2018 NBA Prospect Report Part 4: Luka Doncic

Scoring

Just like in his passing game, Doncic is at his best as a scorer when he receives a ball screen. He is talented beyond his years at more advanced pick-and-roll ball handling techniques, such as snaking, splitting and putting his defender in jail.

His shiftiness, deceleration and ability to pull up all are key components of his scoring game.

In the clip above, he snakes the defense and finishes a difficult shot through contract, demonstrating his underrated strength and ability to absorb contact.

In the clip below, he splits two defenders and gets in the lane for an easy finish after sending his man through the screen multiple times to get in front of him.

His first step leaves something to be desired. But he does have plus deceleration, which helps him get some space for pull-up jumpers. Here he does exactly that.

The concerns about his ability to produce against switch-heavy NBA defenses that do not inherently provide passing seams for him to exploit or space for him to shoot are still valid.

Despite his shiftiness and craft with the ball, he is unable to create sufficient space here against former NBA big man Kevin Seraphin. He is generally a strong midrange pull-up shooter. But still, plays like these will raise eyebrows about his scalability against modern NBA defense. Seraphin is not exactly a shining example of a lockdown switch defender.

But that has generally been the exception to the rule. While he does not have the burst to blow by defenders, he is able to use his stop/start and deceleration ability to create space. He is similar to James Harden in that sense — both rely more on slowing down than speeding up to create space.

At a cursory glance, his 3-point shooting numbers have not exactly wowed this season. He is down to 32 percent after spending much of his career in the 35-40 percent range.

Much of that decline can be attributed to his increase in usage, as his team relies on him to more frequently take difficult threes off the bounce.

He can still make those shots at a higher rate than most players. But that 32 percent may not be entirely representative of what he may be able to accomplish in the future.

Of course, being able to shoot off the dribble is and will be an important skill for him. But perhaps just as important is his ability to knock down spot-up threes.

He has already demonstrated a penchant for taking (and making) threes from Stephen Curry range, which is a massive boost to his gravity as a shooter and significantly changes the calculus for opposing team defenses when defending him on and off ball.

Being able to draw defenders out beyond the three-point line accomplishes two things. First, it changes the angles his man can use to guard him and makes help defense far more costly and difficult, making one-on-one scoring a bit easier.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, it provides more spacing for his teammates when he does not have the ball in his hands. While he is an elite-level initiator, he also will provide value as a secondary scoring threat. That makes a world of difference when projecting the year-over-year offensive value he is likely to provide and his scalability to a diversity of team and lineup constructs.

That scalability sets a high floor for Doncic. There are few other prospects in this draft — if there are any — with his combination of star power and role versatility.

His offensive wing equity was especially prevalent during last year’s Eurobasket, where he played alongside multiple point guards (including Goran Dragic) and went significant stretches playing more as a wing or offensive support player than a primary initiator.

And because of the Slovenian team’s motion-oriented scheme, even on possessions where he was tasked with primary creation duties he often started off ball and received a screen before a handoff or pass instead of bringing the ball up.

As Draft Express breaks down in this video, Doncic’s natural intuition and feel is just as evident when making decisions on the catch as it is handling in the pick-and-roll.

He has a fluid spot-up release and foot mechanics. But like Trae Young, he has a slow turn-and-release motion when coming off screens to shoot.

But Doncic’s height and release point give him a wider margin for error in terms of release speed compared to Young. He also maintains more consistent activity and energy levels without the ball in his hands than Young does. But Young is tasked with a higher usage rate so it is difficult to determine how that may change in a different team situation.

The point is Doncic is just as smart attacking closeouts as he is running an offense. His efficiency numbers are just as impressive — if not even more so — on cuts, spot-ups and shots off screens as they are off the bounce.

Overall, he is a versatile scorer that will be able to find varying degrees of offensive success in a wide range of schemes, teams and lineups. He might not be the most dynamic isolation scorer at this point. But his intelligence and craftiness allow him to dependably exploit every inch the defense gives him. Whether it is with a pass or shot.