes, they would not qualify with just Doncic and no Llull but they would not qualify without Doncic as well. They would never have gotten into top4 in the reg season without him. I can remember at least 6 games they would have lost if Doncic was not on the team. When Llull plays bad and there is no Doncic, Real has no chance of winning a game in the EL against top teams and he plays bad about 35% of the games. If there was no Doncic in those games, Real would loose many of them and they would have at least 5-6 more losses and no way they beat one of the top 4 teams in the PO especially not having a home court advantage. Someone also mentioned he is a role player on Real. If that is a role player, then what are Ayon and Randolph?

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. He is somewhat of an early bloomer WHILE still not being near his physical potential, or at least nowhere as near as most people think.

His frame is undeniably big and if someone is skeptical about that, they should take a look at the numbers: he weights 100kg/220lbs, while neither looking muscular, nor fat, meaning that he's got a nice frame. If he had an average frame, he would either be completely jacked at that weight, or very chubby.

I also agree about his value. Laso clearly sees it also, that's why he's regularly getting top minutes in key games, first in the cup, then recently on extremely important away Euroleague playoff games. Those 2 games became crucial after they dropped home court advantage.

[Mirotic12]

[He is playing way over 20 min in tight games and I think thats more important than playing 15 min in a game thats decided by 30 points. And his minutes are going up as the season is progressing. Besides I said I expect he will be getting 20-25 min and you said he will be nowhere near that. You didnt say he will play 20 min, you said nowhere near 20. Go back and check the posts, it was during the preseason I think..

You said he would play 20-25 minutes a game, and average that. I said no he would not, and said he wasn't averaging over 20 minutes a game. I was right. What I said is factually true this season.

2-3 times now you have mentioned this, saying I was wrong in this, when I wasn't. I didn't respond before, but you keep bringing it up, like some way to discredit me or something. Which makes no sense, because Doncic is not averaging over 20 minutes a game. In reality, I was right, and you were only partially right, because you said 20-25 minutes. I don't know why you keep bringing this up.

Why are you talking only about white PGs? Are there only white players in the NBA? I said he is above average for EL but not for the NBA. There is 80% black PGs in the NBA and half of them are better athletes than Goran. So whats your problem?

whats my problem?
it is my sincere concern for doncic, since your claiming dragic is just so-so athletic speaking of the nba level,how doncic will fair of with his way less then average athletic ability speaking of the nba level (lateral quickness, explosivenes) wich is without a doubt questionable, at the nba level (trust the scouts, talent evaluators, since i am a nowbody)

So you want just a white point guard that played in NBA, that is equal to or more athletic than Dragic?

Easy.....

Brent Barry
Bob Sura
Delonte West
Tomas Satoransky
Alexey Shved
JJ Barea
Jordan Farmar
Nemanja Nedovic
Igor Rakocevic


I only included players from recent times. I didn't even include all the ones who definitely could play in NBA, but don't or didn't. Now, you might say those guys are actually combo guards, or even shooting guards that handled the ball a lot, but that's also the exact same thing Dragic is. Dragic is a shooting guard that just handles the ball a lot - he's not a real point guard under any actual basketball measure. So I took that same kind of player - shooting guards playing as point guards, or combo guards, or whatever, that are white, that played NBA...I think of 9 guys from recent times.

[Mirotic12]

Hey amigo, I've seen Teodesic play, and he's a pretty damn good player. On the right NBA team he can be a very valuable player.
But "way better" than Dragic???!!!! You do know that if he is "way better," he is NBA superstar level? Because Dragic is in that second tier of NBA pgs just below the top five or six. That means he's a very good NBA level pg.
Most comments I've read from NBA people concerning Teodesic is that he can be a good NBA player in the right system, but not a superstar. That is my assessment as well.
He is more skilled than Dragic and a smarter player.
But athleticism, especially speed and quickness, also plays a huge role in the NBA for pgs, and Dragic definitely has the edge there. There are pgs with quicker first steps, but once Dragic gets a step or two in the open court he is about as fast as any pg in the league except for maybe Wall and a few others. Plus, he is one of the best finishers in the league.
In fact, if I'm choosing between Dragic or Teodesic as a starting pg for my NBA team right now, I'm choosing Dragic. You'd have to surround Teodesic with strong defensive players to make up for his lack of lateral quickness. That is a huge thing in the NBA.
Like I said, I like Teodesic's game, and Nash was only an average def. player at best.
But no way is Teodesic "way better" than Dragic. In fact, as far as at the NBA level, Dragic is better and most assuredly would be picked over Teodesic as a starting pg by the people who make those decisions in the NBA.

Dragic is way, waaaaaay better than Teodosic and Bodiroga. It's not close. Teodosic would be a solid contributor on a lot of teams, but come on, Dragic in top form is a fringe all-star.

Well, when they both played in 2014 FIBA world cup Dragic put up better numbers than Teodosic. Dragic avaraged 16/2.9/4.3 in 26 minutes and Teodosic avaraged 13.6/2.1/4.4 in 27 minutes of playing time. They both shot 55.4% from the field. To say that Teodosic is a “much better player than Goran Dragic, regardless of where either of them plays” is not just factually wrong but also just as silly as some Doncic fan boy proclamations on this board. Dragic is one of 3 european guards in the history of NBA who became All NBA players. The other two are Tony Parker and Drazen Petrovic. Teodosic doesn’t come close to any of them. I also seriously doubt that Doncic will become the 4th European All NBA guard. I think it’s possible that he becomes an All NBA forward but that depends on his further physical development.

Cmon guys get serious about Dragič,,, He is at the moment without a doubt the best european PG. Yes Teo is great and a magician, but he just istn't in the same leage as Dragič. And I just can't wait for the eurobasket to start! To see Dončič and Dragič play together..

I don't think you could find a single well-known coach in Europe that wouldn't take Teodosic, Spanoulis, or in previous years guys like Diamantidis, Jasikevicius, Papaloukas, and such over Dragic.

I am pretty much 100% confident every coach in Europe would pick Dragic after them.

The fact that NBA fans here seem to think Goran Dragic is some kind of standard bearer for European point guards is truly sad, and really shows how incredibly overrated the NBA is, and how unbelievably underrated European basketball is. If someone asked who the 10 best all-time European point guards were, the name of Goran Dragic should never appear on any such top 10 European point guard list. Yet clearly, from comments here, most NBA fans (at least American ones) are convinced Dragic is some kind of all time great European point guard - which is laughable, to put it mildly.

[pacersGM]

So you want just a white point guard that played in NBA, that is equal to or more athletic than Dragic?

Easy.....

Brent Barry
Bob Sura
Delonte West
Tomas Satoransky
Alexey Shved
JJ Barea
Jordan Farmar
Nemanja Nedovic
Igor Rakocevic


I only included players from recent times. I didn't even include all the ones who definitely could play in NBA, but don't or didn't. Now, you might say those guys are actually combo guards, or even shooting guards that handled the ball a lot, but that's also the exact same thing Dragic is. Dragic is a shooting guard that just handles the ball a lot - he's not a real point guard under any actual basketball measure. So I took that same kind of player - shooting guards playing as point guards, or combo guards, or whatever, that are white, that played NBA...I think of 9 guys from recent times.

well you did name some athletic guys, even most of those are sgooting guards, and some of them are of mixed race but anyway.
now take a look at what goran dragic is for those guys you listed ... a basketball god , so my point is dragic is a great athlete and a great basketball player.


and the other thing. im not an nba fan, i am a fan of the best basketball played in the world. wich, sadly for you is the NBA right now. if you wat to admit that or not. once european basketball becomes the standard. (we will know once teodosic or spanoulis earn 20 million per year) . but for the euroleague to become watchable popular, it will have to change a few rules, wich are holding it back. so we are in an nba draft forum, and we are talking about best basketball, and who the best point guards from europe were, and sadly for you teodosic, or spanoulis or papaloukas wont be mentioned, because non of them succeded in the best basketballleague in the world, like dragic did. i suggest you dont even bring up spanoulis, because he tried, but wasnt up too it.

and to think he drank some magic posion, once he failed in the nba and returned to europe and became this greek god, your wrong, he is just better suited for euro basketball.

now you wont see me talking in euroleague forums about dragic, since he isnt any good in euroleague style basketball, but i would talk about the euroleague legends teodosic, papaloukas, bodiroga ... because thats their teritory, but unfortunatley for them, thats not the highest form and quality of basketball. that is still, and seems will be for some time, ... the NBA

[Rasho Brezec]

So you want just a white point guard that played in NBA, that is equal to or more athletic than Dragic?

Easy.....

Brent Barry
Jordan Farmar
Nemanja Nedovic

There you go, fixed it.

[baldur]

dragic is way better than bodiroga? i sense drunkenness in this statement.

[JPF]

I don't think you could find a single well-known coach in Europe that wouldn't take Teodosic, Spanoulis, or in previous years guys like Diamantidis, Jasikevicius, Papaloukas, and such over Dragic.

I am pretty much 100% confident every coach in Europe would pick Dragic after them.

The fact that NBA fans here seem to think Goran Dragic is some kind of standard bearer for European point guards is truly sad, and really shows how incredibly overrated the NBA is, and how unbelievably underrated European basketball is. If someone asked who the 10 best all-time European point guards were, the name of Goran Dragic should never appear on any such top 10 European point guard list. Yet clearly, from comments here, most NBA fans (at least American ones) are convinced Dragic is some kind of all time great European point guard - which is laughable, to put it mildly.

You might be a "bit" too confident regarding that. You either haven't watched Dragič enough, or your desire for euro-bball to look better than it actualy is prevails here. Some NBA fans underate it, but on the other hand you overate it, especialy as far as perimeter play goes, there the difference is huge actualy. As I said before look at the euroleague rosters and observe those same US PG's in a summer league f.e.

[pacersGM]

So you want just a white point guard that played in NBA, that is equal to or more athletic than Dragic?

Easy.....

Brent Barry
Jordan Farmar
Nemanja Nedovic

There you go, fixed it.

brent barry, nemanja nedovic ... since jordan farmar is also mixed

[pacersGM]

dragic is way better than bodiroga? i sense drunkenness in this statement.

how was you able to twist and turn and retwist the above quote from my writings? could you explain this to me? ineed, it seems to be some drunkness involved on your part

[baldur]

dragic is way better than bodiroga? i sense drunkenness in this statement.

how was you able to twist and turn and retwist the above quote from my writings? could you explain this to me? ineed, it seems to be some drunkness involved on your part

what the hell are you talking about? i didnt quote you.

[XTraderXL]

@Mirotic
I will end this debate here and now. You said he will not get even close to 20-25min and that there is no way an 18 year old player will get those minutes in Real. I would even argue he will average closer to 25min in ACB PO and F4. He is averaging 20 min in EL so actually I was right and you were wrong. Even if its 19.9min, you still said he will get nowhere near 20min so I dont get how you can say you were factually correct. Anyway, wait until the end of the season and his averages will be 20-25min per game in both competitions.

[burek3]

This weeks ACB game:
http://www.acb.com/fichas/LACB61256.php

Didn't watch the game, but by the look of the box score, there wasn't much to see. Well, as far as Luka is concerned, there was nothing to be seen.

[Mirotic12]

dragic is way better than bodiroga? i sense drunkenness in this statement.

There are a lot of NBA fans that automatically multiply every NBA players' level by about 50, and automatically decrease the level by about 50 of any player not in NBA. Reality and objectivity isn't part of the equation.

@Mirotic
I will end this debate here and now. You said he will not get even close to 20-25min and that there is no way an 18 year old player will get those minutes in Real. I would even argue he will average closer to 25min in ACB PO and F4. He is averaging 20 min in EL so actually I was right and you were wrong. Even if its 19.9min, you still said he will get nowhere near 20min so I dont get how you can say you were factually correct. Anyway, wait until the end of the season and his averages will be 20-25min per game in both competitions.

I was referring to the 25 minutes, and the over 20. Which is what you said........you said 20-25, meaning over 20 and maybe high as 25.

I said, no he isn't. I was right. Please let it go.

You might be a "bit" too confident regarding that. You either haven't watched Dragič enough, or your desire for euro-bball to look better than it actualy is prevails here. Some NBA fans underate it, but on the other hand you overate it, especialy as far as perimeter play goes, there the difference is huge actualy. As I said before look at the euroleague rosters and observe those same US PG's in a summer league f.e.

You mean those summer league stars like Mike James, that is dunking on everybody and crossing over and making defenders fall left and right in summer league.............yeah, that probably has the lowest basketball IQ of any point guard in EuroLeague, and that regularly ball hogs so much and chucks so many bricks that he single handed causes his team to lose games?

You mean those kinds of summer league point guard stars?

[Bob8]

Imho it's really difficult to say one player is the best Pg in Europe, even if he didn't do anything in competitions in Europe, anything serious with national team and anything in Nba. Just because he's playing good in very mediocre Nba team. This is sport and results must mean something. For me Teo is much better basketball player and will always be. If we compare them as Pg's the difference is even bigger. But if we compare what they did in their careers the difference is enormous.

http://www.euroleague.net/competition/players/showplayer?pcode=JDR#!biographye

If Dragic was that good you're saying he's, he would have done something in his career and not only fighting every year for playoffs spot, be on loan in Europe or having bad luck with national team. He's the best player from Slovenia who has ever played in Nba and that's pretty much it.

[XTraderXL]

20-25min avg for the whole season. Wait until the end of the season and then we can revisit this topic and see who was right)))

[Kolkmania]

On this I actually agree. I believe Dragic is much more suited for NBA than Teodosic. Teo knows why he is is 30 and never went to the NBA))) I mean he would be ok but nowhere near the player he is in Europe. On the other hand, Dragic plays best in the NBA and was never as good in FIBA basketball (EL or NT).

Completely agree, very similar to Ricky Rubio. National basketball makes Sergio Rodriguez look like a superior player than Ricky Rubio, which is nowhere close to true when they play in the NBA.

[pacersGM]

Imho it's really difficult to say one player is the best Pg in Europe, even if he didn't do anything in competitions in Europe, anything serious with national team and anything in Nba. Just because he's playing good in very mediocre Nba team. This is sport and results must mean something. For me Teo is much better basketball player and will always be. If we compare them as Pg's the difference is even bigger. But if we compare what they did in their careers the difference is enormous.

http://www.euroleague.net/competition/players/showplayer?pcode=JDR#!biographye

If Dragic was that good you're saying he's, he would have done something in his career and not only fighting every year for playoffs spot, be on loan in Europe or having bad luck with national team. He's the best player from Slovenia who has ever played in Nba and that's pretty much it.

1. i dont know if you are talking about me as i ever said that dragic is the best point guard IN EUROPE?
i said goran dragic is one of the TOP 5 point guards based on how they individualy played in THE BEST BASKETBALL LEAGUE IN THE WHOLE WORLD - THE NBA. so will teodosic be able to average 20 ppg 6 and 4 for an even less MEDIOCRE team like brookly (literaly the worst team in the nba) or wont he be able to do that.

2. if you mean BEST PLAYER - MOST DECORATED, then yes teodosic is a better / more decorated played then goran dragic.
but for me BEST PLAYER - MEANS BETTER INDIVIDUAL STATS, as the the titles, championships won dont ever come by a single player.
the only time a single player ALMOST won a championship by himself was lebron james 2 years ago, PLAYING AGAINST GSW, WITHOUT KEVIN LOVE AND WITHOUT KYRIE IRVING, before failing in 6 GAMES.

95% of other times the cast around YOUR TEODOSIC wins championships. wich means kobe minus shaq, jordan without pippen, duncan without parker, none of them have as much championships without one of they CO-STARS.

if your idea of best or better player is how many championships each has won, then you won, TEODOSIC IS THE KOBE BRYANT OF THE SECOND BEST LEAGUE IN THE WORLD - EUROLEAGUE.

but i really cant wait for next seasons matchup of teodosic (brookly uniform) and dragic (heat uniform), since neither of them will make their bad teams win, it will be nice to see goran score 25 or 30 on teos 15 and 7 beautifull assists

league ranking - NBA - a quite big gap - EUROLEAGUE - big gap national leagues ...
so i will everytime put someone with very good stats (20 ppg in the nba, and 3th team all nba, and nba most improved player) over a DECORATED european player, who is playing in the SECOND best league in the world.

arent you the one who said he doesnt like DRAGIC, because he is a supposetly HEADLESS CHICKEN? i doubt pat riley, spoelstra, steve kerr, and steve nash would agree but hey, everyone can have an oppinion