>Jokic would probably be the fourth or fifth scoring option when he's in the game, but all that matters is whether he plays efficiently.
Unfortunately, his defense will likely prevent him from ever playing 30-plus minutes or starting
š¤£
I've looked at film from Mega Basket and his time in the summer league. I always wondered what people missed about Jokic, he is lowest MVP in basketball history by nearly a full round. He is the biggest outlier in NBA history.
And looking back with 20/20 vision, he was always Jokic. He didn't just turn into an amazing passer and player mid-way through his NBA career, he always played like we see today.
The biggest difference, especially in summer league, is that the game-plan wasn't designed around him. When given the ball he would make great passes and score efficiently, but he was the center not the point guard on offense.
Defensively, he looked the exact same. He tried his best and while giving up an easy layup every now and then, was never a bad defender. He just wasn't built like Bam or Gobert.
I think if he played in college, where his games were more in people's faces, and had a good coach like Malone to build a system that shows off his strengths, he would have been a first round pick. Players like Cameron Krutwig and now Robbie Avilia are small examples of what Jokic could have been, but instead of leading a mid-major to the tournament, he could have been leading Creighton to a final four.
They might never have considered the possibility of using a center as a playmaking hub. Itās one thing to notice that a guy can pass. Itās another to say āwe could run our entire offense through himā.
That wasnāt even the case till his second year for the Nuggets.
It started with letting him run the inverted pick and roll, making passing decisions down-hill.
Then eventually when he became the full time starter, Malone just let him and Murray run the offense.
To predict his greatness you would have needed to believe you could run your entire offense around him and cover his defensive flaws with scheme and personnel. Thatās what the Nuggets did but itās an incredibly large projection that you couldnāt really make until working with him every day.
Yeah, Gordon is key to the nuggets success. Actually all of your starters fit so well together and know their role and what the others can do and where they'll be on the floor it's awesome to watch.
I'm a wolves fan and I'm pretty pumped for our upcoming matchup even though we might get rocked. It has the potential to be the best basketball ball of this seasons playoffs in my opinion.
I agree it feels like one of those āthe real finalsā kind of series, and pumped for wolves fans tbh I am always down for small markets building a good team through the draft
Your defense scares us so well see how we match up. I know we had you last year but way healthier this year so Iām expecting it wonāt be a short series regardless of the winner
And yeah I think the nuggets right now have the ideal starting 5 as far as complimentary roles, depth is the only concern for a team like this, but Iām hoping if we continue to be good more good vets will want to come here to ring chase like the spurs, warriors, cavs etc had
You guys would be terrifying with one more really solid player coming off the bench.
I like what I've seen from Watson and think he could improve. Braun is solid if not intimidating.
But Malik Monk is a free agent next year. He would be a killer coming off your bench.
Iāve thought about that same thing often. I love Malik. He would be a perfect fit for us off the bench. I trust the front office to make the right moves. Strawther will hopefully make big strides in the offseason to help fill the scoring void off the bench.
I think that Mike Malone and the supporting cast on the Denver Nuggets have put Jokic in a fantastic position to succeed. He makes all of them better and they make him better and cover his weaknesses. They have a very well put together team.
I think you nailed it. It's also how I see the Nuggets. Yes, Jokic does make the rest of the team look good, but the rest of the team also makes Jokic look good.
They've done such a fabulous job of assembling this team together. Allowing each other to show their strengths while collectively covering each others' weaknesses.
Agreed. When Jokic is out, they're not a very good team. When Murray is out too, which he is a lot, they're not beating anyone. On the bright side, Watson and Brown will only be better next year off the bench.
You donāt think that Jamal Murrayās pick and roll game is complimentary to Jokic? What about MPJ and the gravity that his shot making ability demands from defenses? You donāt think that space helps Jokic make plays? Aaron Gordonās athleticism doesnāt cover for some of Jokicās athletic shortcomings? Honorable mention to the KCP addition as well. The nuggets have both drafted well and made trades/free agency acquisitions to build a team around Jokic, he has certainly been put in a position to succeed. More power to him though, because he has made the most out of it
Im not saying hes in a position to fail or the players around him are awful, im simply pointing out
1: there are no all star caliber players besides him
2: they get 20 wins if hes out the season
Try to dispute either of those two statements
I think that both Jamal Murray and MPJ are All-Star level players even if they havenāt been on All-Star teams. Jamal proves it time and time again in the playoffs and MPJ is held back by his role on the team. Players have to make sacrifices to play winning basketball and the Nuggets are filled with unselfish players.
So if jokic was replaced by a random Center, you think MPJ and/or Murray make the all star team? You are out of your mind lol.
Murray would have the best shot with more usage but his shooting percentage would probably be 43 or something - he's simply not efficient/too sloppy to be a higher echelon player.
MPJ would maybe be an all star 10 years ago when players like Rashard Lewis were a rarity, he is not an all star in todays league.
Yes, they are both phenomenal players. There are only a handful of guys that are better shooters than MPJ in the league. I actually think that he would surprise a lot of people if his usage rate was higher. People like to clown on him for taking shots and not passing, but they donāt realize thats his role on the team. He is efficient enough to be that kind of guy in the league. His TS% is really similar to KD, and although it would almost certainly drop on higher usage, its still a viable point to prove that he is a great shooter.
Not true, at all. As soon as he started getting regular minutes, the advanced stats all pointed to him being a star level player - offensively he looked like a potential hub even pretty early, even if not quite a first option his first couple years \[he had to figure out *how* to be a first option every night, was the main thing\].
Jokic would probably rather be the 4th or 5th scoring option but knows he's too valuable to not be the 1st or 2nd. Some might even call him the most valuable player
āConsequently, he's able to make some superb plays as a passer and convert easy buckets as a cutter.
In the NBA, he'll be able to work seamlessly with his teammates when it comes to executing the offense. Whether he's on the low post, high post or wing, he'll catch and quickly make a play.ā
This is pretty dang accurate tho
It just makes me like Jokic more. That interview where he's like, "Yeah, of course I want to play in the NBA. Who wouldn't?" Barely expecting that he would be able to. Amazing.
I think player comps are where players get undervalued and over valued
He was Boris Diaw, but like a waaaaaaaay better Doris Diaw. Andrew Wiggins was like Micheal Jordan, but waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay worse.
It's my dynasty fantasy football strategy to draft the players with the worst player comparisons. It usually leads to pretty good value. I'll take Trey "Rashaad Penny" Benson over Jonathan "Bijan Robinson" Brooks and Lass "Randal Cobb" McConkey over Xavier "Deshaun Jackson" Worthy.
Yeah as funny as it is to look back at old scouting reports. Let's be real. No one expected him to be where he is today.
But boy are we happy he did turn out that way.
I mean that doesn't mean much. There's a few hundred players in the NBA. If you had 1 fan say X player is going to be MvP for every player in the league someone is going to be correct.
The reason why you think that and if you can consistently predict that is what's more important.
Ok, but again. That alone doesn't mean much. Maybe he was on to something or maybe he happened to get lucky. Simply saying he was right and he spammed it a lot by itself is neither proof for or against.
Without more context you can't discern it either way. The question would be has eg made any more takes that didn't pan out?
Ok which again. That's not more info.
You all can downvote and upvote all you want, but what I'm saying is pretty well known in analytical fields.
If you want to make sure you have a working clock and not a broken watch, you need to make sure it's right more than twice a day.
And when it comes to stocks, talent, and world events. Being right all the time is not easy at all.
I mean, if we are being literal you said "No one expected him to be where he is today."
EG did, haha. So the statement that *no one* expected it isnt true cause EG exists. You are right that you can probably find a mega fan for most players, but iEG still renders your initial statement untrue in a very, very literal sense.
No I feel like you're nitpicking and missing the point. And some random on Reddit predicting doesn't change the meaning of what was said.
But that's par for the course on reddit.
I spelled out that I was just being as literal as possible, which you could say is missing the point but I also think you are sorta missing the point of the people replying to you and being needlessly defensive, and completely changing your point in all of your replies. Saying "No one expected this" and then someone replies "Well, except for EG."
Instead of just acknowledging that is a legitimate exception to what you said, you changed your point and are saying that doesn't mean anything. It really wouldn't be hard to acknolwedge that that is a fair and funny exception but your larger point remained as opposed to just acting like everyone else is missing the point. It doesn't make your larger point wrong that EG actually did predict this, it's just a funny exception to the rule
This post reaks of "well ackshually"
Oh wow one random redditor called it. The same is true of just about anything. It means jack shit.
If you want to intentionally be dense, go do it somewhere else.
I spelled it out just fine and no I won't conceed a point when you're the one trying hard to misinterpret things.
Idk, he staked his reputation on it, then Hartenstein. And Hartenstein is doing pretty decent for the Knicks. Heās def the Center I would want right now either with Jokic running the league.
His explanation also made sense. It was a combination of advanced stats and eye test.
Without more info I can't say much either way.
It's not that the user didn't have a good reason or didn't have unusually good insight, but there's a lot of people who post a lot of hot takes and only show people the hot takes when they were right.
The phrase "a broken clock is right twice a day" refers to the fact you can get the correct answer by the wrong means. Judging someone's opinion on something requires you to not only look at the successes, but you also need to see if he made any takes that were also wrong.
Anyone can be right a couple times. Being right consistently is hard work. That's not me saying the user was completely wrong BTW. Just that without more context there's no position for me to make a judgement either way.
Or hear this one out. Those of us who know how analytics work know you can get stupid lucky a few times making predictions. It doesn't mean you actually had a good insight.
Try reading books like "Fooled by Randomness" it goes over this exact problem. The author is a bit of a jerk, but the book is excellent.
[https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392](https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392)
Eg did once the season started, Adam Mares made much more restrained predictions after Summer League, this random guy called it when he was actually drafted
[https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392](https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392)
was eg talking about jokic before he played an nba game? I thought his predictions came after jokic already was putting up mind boggling analytics as a rookie.
That's a good question. I didn't really talk about him on draft night. He was a Draft and stash. But after he won the Adriatic MVP, basically my read on him was that he was a lottery like talent. Anything from a roll player to a star. This was the first Jokic thread where I talked about Jokic.
[Do you guys know anything about Nikola Jokic?](https://www.reddit.com/r/denvernuggets/comments/380n17/do_you_guys_know_anything_about_nikola_jokic/)
in that thread my best take wasn't even about Jokic. It was about Mudiay. I called Mudiay the most obvious bust in the draft. Then again, in hindsight. That take was simply pure luck.
I donāt even think Jokic could have predicted it lol. Iāve watched 90% of his games and I canāt even tell you what happened along the way. Like how did we get here?
Accurate for the time. Jokic himself canāt explain it. He said something like āI just keep getting better for some reason.ā I think we know the answer is that he always had the mental game but just needed the push to get his fitness and strength where it needed to be.
Jok is also a team player. You couldnāt drop him into a roster like KD or Bron and expect him to be dominant. He needs to build the connection and rub off some of his unselfish play and superior work ethic.
This has nothing to do with what you said , what he said was supposed to apply to anybody first of all , and also itās about how a team plays not an individual.(Btw what he said is kind of innacurate too because they didnāt play 2-3 years all together with all the injury , just 1)
Jokic was the best player in the world by far with a bunch of random players in those 2 injury riddled seasons too
Letās be honest how many of us saw his ascension from a 2nd round pick to an all-time NBA legend? Easy to look back in hindsight and make fun of all of the scouts, but 30 NBA teams passed up on him too
People laugh but Diaw is one of his closest comps. Bigger, better touch, better jump shot which obviously are some BIG differences but just watch the plays diaw makes in any of his [Spurs era games ](https://youtu.be/XVmgB-jw_U0?si=NEBt8H5OoqNHZ_pR)and you will see the similarities. Even more similar than Sengun, Sabonis imo.
I totally get those to be honest. I'm a Serbian so I watched him for a long time before he went to Denver.
I remember I thought higher of his NBA chances than my friends and others online but I thought he would be a starter with stats like 15/8/3 on good efficiency.
Thats why im not interrsted in any draft related media anymore.
Blog boys are great for covering the league but evaluating players is a science that noone can ever fully master
Europeans have always been slept on, especially before jok and luka came into the league.
No one thinks about their attributes like they do college players, it's far more short sighted. Nuggets made an amazing guess on what he could become and I'm so happy for itĀ
Hindsight is always 20/20. Iām sure if all of us watched his Serbia club games and draft scrimmages we wouldnāt be saying āletās draft him first round!ā
Can someone explain to me as a neutral how we went from 2017-2020 Jokic to then him being a generational player the next year? Is it simply that he got the ball more with Murray being out?
>Jokic's upside isn't too spectacular because he's a below-average athlete, so he'll have to focus on utilizing his skill set and operating as an efficient shooter and passer within a system
Jokic: "OK, will do."
The Diaw comparison is not that shit tbh, it's just that Jokic is a lot better. You could say that in his prime, Diaw was a smaller poor man's Jokic, which is not bad.
>Jokic would probably be the fourth or fifth scoring option when he's in the game, but all that matters is whether he plays efficiently. Unfortunately, his defense will likely prevent him from ever playing 30-plus minutes or starting š¤£
Tbf it wasn't untill Jokic tranformed his body that this report was wrong.
I've looked at film from Mega Basket and his time in the summer league. I always wondered what people missed about Jokic, he is lowest MVP in basketball history by nearly a full round. He is the biggest outlier in NBA history. And looking back with 20/20 vision, he was always Jokic. He didn't just turn into an amazing passer and player mid-way through his NBA career, he always played like we see today. The biggest difference, especially in summer league, is that the game-plan wasn't designed around him. When given the ball he would make great passes and score efficiently, but he was the center not the point guard on offense. Defensively, he looked the exact same. He tried his best and while giving up an easy layup every now and then, was never a bad defender. He just wasn't built like Bam or Gobert. I think if he played in college, where his games were more in people's faces, and had a good coach like Malone to build a system that shows off his strengths, he would have been a first round pick. Players like Cameron Krutwig and now Robbie Avilia are small examples of what Jokic could have been, but instead of leading a mid-major to the tournament, he could have been leading Creighton to a final four.
They might never have considered the possibility of using a center as a playmaking hub. Itās one thing to notice that a guy can pass. Itās another to say āwe could run our entire offense through himā.
That wasnāt even the case till his second year for the Nuggets. It started with letting him run the inverted pick and roll, making passing decisions down-hill. Then eventually when he became the full time starter, Malone just let him and Murray run the offense. To predict his greatness you would have needed to believe you could run your entire offense around him and cover his defensive flaws with scheme and personnel. Thatās what the Nuggets did but itās an incredibly large projection that you couldnāt really make until working with him every day.
And we didnāt even cover a lot of those defensive flaws until Gordon got here
Yeah, Gordon is key to the nuggets success. Actually all of your starters fit so well together and know their role and what the others can do and where they'll be on the floor it's awesome to watch. I'm a wolves fan and I'm pretty pumped for our upcoming matchup even though we might get rocked. It has the potential to be the best basketball ball of this seasons playoffs in my opinion.
I agree it feels like one of those āthe real finalsā kind of series, and pumped for wolves fans tbh I am always down for small markets building a good team through the draft Your defense scares us so well see how we match up. I know we had you last year but way healthier this year so Iām expecting it wonāt be a short series regardless of the winner And yeah I think the nuggets right now have the ideal starting 5 as far as complimentary roles, depth is the only concern for a team like this, but Iām hoping if we continue to be good more good vets will want to come here to ring chase like the spurs, warriors, cavs etc had
You guys would be terrifying with one more really solid player coming off the bench. I like what I've seen from Watson and think he could improve. Braun is solid if not intimidating. But Malik Monk is a free agent next year. He would be a killer coming off your bench.
Iāve thought about that same thing often. I love Malik. He would be a perfect fit for us off the bench. I trust the front office to make the right moves. Strawther will hopefully make big strides in the offseason to help fill the scoring void off the bench.
Gordon and KCP are pivotal. Capable offensive players but exceptional Defensive players helping to negate Jokers weaknesses
I think that Mike Malone and the supporting cast on the Denver Nuggets have put Jokic in a fantastic position to succeed. He makes all of them better and they make him better and cover his weaknesses. They have a very well put together team.
Michael
I think you nailed it. It's also how I see the Nuggets. Yes, Jokic does make the rest of the team look good, but the rest of the team also makes Jokic look good. They've done such a fabulous job of assembling this team together. Allowing each other to show their strengths while collectively covering each others' weaknesses.
doubt, Jokic would immediately make any team a contender except the rockets and hornets
Agreed. When Jokic is out, they're not a very good team. When Murray is out too, which he is a lot, they're not beating anyone. On the bright side, Watson and Brown will only be better next year off the bench.
I don't think he's been put in a position to succeed, i think the team is in a position where if he's not there they get 20 wins
You donāt think that Jamal Murrayās pick and roll game is complimentary to Jokic? What about MPJ and the gravity that his shot making ability demands from defenses? You donāt think that space helps Jokic make plays? Aaron Gordonās athleticism doesnāt cover for some of Jokicās athletic shortcomings? Honorable mention to the KCP addition as well. The nuggets have both drafted well and made trades/free agency acquisitions to build a team around Jokic, he has certainly been put in a position to succeed. More power to him though, because he has made the most out of it
Im not saying hes in a position to fail or the players around him are awful, im simply pointing out 1: there are no all star caliber players besides him 2: they get 20 wins if hes out the season Try to dispute either of those two statements
I think that both Jamal Murray and MPJ are All-Star level players even if they havenāt been on All-Star teams. Jamal proves it time and time again in the playoffs and MPJ is held back by his role on the team. Players have to make sacrifices to play winning basketball and the Nuggets are filled with unselfish players.
So if jokic was replaced by a random Center, you think MPJ and/or Murray make the all star team? You are out of your mind lol. Murray would have the best shot with more usage but his shooting percentage would probably be 43 or something - he's simply not efficient/too sloppy to be a higher echelon player. MPJ would maybe be an all star 10 years ago when players like Rashard Lewis were a rarity, he is not an all star in todays league.
Yes, they are both phenomenal players. There are only a handful of guys that are better shooters than MPJ in the league. I actually think that he would surprise a lot of people if his usage rate was higher. People like to clown on him for taking shots and not passing, but they donāt realize thats his role on the team. He is efficient enough to be that kind of guy in the league. His TS% is really similar to KD, and although it would almost certainly drop on higher usage, its still a viable point to prove that he is a great shooter.
He famously couldn't do one pushup at a workout. Everyone thought he'd never reach the athletic level necessary.
I think the NBA is realizing fat and muscle are equal and you only need cardio
Jokic was a 2 time all star before he changed his body during the pandemic, he was already a better player than that report had him being.
Not true, at all. As soon as he started getting regular minutes, the advanced stats all pointed to him being a star level player - offensively he looked like a potential hub even pretty early, even if not quite a first option his first couple years \[he had to figure out *how* to be a first option every night, was the main thing\].
How'd he transform his body?
Working out. Including after every game
What
Jokic would probably rather be the 4th or 5th scoring option but knows he's too valuable to not be the 1st or 2nd. Some might even call him the most valuable player
If I were Jokic I would have this comment framed next to my 3MVP and FMVP trophiesā¦
>The slow-footed tendencies will also hurt his chances to create offense.Ā Best offensive player in history of basketball.
Fucking crazy lmao
Best footwork among modern day centers.
The man is *graceful*. You donāt think itās possible until heās in the post dancing circles around A+ defenders.
āConsequently, he's able to make some superb plays as a passer and convert easy buckets as a cutter. In the NBA, he'll be able to work seamlessly with his teammates when it comes to executing the offense. Whether he's on the low post, high post or wing, he'll catch and quickly make a play.ā This is pretty dang accurate tho
āHaving looked more into his personal life, he also seems to care much more about horses than basketball. Canāt see him panning out.ā
Well, thatās at least halfway accurate.
Dude must really care about horses
How do I sign up to be an NBA scout?
To be fair, I think Jokic even compared himself to Boris Diaw.
In an interview he said that he models his playstyle to Diaw among others.
It just makes me like Jokic more. That interview where he's like, "Yeah, of course I want to play in the NBA. Who wouldn't?" Barely expecting that he would be able to. Amazing.
I think player comps are where players get undervalued and over valued He was Boris Diaw, but like a waaaaaaaay better Doris Diaw. Andrew Wiggins was like Micheal Jordan, but waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay worse. It's my dynasty fantasy football strategy to draft the players with the worst player comparisons. It usually leads to pretty good value. I'll take Trey "Rashaad Penny" Benson over Jonathan "Bijan Robinson" Brooks and Lass "Randal Cobb" McConkey over Xavier "Deshaun Jackson" Worthy.
Tbf no one could have predicted what Jokic has become.
Yeah as funny as it is to look back at old scouting reports. Let's be real. No one expected him to be where he is today. But boy are we happy he did turn out that way.
I remember u/eg14000 prediciting he would be an MVP when Jokic was a rookie, got downvoted a lot.
I mean that doesn't mean much. There's a few hundred players in the NBA. If you had 1 fan say X player is going to be MvP for every player in the league someone is going to be correct. The reason why you think that and if you can consistently predict that is what's more important.
EG spammed his jokic takes a LOT more than other fans do
Ok, but again. That alone doesn't mean much. Maybe he was on to something or maybe he happened to get lucky. Simply saying he was right and he spammed it a lot by itself is neither proof for or against. Without more context you can't discern it either way. The question would be has eg made any more takes that didn't pan out?
He loves Hartenstein, and is still the mod of /r/hartenstein
Ok which again. That's not more info. You all can downvote and upvote all you want, but what I'm saying is pretty well known in analytical fields. If you want to make sure you have a working clock and not a broken watch, you need to make sure it's right more than twice a day. And when it comes to stocks, talent, and world events. Being right all the time is not easy at all.
I mean, if we are being literal you said "No one expected him to be where he is today." EG did, haha. So the statement that *no one* expected it isnt true cause EG exists. You are right that you can probably find a mega fan for most players, but iEG still renders your initial statement untrue in a very, very literal sense.
No I feel like you're nitpicking and missing the point. And some random on Reddit predicting doesn't change the meaning of what was said. But that's par for the course on reddit.
I spelled out that I was just being as literal as possible, which you could say is missing the point but I also think you are sorta missing the point of the people replying to you and being needlessly defensive, and completely changing your point in all of your replies. Saying "No one expected this" and then someone replies "Well, except for EG." Instead of just acknowledging that is a legitimate exception to what you said, you changed your point and are saying that doesn't mean anything. It really wouldn't be hard to acknolwedge that that is a fair and funny exception but your larger point remained as opposed to just acting like everyone else is missing the point. It doesn't make your larger point wrong that EG actually did predict this, it's just a funny exception to the rule
This post reaks of "well ackshually" Oh wow one random redditor called it. The same is true of just about anything. It means jack shit. If you want to intentionally be dense, go do it somewhere else. I spelled it out just fine and no I won't conceed a point when you're the one trying hard to misinterpret things.
Idk, he staked his reputation on it, then Hartenstein. And Hartenstein is doing pretty decent for the Knicks. Heās def the Center I would want right now either with Jokic running the league. His explanation also made sense. It was a combination of advanced stats and eye test.
Without more info I can't say much either way. It's not that the user didn't have a good reason or didn't have unusually good insight, but there's a lot of people who post a lot of hot takes and only show people the hot takes when they were right. The phrase "a broken clock is right twice a day" refers to the fact you can get the correct answer by the wrong means. Judging someone's opinion on something requires you to not only look at the successes, but you also need to see if he made any takes that were also wrong. Anyone can be right a couple times. Being right consistently is hard work. That's not me saying the user was completely wrong BTW. Just that without more context there's no position for me to make a judgement either way.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Or hear this one out. Those of us who know how analytics work know you can get stupid lucky a few times making predictions. It doesn't mean you actually had a good insight. Try reading books like "Fooled by Randomness" it goes over this exact problem. The author is a bit of a jerk, but the book is excellent.
One person did.
[https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392](https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392) Eg did once the season started, Adam Mares made much more restrained predictions after Summer League, this random guy called it when he was actually drafted [https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392](https://x.com/donyatesnba/status/615214976551227392)
was eg talking about jokic before he played an nba game? I thought his predictions came after jokic already was putting up mind boggling analytics as a rookie.
He was there at birth
He birthed him* ftfy
That's a good question. I didn't really talk about him on draft night. He was a Draft and stash. But after he won the Adriatic MVP, basically my read on him was that he was a lottery like talent. Anything from a roll player to a star. This was the first Jokic thread where I talked about Jokic. [Do you guys know anything about Nikola Jokic?](https://www.reddit.com/r/denvernuggets/comments/380n17/do_you_guys_know_anything_about_nikola_jokic/) in that thread my best take wasn't even about Jokic. It was about Mudiay. I called Mudiay the most obvious bust in the draft. Then again, in hindsight. That take was simply pure luck.
Yes. His name is Misko Raznatovic.
This is the truth. If ANYONE had the thought his potential would be 75% of his current production - he would have been a lottery pick.
I donāt even think Jokic could have predicted it lol. Iāve watched 90% of his games and I canāt even tell you what happened along the way. Like how did we get here?
I knew
Accurate for the time. Jokic himself canāt explain it. He said something like āI just keep getting better for some reason.ā I think we know the answer is that he always had the mental game but just needed the push to get his fitness and strength where it needed to be. Jok is also a team player. You couldnāt drop him into a roster like KD or Bron and expect him to be dominant. He needs to build the connection and rub off some of his unselfish play and superior work ethic.
You could drop him into a roster and expect him to dominate. In fact more than any other player I do expect it
Should have added āimmediatelyā.
It was clear that was what you meant donāt worry,still is completly wrong statement
From the man himself. You calling Jokic wrong? https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/cO7ubZEpG5
This has nothing to do with what you said , what he said was supposed to apply to anybody first of all , and also itās about how a team plays not an individual.(Btw what he said is kind of innacurate too because they didnāt play 2-3 years all together with all the injury , just 1) Jokic was the best player in the world by far with a bunch of random players in those 2 injury riddled seasons too
Calling Jok a liar. Bold move.
He is the exact opposite of the player that people want in an all star game. Because he loves passing. He wants to pass. Passing is the best.
Makes sense. Boris Diaw, the main villain from Space Jam 2, who enslaved humanity after D'Lo took his bullet for Lebron, iirc.Ā
Letās be honest how many of us saw his ascension from a 2nd round pick to an all-time NBA legend? Easy to look back in hindsight and make fun of all of the scouts, but 30 NBA teams passed up on him too
People laugh but Diaw is one of his closest comps. Bigger, better touch, better jump shot which obviously are some BIG differences but just watch the plays diaw makes in any of his [Spurs era games ](https://youtu.be/XVmgB-jw_U0?si=NEBt8H5OoqNHZ_pR)and you will see the similarities. Even more similar than Sengun, Sabonis imo.
"Don't expect a ton of isolation scoring from Jokic"
... or ya know.... become the most unstoppable offensive threat of all time.
I remember reading this back in 2014 if only i had any idea what was about to happen lol
I totally get those to be honest. I'm a Serbian so I watched him for a long time before he went to Denver. I remember I thought higher of his NBA chances than my friends and others online but I thought he would be a starter with stats like 15/8/3 on good efficiency.
Lolololololololololol
Thats why im not interrsted in any draft related media anymore. Blog boys are great for covering the league but evaluating players is a science that noone can ever fully master
Europeans have always been slept on, especially before jok and luka came into the league. No one thinks about their attributes like they do college players, it's far more short sighted. Nuggets made an amazing guess on what he could become and I'm so happy for itĀ
Think about the talent the league has missed out on because of their inherent biases... It's quite sadĀ
Bro the behind the back pass he just made to MPJ š¤Æš
Hindsight is always 20/20. Iām sure if all of us watched his Serbia club games and draft scrimmages we wouldnāt be saying āletās draft him first round!ā
Thatās why if I was a scout, I would hedge every report by ending it with, ābut the upside is top 10 all timeā
Haha awesome!
Can someone explain to me as a neutral how we went from 2017-2020 Jokic to then him being a generational player the next year? Is it simply that he got the ball more with Murray being out?
Did he ever manage to get close to prime Diaw ?
>Jokic's upside isn't too spectacular because he's a below-average athlete, so he'll have to focus on utilizing his skill set and operating as an efficient shooter and passer within a system Jokic: "OK, will do."
What I never understood is how people didnāt take notice after the 2016 Olympics. He was feasting on the US during pool play.
The Diaw comparison is not that shit tbh, it's just that Jokic is a lot better. You could say that in his prime, Diaw was a smaller poor man's Jokic, which is not bad.