Are Luka/Jokic the top 2 offensive players in NBA history?

[SlimShady83]

It's MJ.

Did it both ends of the floor

Great as an offensive basketball player and then offended the opponents on defense?

Yep his just that good

[picko]

Jokic certainly has a case, but there isn't a particularly strong argument for placing Doncic ahead of Jordan or LeBron. Or even guys like Curry or Magic at their peak.

[hagredionis]

Luka most certainly has a case because he's an unstoppable force on offense. People have a short memory and don't remember how many iconic playoff performances he had like for example when in 2020 he averaged 31 ppg in a series against the Clippers being guarded by prime Kawhi.

[CodeBreaker]

Jokic
MJ

and then everyone else

[og15]

Luka most certainly has a case because he's an unstoppable force on offense. People have a short memory and don't remember how many iconic playoff performances he had like for example when in 2020 he averaged 31 ppg in a series against the Clippers being guarded by prime Kawhi.

He did great against the Clippers. Kawhi guarded him only in select moments, he didn't average 31 ppg being guarded by prime Kawhi

[Calvin Klein]

Still MJ

[Woodsanity]

Luka isn't in the same stratosphere as an offensive player. Not even sure Luka is a top 10 offensive player all time.

[Common Sensei]

no, today's NBA is a pathetic joke with everything geared towards offense and putting up counting stats due to usage and no expectations from coaches to play defense. There's a reason slow, unathletic Europeans couldn't make the NBA back then when players were expected to play defense, sat if they couldn't, didn't have the ball 35% of the time and couldn't travel, carry, push off and force switches onto centers using illegal moving screens. It's like comparing numbers of today's QBs to those of the 70s and 80s

No argument here.

The NBA should be renamed National Practice Ball or National Freestyle Ball.

[hagredionis]

Luka isn't in the same stratosphere as an offensive player. Not even sure Luka is a top 10 offensive player all time.

Career PPG

1. Michael Jordan* 30.12
2. Wilt Chamberlain* 30.07
3. Luka Dončić 28.73
4. Joel Embiid 27.60
5. Elgin Baylor* 27.36
6. Kevin Durant 27.20
7. Jerry West* 27.03
8. LeBron James 27.01
9. Allen Iverson* 26.66
10. Bob Pettit* 26.36
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
43. Nikola Jokić 21.86


But sure Luka "isn't in the same stratosphere as Jokic". Internet logic at its absolute best.

[nate33]

Luka isn't in the same stratosphere as an offensive player. Not even sure Luka is a top 10 offensive player all time.

Career PPG

1. Michael Jordan* 30.12
2. Wilt Chamberlain* 30.07
3. Luka Dončić 28.73
4. Joel Embiid 27.60
5. Elgin Baylor* 27.36
6. Kevin Durant 27.20
7. Jerry West* 27.03
8. LeBron James 27.01
9. Allen Iverson* 26.66
10. Bob Pettit* 26.36
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
43. Nikola Jokić 21.86


But sure Luka "isn't in the same stratosphere as Jokic". Internet logic at its absolute best.

Luka's career TS% is .588
Jokic's is .640.

Put it this way. All Jokic needed to do to match Luka's point total at Luka's scoring efficiency would be to score an extra 6.87 points per game at a horrific TS% of .420. I'm sure he could have managed that if he wanted to. The worst players in the league do better than that. But instead, Jokic chose to create shots for his teammates in a better scoring position so that they could score much more efficiently.

[hagredionis]

Luka isn't in the same stratosphere as an offensive player. Not even sure Luka is a top 10 offensive player all time.

Career PPG

1. Michael Jordan* 30.12
2. Wilt Chamberlain* 30.07
3. Luka Dončić 28.73
4. Joel Embiid 27.60
5. Elgin Baylor* 27.36
6. Kevin Durant 27.20
7. Jerry West* 27.03
8. LeBron James 27.01
9. Allen Iverson* 26.66
10. Bob Pettit* 26.36
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
43. Nikola Jokić 21.86


But sure Luka "isn't in the same stratosphere as Jokic". Internet logic at its absolute best.

Luka's career TS% is .588
Jokic's is .640.

Put it this way. All Jokic needed to do to match Luka's point total at Luka's scoring efficiency would be to score an extra 6.87 points per game at a horrific TS% of .420. I'm sure he could have managed that if he wanted to. The worst players in the league do better than that. But instead, Jokic chose to create shots for his teammates in a better scoring position so that they could score much more efficiently.

Yeah and one is a guard and the other is a center. Put it this way. Centers are always more efficient than the guards, it's how basketball works.

[MoneyTalks41890]

We have a polar bear in Texas.

[nate33]

Yeah and one is a guard and the other is a center. Put it this way. Centers are always more efficient than the guards, it's how basketball works.

Irrelevant.

The topic of this thread isn't "Are Luka/Jokic the top 2 offensive players for their position in NBA history?"

[zero rings]

Career PPG

1. Michael Jordan* 30.12
2. Wilt Chamberlain* 30.07
3. Luka Dončić 28.73
4. Joel Embiid 27.60
5. Elgin Baylor* 27.36
6. Kevin Durant 27.20
7. Jerry West* 27.03
8. LeBron James 27.01
9. Allen Iverson* 26.66
10. Bob Pettit* 26.36
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
43. Nikola Jokić 21.86


But sure Luka "isn't in the same stratosphere as Jokic". Internet logic at its absolute best.

Luka's career TS% is .588
Jokic's is .640.

Put it this way. All Jokic needed to do to match Luka's point total at Luka's scoring efficiency would be to score an extra 6.87 points per game at a horrific TS% of .420. I'm sure he could have managed that if he wanted to. The worst players in the league do better than that. But instead, Jokic chose to create shots for his teammates in a better scoring position so that they could score much more efficiently.

Yeah and one is a guard and the other is a center. Put it this way. Centers are always more efficient than the guards, it's how basketball works.

This isn’t the 1960s. The 3 pt shot leveled the playing field for perimeter scorers long ago.

And even if it didn’t, so what? Being tall is an absolute advantage in basketball. Luka doesn’t get bonus points for being shorter than Jokic.

[cupcakesnake]

To me the top 5 offensive players ever are:

Jokic
Magic
Jordan
Curry
James
(in some order)

Luka has a chance to get there, but that top 5 is hard to crack.

Luka is somewhere in a list with:
Nash, Oscar, Shaq, Kareem, Dirk, Bird, West, Kobe, Durant, Barkley, Harden, Reggie.

[mademan]

That's probably one of the dumbest basketball takes ever. Here are the career playoffs stats:

Luka 30.9 ppg / 7.8 apg / 9.2 rpb
Harden 22.5 ppg / 6.5 apg / 5.5 rpg

Now just do Houston Harden for an apples to apples comparison.

You sure you wanna do that? His dog crap percentages will not work in his favor along with no shows where he doesn’t even show up. He sucks, deal with it… hahaha

Houston playoff Harden: 57.8 TS%
Playoff Luka: 57.3 TS%

Luka is very quickly getting a playoff reputation that is outpacing his production. He has had some big playoff performances and certainly some big shots, but while he started out as a playoff killer, his last 2 playoff runs (finals/first round exit) have been individually underwhelming for him, and that makes up about half his playoff games. These get hand waved away by injury, but that opens up another discussion about durability and being able to withstand 82 games and the playoffs and stay at a high level.

[mademan]

To me the top 5 offensive players ever are:

Jokic
Magic
Jordan
Curry
James
(in some order)

Luka has a chance to get there, but that top 5 is hard to crack.

Luka is somewhere in a list with:
Nash, Oscar, Shaq, Kareem, Dirk, Bird, West, Kobe, Durant, Barkley, Harden, Reggie.

Disrespecting Shai

[Mephariel]

To me the top 5 offensive players ever are:

Jokic
Magic
Jordan
Curry
James
(in some order)

Luka has a chance to get there, but that top 5 is hard to crack.

Luka is somewhere in a list with:
Nash, Oscar, Shaq, Kareem, Dirk, Bird, West, Kobe, Durant, Barkley, Harden, Reggie.

Disrespecting Shai

Yeah, Shai is a much better offensive player than Reggie Miller. So is Giannis. So is Anthony Edwards.

[LarsV8]

Some semantics are important here, and will limit my scope of discussion to 1980s forward.
-I think if you say who are the best shooters of all time, which is a specific subset of scoring, which is a subset of offense. You are going with guys like Curry, Miller, Durant
-I think if you say who are the best scorers of all time, which includes shooting, which is a subset of offense. You are going with guys like Jordan, Durant, Jokic, Barkley, Giannis, Shaq, Dantley, Harden, Shai....honestly there are a ton of people in the conversation framed this way.
-I think if you say who are the best creators of all time, which is another subset of offense. You are going with guys like Paul, Nash, Harden, Doncic, Trae, Jokic, Kidd, Stockton, Magic, Rondo, Lebron.

But if you say "best offensive player", where you are balancing scoring + playmaking, just overall generating offense in any way possible, I really only see three serious names: Jokic, Harden, Lebron. Hard to audit every player in NBA history, but don't think anyone is comparable to those 3 when it comes to both high volume efficient scoring, and high volume good shots created for others.

Sorry, not sorry.

[Sane]

That's probably one of the dumbest basketball takes ever. Here are the career playoffs stats:

Luka 30.9 ppg / 7.8 apg / 9.2 rpb
Harden 22.5 ppg / 6.5 apg / 5.5 rpg

Now just do Houston Harden for an apples to apples comparison.

Cherry picking stats is not apples to apples comparison but ok here we go: 28.4 ppg / 5.7 apg / 7.1 apg

Cherry picking? Lol

You included his stats when coming off the bench for OKC. Just compare them as starters.

Not only are they the same, but half of Luka's moves are lifted off Harden.

Luka the slightly better scorer probably but Harden is the better passer. To put THAT in perspective for you, when Kyrie Irving and Chris "Point God" Paul played with James Harden - both coaches handed PG duties to James Harden and both players accepted it as the best solution. He successfully outperformed both of them. Luka is not in that category of passer. The fact that he gives you 1 more ppg doesn't make up for that.