2018 NBA Prospect Report Part 4: Luka Doncic

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Passing and the pick and roll

For all the concerns about Luka Doncic’s explosiveness and athleticism, it may end up not being all that important.

While being able to blow by athletic defenders certainly would be a boost to his offensive productivity, he is more than capable of making incredible reads and passes from all over the floor under tight defensive pressure. He is a crafty pick-and-roll ball handler and dangerous pull-up shooter more than capable of forcing individual defenders and team defenses into difficult situations.

In this game against Greece during Eurobasket, Doncic’s Slovenia runs a Spain pick-and-roll that results in an odd defensive miscommunication. Essentially, three defenders end up pressuring Doncic in a three-pronged trap (see the video above).

Doncic is still able to identify the advantage on the weakside and execute as accurate a pass as you will ever see in against a high-pressure defense.

Here, against Kristaps Porzingis and the Latvian national team, he zips a bullet pass to the roller despite a hard hedge forcing him out to nearly the halfcourt line.

Holding his composure against aggressive, screen-level pick-and-roll defense bodes well for his ability to continue the elite offensive production in the NBA even without dynamic explosiveness. His ability to attack NBA switch defenses that do not give him an opening to shoot has been a point of concern. But plays like that one provide a reason for optimism.

Those plays also typify how the Slovenian wunderkind has been able to be so productive without an elite first step. Although he is liable to bust out a step back or hesitation move, he does not rely on creating one-on-one advantages with dribble moves.

Against the NBA-caliber athletes he has faced, he has generally been inconsistent creating space in isolation. But because of the threat of his shot off the dribble and his incredible vision and skill navigating pick-and-rolls, he produces anyways.

His deep shooting range forces defenders to go over screens and gives him an extra step on the defense, opening up much of his on-ball offensive game.

He does not need to create deep penetration individually — all he needs is a small window — to facilitate team offense because he is able to exploit advantages created on a team level (i.e. defensive pick-and-roll coverages that require hedging, tagging or help from a third or fourth defender) under pressure from virtually anywhere on the court.

Part of that is due to his height (6-foot-8) and ability to see over defenders, and part is due to his advanced offensive feel and timing. If there is a pressure point in the defense, he will find it and attack it.

Maybe he will not immediately be the kind of player to whom you can throw the ball at the end of a shot clock and expect to create efficient offense by himself consistently. But within a NBA spread pick-and-roll scheme and the league’s defensive three-seconds rule, he will not need to be that to be successful. The improved spacing environment is tailor-made for him.

Doncic is also rarely baited into unreasonably tough shots or otherwise bad decisions when he is unable to create an advantage. He tends to make the right play. Playing alongside a big man that can both finish out of the pick-and-roll and post-up mismatches could help counterbalance whatever offense Doncic loses against switch defenses, at least until he improves his athletic burst in tighter spaces.

His creativity and efficiency as a playmaker is also borne out statistically.

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My playmaking efficiency metric, based on the assist percentages and pure point ratings of 173 NBA prospects in Europe and the NCAA, places him in the 95th percentile of all those prospects.

He has excellent timing on his pick-and-roll passes to both rollers and spot-up shooters, as he can quickly diagnose defenses and identify overhelps, small seams and pockets off the bounce going either direction. But his talent in this area of the game has already been written about ad nauseum.

Doncic’s passing and ball handling are his most important skills when projecting him into the NBA. No team that has done its due diligence will be drafting Doncic for him to be primarily an isolation scorer. He is an offensive initiator.

Although he can create space with craft, the fact that he demonstrably does not require athletic burst or significant space to provide value as a playmaker (coupled with his off-ball scoring – more later) is evidence as strong as you will find that he does not need to be a traditionally explosive athlete to be a very good NBA player.