Luka Dončić Discussion - Year 2

[Dirk]

Vet.

Gfycat Video - Click to Play

Gfycat Video - Click to Play

Gfycat Video - Click to Play

Gfycat Video - Click to Play

[stilldropin20]

ok. ive seen enough.

Luka is going to be the best player in the game and very soon. he is already playing like a top 5 player. he is the perfect combination of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson. damn! why couldn't my bullies move up to get him!!

[XTraderXL]

Luka has been trending down the last 5-6 games. To me the situation seems very similar as last season. At the beginning of the season he has been playing great, didnt have any bad games and in January started to struggle with his shot and it all went downhill from there. These last few games his % dropped, I cant remember when I saw a floater from the last time, that one midrange shot he takes per game is usually a miss, cant hit FTs at a high rate... Part of it is also that teams are focusing on him more and he has to adapt. Maybe I am wrong but I just see too many similarities between last season and this one.

[Archx]

Luka has been trending down the last 5-6 games. To me the situation seems very similar as last season. At the beginning of the season he has been playing great, didnt have any bad games and in January started to struggle with his shot and it all went downhill from there. These last few games his % dropped, I cant remember when I saw a floater from the last time, that one midrange shot he takes per game is usually a miss, cant hit FTs at a high rate... Part of it is also that teams are focusing on him more and he has to adapt. Maybe I am wrong but I just see too many similarities between last season and this one.

Yeah because defenders know about his 2 way game. Either pull up a 3 or go to the rim. His mid range game is non existent. I really thought they will fix that coming to the nba. So often he gets free of his defender in PnR but he just waits for him to catch up or is not sure when to drive or simply take an easy shot. It's frustrating because he really needs to add that to his game.

Last night whole team looked really lazy. They are terrible on the road, no energy.

[Rn5ho]

Lol, going from one extreme to another. He had a bad game yesterday, but then again he only played 22 and still ended with 8/4/6 and he's known as the player who plays at his best in final quarter - if the game was not a blowout and he actually played, I'm sure he'd get to his usual 15-20pts.

The previous games he only had a horrible showing in Los Angeles, but that only happened after the intentional foul by LBJ - his game completely fell apart and he even missed next game due to that. Other than that he's been pretty consistent - of course one can always play better and that's also what Luka keeps repeating - he can improve in everything, but it's not nearly as bad as you guys are trying to show it.

Whole team sucked last night, he even had by far the best plus/minus among all starters and only Broekhoff had better one among all players playing more than 10mins. So hold your horses, because this season is nothing like last season. Last season all defenses adapted to him and started playing physically, knowing he had no teammate support and stopping Luka was equal to stopping Real, but this season he has decent supporting cast and he can still step aside and his teammates make things happen (welp, not yesterday obviously).

[XTraderXL]

Lol, going from one extreme to another. He had a bad game yesterday, but then again he only played 22 and still ended with 8/4/6 and he's known as the player who plays at his best in final quarter - if the game was not a blowout and he actually played, I'm sure he'd get to his usual 15-20pts.

The previous games he only had a horrible showing in Los Angeles, but that only happened after the intentional foul by LBJ - his game completely fell apart and he even missed next game due to that. Other than that he's been pretty consistent - of course one can always play better and that's also what Luka keeps repeating - he can improve in everything, but it's not nearly as bad as you guys are trying to show it.

Whole team sucked last night, he even had by far the best plus/minus among all starters and only Broekhoff had better one among all players playing more than 10mins. So hold your horses, because this season is nothing like last season. Last season all defenses adapted to him and started playing physically, knowing he had no teammate support and stopping Luka was equal to stopping Real, but this season he has decent supporting cast and he can still step aside and his teammates make things happen (welp, not yesterday obviously).

He has clearly been playing worse recently. Is that something we shouldnt be talking about? Its not just this game, its the LAL game and a few others as well. That LeBron foul is just a stupid excuse, you want us to believe that he lost his concentration because LeBron fouled him? If thats true, its a terrible look for Doncic.

Archix and I have been mentioning his lack of mid range game for a while now and thats one aspect of his game where he has a lot of room to improve. Every time he comes off the screen, he has enough room to shoot it because the defenders pack the paint. They do this because they know he will not shoot and thats why he is not able to go to the paint. Just shoot the damn ball 2-3 times, hit those shots at 60% and the floor will open up for him. Right now he has to work hard for every shot and he is still taking tough shots, thats why % accross the board are down. And they will stay low until he realises that he needs to expand his offensive game. He will be limited in what he can do offensively until that happens.

[Lord Cuban]

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Special thanks to Phoenix Suns, Atlanta Hawks and Sacramento Kings front offices...

[Lord Cuban]

Read on Twitter

[Rn5ho]

He has clearly been playing worse recently. Is that something we shouldnt be talking about? Its not just this game, its the LAL game and a few others as well. That LeBron foul is just a stupid excuse, you want us to believe that he lost his concentration because LeBron fouled him? If thats true, its a terrible look for Doncic.

While I'm not disagreeing with 2nd part (which I left out of quote), this quote above is just mind-boggling. What the hell are you talking about? He was visibly not himself the rest of the game and not because of some concentration drop, but because of the injury on his hip that was caused by that foul - he even missed the next whole game because of that and you're talking about concentration drop?

He's still a rookie, putting up historical numbers, shooting 45%+ in all but 2 of the last 6 games that you're mentioning.. yeah, he's n.1 option on Dallas and defenses are adapting to him, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's playing worse, but defenses are playing more focused on him. He will adapt and as long as he's contributing in other areas, I'm not worried - he had 9 steals in last 6 games for example. Again, he's a rookie, he's still learning and having veteran standards for him is just unfair, especially since his bad games came in games where whole team played poorly and lost.

[XTraderXL]

He has clearly been playing worse recently. Is that something we shouldnt be talking about? Its not just this game, its the LAL game and a few others as well. That LeBron foul is just a stupid excuse, you want us to believe that he lost his concentration because LeBron fouled him? If thats true, its a terrible look for Doncic.

While I'm not disagreeing with 2nd part (which I left out of quote), this quote above is just mind-boggling. What the hell are you talking about? He was visibly not himself the rest of the game and not because of some concentration drop, but because of the injury on his hip that was caused by that foul - he even missed the next whole game because of that and you're talking about concentration drop?

He's still a rookie, putting up historical numbers, shooting 45%+ in all but 2 of the last 6 games that you're mentioning.. yeah, he's n.1 option on Dallas and defenses are adapting to him, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's playing worse, but defenses are playing more focused on him. He will adapt and as long as he's contributing in other areas, I'm not worried - he had 9 steals in last 6 games for example. Again, he's a rookie, he's still learning and having veteran standards for him is just unfair, especially since his bad games came in games where whole team played poorly and lost.

How do you know he got injured on that play? And if he did, he would not have kept playing for another 20 min +. Luka looked the same to me, he was just playing badly because Ingram locked him down. Carlisle would have taken him out if he saw something was up but he didnt do that.

So whats the excuse after this Pelicans game? Was he still feeling the injury to his hip? I dont buy this crap. If you are injured, you dont play. And if you are playing, there are no excuses if you play badly. You are just looking for excuses instead of admitting he had a bad game. I wonder what your reasoning will be next time he has a bad game, which I suspect is going to be pretty soon the way he has been trending.


And your numbers of his last 6 games are wrong. In the last 6 games, he was below 45% 3 times and in the last 10 games he shot below 45% 6 times and another time exactly 45%. Out of that 6 sub 45% games, 5 of them were sub 40%. Compare those numbers with the numbers from first 10 games. Get your facts straight next time...

[wolfram]

Yes, he is playing worse last few games. Also last game was b2b on the road. Luka looked fine against Portland. So I don't think you need to worry so much. Maybe you just love to nitpick him when his game is not up to your standards.

[The-Power]

I really dislike when people say Luka plays like a vet. It's misleading, because it implies that veterans naturally develop this kind of game. In reality, however, the vast majority of them do not. The more accurate way to talk about Doncic' game would be to say: ‘if anybody plays like this, it would be a vet’. Fully recognizing that most vets never develop this kind of acumen. This might be one of the reasons why Doncic' ceiling is sometimes questioned; because such comments make it seem like Doncic' main advantage is experience, and that it will therefore become less of an advantage as other players of his age naturally gain experience. To me, that's just a screwed up way to look at Doncic' game.

[Nikson]

It is now official on National level: "Luka might be a mix of EMJ and LB".

Ha, ha, ha, when I was saying the same on this forum in march 2018, I was almost crucified.

[Dirk]

I really dislike when people say Luka plays like a vet. It's misleading, because it implies that veterans naturally develop this kind of game. In reality, however, the vast majority of them do not. The more accurate way to talk about Doncic' game would be to say: ‘if anybody plays like this, it would be a vet’. Fully recognizing that most vets never develop this kind of acumen. This might be one of the reasons why Doncic' ceiling is sometimes questioned; because such comments make it seem like Doncic' main advantage is experience, and that it will therefore become less of an advantage as other players of his age naturally gain experience. To me, that's just a screwed up way to look at Doncic' game.

I tend to identify 'vet plays' as 'high iq' plays. And obviously some young players just have a special feel for the game and that is why we see them make plays that we most commonly associate with veteran players. Instinct, creativity... you can't really teach those.

It's interesting what you mention, because instead of people seeing the fact that he has a large baggage of "vet plays" as a positive thing... because he is just ahead of the curve and will keep growing upon that... instead they think that means he is closer to just being a finished article... which is kind of ridiculous considering the age factor/physical growth + no matter how many games he played in Spain... the NBA is a different place

Ironically, I described this play as "vet", just because I thought it was hilarious how he hooked Stauskas.

Spoiler:

Vet.

Gfycat Video - Click to Play

This is an interesting topic because we can look at a guy that wasn't as a talented. Someone like Barea... he has all sorts of "vet plays". And again... does he make them because of experience or because he is smart? We must take for granted that experience and repetition play a part, but it ultimately is more about a player's natural ability and mental make up than purely a result of having x amount of games.

Barea says of how he’s able to produce at this level in his 13th NBA season.

“First of all just staying healthy,” “But second of all now the way I read the game, my IQ for the game is awesome compared to where I used to be when I was younger. It helps me big time, and this intuition I have, with the coach I got, it feels super comfortable.”

Can we measure "intuition"? We can't. But we can see it. And we have to believe that when someone has a special intuition for the game, he'll just continue to grow. He won't suddenly hit his ceiling at age 22 because he has been a pro for 7 or 8 years by then. Providing we keep working hard, we'll always continue to adapt and grow.

Does the quoted tweet make any sense:

Read on Twitter

[stilldropin20]

It is now official on National level: "Luka might be a mix of EMJ and LB".

Ha, ha, ha, when I was saying the same on this forum in march 2018, I was almost crucified.

imma go with steph curry and larry bird. fa reelz!

[Rn5ho]

He has clearly been playing worse recently. Is that something we shouldnt be talking about? Its not just this game, its the LAL game and a few others as well. That LeBron foul is just a stupid excuse, you want us to believe that he lost his concentration because LeBron fouled him? If thats true, its a terrible look for Doncic.

While I'm not disagreeing with 2nd part (which I left out of quote), this quote above is just mind-boggling. What the hell are you talking about? He was visibly not himself the rest of the game and not because of some concentration drop, but because of the injury on his hip that was caused by that foul - he even missed the next whole game because of that and you're talking about concentration drop?

He's still a rookie, putting up historical numbers, shooting 45%+ in all but 2 of the last 6 games that you're mentioning.. yeah, he's n.1 option on Dallas and defenses are adapting to him, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's playing worse, but defenses are playing more focused on him. He will adapt and as long as he's contributing in other areas, I'm not worried - he had 9 steals in last 6 games for example. Again, he's a rookie, he's still learning and having veteran standards for him is just unfair, especially since his bad games came in games where whole team played poorly and lost.

How do you know he got injured on that play? And if he did, he would not have kept playing for another 20 min +. Luka looked the same to me, he was just playing badly because Ingram locked him down. Carlisle would have taken him out if he saw something was up but he didnt do that.

So whats the excuse after this Pelicans game? Was he still feeling the injury to his hip? I dont buy this crap. If you are injured, you dont play. And if you are playing, there are no excuses if you play badly. You are just looking for excuses instead of admitting he had a bad game. I wonder what your reasoning will be next time he has a bad game, which I suspect is going to be pretty soon the way he has been trending.


And your numbers of his last 6 games are wrong. In the last 6 games, he was below 45% 3 times and in the last 10 games he shot below 45% 6 times and another time exactly 45%. Out of that 6 sub 45% games, 5 of them were sub 40%. Compare those numbers with the numbers from first 10 games. Get your facts straight next time...

Yeah, literally mix of Hezonja and Miličič.

[Jstock12]

Gfycat Video - Click to Play

All of those plays were nice, but this one irks me. It's a nice pass, but the decision was silly. Just run down the clock. If you turn it over on such a high risk play and they hit a three, then anything can still happen. While the other moves were vet-like, this was a rookie play. Why take a 5% chance of losing the game when you can keep it at 0%.

[XTraderXL]

While I'm not disagreeing with 2nd part (which I left out of quote), this quote above is just mind-boggling. What the hell are you talking about? He was visibly not himself the rest of the game and not because of some concentration drop, but because of the injury on his hip that was caused by that foul - he even missed the next whole game because of that and you're talking about concentration drop?

He's still a rookie, putting up historical numbers, shooting 45%+ in all but 2 of the last 6 games that you're mentioning.. yeah, he's n.1 option on Dallas and defenses are adapting to him, but that doesn't necessarily mean he's playing worse, but defenses are playing more focused on him. He will adapt and as long as he's contributing in other areas, I'm not worried - he had 9 steals in last 6 games for example. Again, he's a rookie, he's still learning and having veteran standards for him is just unfair, especially since his bad games came in games where whole team played poorly and lost.

How do you know he got injured on that play? And if he did, he would not have kept playing for another 20 min +. Luka looked the same to me, he was just playing badly because Ingram locked him down. Carlisle would have taken him out if he saw something was up but he didnt do that.

So whats the excuse after this Pelicans game? Was he still feeling the injury to his hip? I dont buy this crap. If you are injured, you dont play. And if you are playing, there are no excuses if you play badly. You are just looking for excuses instead of admitting he had a bad game. I wonder what your reasoning will be next time he has a bad game, which I suspect is going to be pretty soon the way he has been trending.


And your numbers of his last 6 games are wrong. In the last 6 games, he was below 45% 3 times and in the last 10 games he shot below 45% 6 times and another time exactly 45%. Out of that 6 sub 45% games, 5 of them were sub 40%. Compare those numbers with the numbers from first 10 games. Get your facts straight next time...

Yeah, literally mix of Hezonja and Miličič.

Great comeback... Did I ever mention any one of those guys? You clearly lost the arugment and are only making a fool out of yourself.

Will you disproove the numbers I gave you? And again, 3 quarters into the game and he is shooting 25% from the field, playing terrible on defense and looking slow just like he did last season from Jan/Feb on. Or you are going to argue thats not the case? What is it this time? Did he get injured 2 min into the game and he is not himslef or will you find a better excuse for the bad game he is having?

[Rn5ho]

Ok.

[Nikson]