Have we ever truly seen a player like Luka Doncic? We searched for the closest comparisons -

Last week, LeBron James’ mind began churning through its eidetic Rolodex, rifling through a mental folder labeled, “Players I Consider Great.” Contained within, there was Kevin Durant, longtime rival and oft-NBA Finals opponent. Then Jimmy Butler, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Joel Embiid, Eastern Conference foes when James played in Cleveland. Then Ben Simmons, represented by Klutch Sports and mentored by James. And finally, after those names had been said and after a brief moment had slipped by, James practically rushed to add one more: Luka Doncic.

“These are great players, absolutely,” James stated.

For James, it was a brief aside as a larger Anthony Davis storyline raged around him. But for Doncic, it was unprompted validation from the superstar he had aspired to emulate ever since his starry ascent began as a 13-year-old youth team prospect at Real Madrid. James is often asked to say nice things about promising rookies, but this was an unconscious association that a 19-year-old, one James didn’t even know one year prior, was a worthy company of superstars he rattled off in quick succession. And Doncic, unquestionably, belongs.

It’s hardly just James. “He has found a way to impose his will on most nights, (and) it’s going to be good to see him develop into a star,” Stephen Curry said. Curry’s teammate Draymond Green was equally impressed with the budding Dallas star: “He already a problem.” Mike D’Antoni: “He’s a man with his game.” And Dave Joerger, who coaches a team that passed on drafting Doncic: “Perhaps there was an idea that there was a ceiling with him, (but) I don’t see it.”

That, right there, is the only real question about Doncic’s future: not whether he will be a star (he already is), but how big of one. Right now, Mark Cuban has already begun lobbying for his All-Star candidacy, a difficult case in the crowded Western Conference but one that carries a legitimate argument all the same. “Is anyone else putting up his numbers?” Cuban asked recently. As a rookie, certainly not. Only six first-year players have averaged at least 18 points, 5.5 rebounds, and five assists, like Doncic currently is. Only one was a teenager: LeBron James. Add Doncic’s efficiency, and you narrow the list to three names: Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, and Oscar Robertson.

Those are four Hall of Famers; not sneak-into-the-party-through-the-back-entrance Hall of Famers, or I’m-the-plus-one-of-my-cooler-friends Hall of Famers, but genre-defining Hall of Famers, the type of Hall of Famers that are basketball, not just participants of it. Doncic’s measuring stick isn’t the Hall of Fame; that’s not a reasonable measuring stick for any 19-year-old, obviously. But as we continue understanding and appreciating this teenager, those comparisons must appear. He is earning them.

Dallas, as any good franchise should, has shied away from projecting greatness onto Slovenia’s Wonder Boy. Rick Carlisle, in particular, has been careful not to heap unnecessary praise onto Doncic, answering questions but rarely singling Doncic out on his own. Naturally, Mark Cuban hasn’t been so shy. “The moment’s never too big,” he said. “You don’t see that in a rookie, ever.”

Yet even Cuban didn’t expect Doncic to be this good, this quick: “Fuck no,” he laughed. He’s already projecting his future: “He’s got to get better as a shooter, and when he’s better as a shooter, watch out. Then he’ll be unstoppable.” And even as the team avoids aggrandizing Doncic, you still hear whispers of comparisons, from those around the league and those employed by the Mavericks, comparisons that reach to cerebral heights, even ones from certain team employees wondering if he’s the next Larry Bird.

Leading up to the draft, talent evaluators who disliked Doncic would call him Hedo Turkoglu, one Mavericks executive told me. That comparison, intended as a slight, can already be cast aside; at Turkoglu’s highest peak, the 6’10 Turkish forward averaged 19.5 points, 5.7 rebounds, 5.0 assists, and shot 40 percent behind the arc. That’s damn near what the 19-year-old Doncic is doing right now.

That said, Turkoglu’s highlights are eerily similar, at least aesthetically. Consider how the two both love the jump pass, especially when they use it to find corner shooters.

There’s an added danger to the jump pass, an extra finality to whatever imminent decision will be made with the ball, but that’s why it often works so well. Only the savviest players can use it to their advantage. Turkoglu averaged 3.0 turnovers per game during his best season, while Doncic has coughed it up an average of 3.4 times each game this year. Doncic is less polished with more responsibilities, so that’s to be expected.

Turkoglu, like Doncic, never burst by defenders, and rarely left them in his wake. Instead, he constantly probed defenses, waiting for his opportunity to strike, something you’ve surely seen from the Slovenian, as well.

And Turkoglu, like Doncic, never feared the jump stop leaving him stuck. How many times has Doncic stepped back for his signature 3-point shot and passed it up? How many times has he tossed the ball back outside after a failed sortie to the interior?

Even the wrong-footed layups, a Steve Nash-like trait from the two towering forwards, are identical.

As are the close-range floaters, one trick that any player with Doncic’s or Turkoglu’s athletic build must know. They lack the Slender Man wingspan or helium hangtime to always reach the rim, but they’re skilled enough that it doesn’t matter.

Stan Van Gundy coached Turkoglu at his best, and he said this about Doncic: “I know this: if Luka Doncic doesn’t get one bit better, he’s going to be a damn good pro for 15 years in this league.” That’s telling praise. Doncic’s game mimics Turkoglu’s in many ways, but he’s already reaching a much higher trajectory as a player.

Doncic’s athleticism doesn’t come neatly packaged for American sports consumption. There’s no spectacular 40-yard dash, no incredible vertical leap, no quick-twitch first step, all athleticism attributes we’ve grown accustomed to. Yet Doncic is athletic, incredibly so, in ways we appreciate less. The same could be said for Paul Pierce.

A 2013 Sloan Sports Conference paper helped explain that. The paper, penned by NYU’s Philip Maymin and presenting data from the then-brand-new SportsVU motion tracking cameras, helped isolate how often and to what degree players accelerated during the course of a basketball game. Pierce couldn’t have beaten most defenders in a straight-line race, but he sped up and slowed down better than nearly anyone. That study, in fact, favorably compared Pierce’s acceleration to Kevin Durant, Dwyane Wade, and even LeBron James.

Sports Illustrated’s Rob Mahoney wrote about the paper then, describing it like this:

“The ease with which Pierce changes directions and speeds is in itself a physical ability, albeit one maximized by his guile. There’s no question that Pierce understands the value of varied movement, perhaps to a deeper extent than any player in the league. But he is only so successful as a stutter-step player because he’s able to shift gears constantly while maintaining perfect balance. That’s an incredible physical talent, albeit one not captured by a traditional conception of athleticism that favors sprinting speed and aerial acrobatics above the more restrained flares of a player like Pierce.”

That description rings true for Doncic, too, who often separates from defenders who are in front of him by slowing down or manipulating their momentum against his own just right. He won’t ever separate from defenders like, say, Russell Westbrook, but Doncic’s size gives him another advantage. Pierce used his frame to shield layup attempts for his entire career, and Doncic has already learned that trick, too. Even without much space, Doncic can finish.

While Brad Stevens never coached Pierce, he said this about Doncic: “He has all the savvy moves of older guys. The game seems awfully slow for him. He can just manipulate the game as he goes along.”

From ages 23 to 29, Pierce averaged 8.8 free throw attempts along with his 24.8 points per game. Doncic is already averaging 5.5 free throw attempts, and given his size and savvy, he’s only going to earn more as time progresses. “He’s so big and he such a good feel for angles, getting guys on his hip,” Mavericks assistant coach Stephen Silas said. “When he can drive, when he can draw help and maybe get a foul.” Modeling his scoring after Pierce, especially around the rim, can only help.

James Harden is another favorable comparison to Doncic, and not only because they both shoot stepback 3-pointers. In fact, the skill that largely dictates that stepback ability is deceleration, the counterpart to Paul Pierce’s hidden athleticism we just discussed. Harden and Doncic have both worked out for P3 Applied Sports Science, an athletic facility that measures those hidden athleticism variables that casual fans haven’t learned to value. Among the substantial database of players they had tested, Harden ranked in the 99th percentile in deceleration, and Doncic in the 93rd.

Slowing from full sprint to a standstill isn’t easy, but is an incredibly functional feat of athleticism, especially in basketball. Harden and Doncic both use it well.

Doncic covers immense ground when he leaps back, something that permits him to launch that shot with regularity against virtually any defender. That’s how Harden has made his stepback so effective.

Both Doncic and Harden do an exceptional job of slowing down in the paint with defenders behind them, like this example from Doncic, courtesy this ESPN analysis of the two players. It’s a trick that encourages everything that makes them great: the patience, the sideline-to-sideline vision, the trickery. It freezes basketball possessions in advantageous five-on-four situations, and the only thing more dangerous than Luka Doncic in a five-on-four situation is Doncic in that same situation for many consecutive seconds at a time.

Harden has developed into one of the sport’s greatest scorers ever, and his first-step burst might be something Doncic can’t ever recreate. That said, there’s much these two players have in common. Even Harden’s biggest question – whether his conditioning and stamina is ever strong enough to hold up over the course of an 82-game season and into the postseason beyond that – is one Doncic shares. In time, Doncic will need to shed his teenaged dietary habits before developing further as a superstar. But that’s a future problem. He’s already this good, after all.

No Doncic comparison is more ambitious than Larry Bird, but really, you don’t have to look far to see it. Tall shooters, inherently gifted at scoring, with vision that practically peers into the future. The highlights, already, recall each other.

Seriously. Not far at all.

Bird’s four-year prime was this: 28.1 points, 9.7 rebounds, 6.8 assists, and 50/40/90 shooting. He’s one of the most impossibly skilled basketball players in the league’s history. Doncic could be another, or he could improve to a multiple time All-Star who never cracks the top-10, or perhaps his skills could just plateau right here. But he’s already the best player on a team fighting for playoff contention. What Doncic is right now, even if the only thing he develops further is veteran polish, is what Draymond Green said: a problem.

Doncic isn’t one-of-a-kind. Players like him exist, scattered scarcely throughout the league’s history. But when those players do exist, they tend to dominate the league for years, leaving marks that won’t be replicated until the next such anomaly arrives. Doncic, it has become increasingly clear, is simply the next in this all-talented line of succession.

(Photo by Jerome Miron/ USA Today Sports)

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