Better FIBA Player: Jokic vs Luka

[User9992]

Jokic plays for one of European Basketball mastodonts — Serbia. Serbia just like Spain, France, Germany, Lithuania and Latvia belongs to European BBall elite and among favorites in Eurobasket and every other FIBA competitions excluding USA (of course).

Luka plays for Slovenia, a country not known as a basketball powerhouse even by European standards, whom got lucky in 2017 to win Eurobasket with prime Dragic and 18 y.o. Luka.

Jokic has good players around him including decent NBA players, while Luka has plumbers as his teammates.

[MrGoat]

Luka was a possession away from medaling in the summer Olympics with Slovenia, and it was his teammate who screwed it up. He won Eurobasket with Slovenia and made the all Eurobasket team before he even stepped onto an NBA court. This one isn't even close

[Capn'O]

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

[pepe1991]

Under FIBA rules- Luka.
Guard/ballhandler is most important position in FIBA setting on the court because elite guards make defense crack.

Jokić is still monster, but in nba he simply has more space to operate and it's harder to trap him because guarding cuts and trapping him is impossible, where, under FIBA rules center can camp on defense below rim and floor is narrower so doubling big isn't that punishing even if big can pass as good as Jokić. Also running isolation for post up big is harder because there is more traffic in smaller pockets of space. Even traditional pick&roll is much harder to execute, especially inverted pick&roll, something Jokić is masterful at in NBA.


Best example of it is how Bogdan Bogdanovic injury impacted Serbia and how terrible they were vs Finland at executing offense.
What Schroder did to Germany at WC is also great example of elite guard play that carries team.

France could be used as another example of decline that lines up with decline of Fournier and DeColo. Spain won WC in 2006 and for sure they had Gasol but in that starting 5 they had 3 reliable ball handlers in Navarro (who was crem-de-la-crem of euro guards), Calderon and Fernandez.

[Mavrelous]

Luka is more accomplished and successful, but that Paris semi finals game was something else, taking a serious USA team to the brink was legendary.

[Petergrifindor]

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

No, imposible for him.

You can't get there as an Slovenian.

[KGtabake]

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

No.
Vlade Divac, Dejan Bodiroga and Pau Gasol will be very difficult to outrank by anyone.

Divac and Bodiroga doninated with Yugoslavia and Serbia and Pau was dominant for 15 years.

[UcanUwill]

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

You probably need gold medals to be GOAT, and Luka has one when he was a teen, that is just not enough. I do not know who is FIBA goat, maybe it is Pau. I definitley do not think Divac is FIBA goat, he was not even the best center in Europe during his prime.

[Mirotic12]

Jokic plays for one of European Basketball mastodonts — Serbia. Serbia just like Spain, France, Germany, Lithuania and Latvia belongs to European BBall elite and among favorites in Eurobasket and every other FIBA competitions excluding USA (of course).

Luka plays for Slovenia, a country not known as a basketball powerhouse even by European standards, whom got lucky in 2017 to win Eurobasket with prime Dragic and 18 y.o. Luka.

Jokic has good players around him including decent NBA players, while Luka has plumbers as his teammates.

Spain and Latvia are most definitely not among the elite European national teams, and that's not debatable.

[Mirotic12]

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

No.

[Mirotic12]

No.
Vlade Divac, Dejan Bodiroga and Pau Gasol will be very difficult to outrank by anyone.

Divac and Bodiroga doninated with Yugoslavia and Serbia and Pau was dominant for 15 years.

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

You probably need gold medals to be GOAT, and Luka has one when he was a teen, that is just not enough. I do not know who is FIBA goat, maybe it is Pau. I definitley do not think Divac is FIBA goat, he was not even the best center in Europe during his prime.

Those players mentioned above, didn't match the successes of the original Yugoslavia and USSR team players.

Kresimir Cosic
Dragan Kicanovic
Drazen Dalipagic
Sergei Belov
Gennady Volnov
Alexander Belostenny
Vladimir Tkachenko
Sergei Tarakanov
Modestas Paulaskas
Zurab Sakandelidze

The FIBA GOAT is debated among that group of players. Unless people only want to count since NBA players have been included.

There's no way for any modern player to match the success of guys that played on teams that dominated for several decades.

[Woodsanity]

Jokic almost beat a much more talented team USA which tops whatever Luka has done so far.

Fiba Jokic>Fiba Luka

NBA Jokic>>>NBA Luka

[Mirotic12]

Jokic almost beat a much more talented team USA which tops whatever Luka has done so far.

Fiba Jokic>Fiba Luka

NBA Jokic>>>NBA Luka

To this point in their respective careers, Luka has been a much better player in FIBA than Jokic has.

[CodeBreaker]

Jokic is my current favorite NBA player. He's head and shoulders above Luka and Giannis in the NBA.

But FIBA Luka >> FIBA Jokic

[sisibilio]

No.
Vlade Divac, Dejan Bodiroga and Pau Gasol will be very difficult to outrank by anyone.

Divac and Bodiroga doninated with Yugoslavia and Serbia and Pau was dominant for 15 years.

To FIBA fans - does Luka have a GOAT FIBA case yet? Is he en route?

You probably need gold medals to be GOAT, and Luka has one when he was a teen, that is just not enough. I do not know who is FIBA goat, maybe it is Pau. I definitley do not think Divac is FIBA goat, he was not even the best center in Europe during his prime.

Those players mentioned above, didn't match the successes of the original Yugoslavia and USSR team players.

Kresimir Cosic
Dragan Kicanovic
Drazen Dalipagic
Sergei Belov
Gennady Volnov
Alexander Belostenny
Vladimir Tkachenko
Sergei Tarakanov
Modestas Paulaskas
Zurab Sakandelidze

The FIBA GOAT is debated among that group of players. Unless people only want to count since NBA players have been included.

There's no way for any modern player to match the success of guys that played on teams that dominated for several decades.

It's clearly Sakandelidze.

[sisibilio]

Jokic plays for one of European Basketball mastodonts — Serbia. Serbia just like Spain, France, Germany, Lithuania and Latvia belongs to European BBall elite and among favorites in Eurobasket and every other FIBA competitions excluding USA (of course).

Luka plays for Slovenia, a country not known as a basketball powerhouse even by European standards, whom got lucky in 2017 to win Eurobasket with prime Dragic and 18 y.o. Luka.

Jokic has good players around him including decent NBA players, while Luka has plumbers as his teammates.

Slovenia used to have super deep squads in the 2000s - early 2010s but perennially underachieved.

[Archx]

Jokic almost beat a much more talented team USA which tops whatever Luka has done so far.

Fiba Jokic>Fiba Luka

NBA Jokic>>>NBA Luka

You clearly don't understand the strength difference in coaching and player base between Serbia and Slovenia. Show this to any Slovenian and he would laugh you out of the building. Ridiculous comparison in levels. It's wild how underrated Luka has become after one "down" year, which in irony, would probably still be a career year for a very high % of players in NBA history.

[The Master]

Jokic almost beat a much more talented team USA which tops whatever Luka has done so far.

Fiba Jokic>Fiba Luka

NBA Jokic>>>NBA Luka

Yeah, but Jokic didn't play any spectacular game against the US (17-5-11 on 45TS% and -10 in +-) - obviously, he was better than the stats suggest in that game, but Serbia all-round was playing great until the latter half of the 4th Q and it wasn't any epic performance from NJ, so to say that it tops anything Luka has done (especially considering it was a loss after all) is a reach.

[Mirotic12]

It's clearly Sakandelidze.

To narrow it down more, It's probably really between these four players:

Kresimir Cosic
Dragan Kicanovic
Drazen Dalipagic
Sergei Belov

And to narrow it down even further, it's probably mainly between these two players:

Kresimir Cosic
Sergei Belov

[Mirotic12]

Slovenia used to have super deep squads in the 2000s - early 2010s but perennially underachieved.

Slovenia had such a strong team in the 2000s, that I'm not sure if there 2nd best player now, would have made the main rotation back then.