everything I read about Jokic is that he never ever did any self promotion. He was perfectly fine playing on his team in his local village. He was so good though that outsiders noticed and he kept getting promoted
Self promotion over the team is frowned upon in Serbia, and the European game in general compared to US youth development, but Jokić in particular is a real home boy, & probably wont be retiring to Bel Air.
I remember watching a video - maybe Dee Brown - talking about being an assistant for Denver during the Joker's rookie year. He said his first thoughts were 'this is the best point guard on the team.' He didn't look like Magic bringing the ball down in practice but nobody could steal the ball from him. He doesn't look like he takes great care of the ball when dribbling down the floor. It's usually high and gets wide sometimes. Then he gets focused and does something incredible. I was pretty high on Nurkic early. He could rebound and play some defense. But he could also score and finish. And he seemed like he could be a consistent 16-17 ppg NBA player in the post. I remember the trade that sent him to Portland for Plumlee. My first reaction was that the Joker had to be pretty special for a team to send a quality post player for Plumlee. And that was an in-division trade for a young post player projected to be a starter immediately upon his arrival in Portland. Nurkic has averaged 15/9 against Denver since he left - his 2nd highest ppg against for his career (Nets). Nobody from Denver seems to care. I've read and seen interviews where there's a bad vibe about the Nurkic egomania. That he wears out his welcome pretty quickly - even in a league where people almost have to have big egos to survive. For me, the Joker is hard to read for natural ability. The first thing I noticed about him were his feet and how coordinated and confident he was moving his feet. He is a post player that acts like he played a lot of soccer growing up. They have a different and more confident mindset about moving their feet it seems (Patrick Ewing/Akeem and others throughout history). His positioning in the post is way ahead of the curve but what helps get him there is the lower half of his body and his 'educated', active and confident feet. In this regard his overall thinking, activity and confidence is literally head to toe.
I was pretty high on jusuf nurkic at first just like a lot nuggets fan. I remember watching jokic getting bullied by smaller but thicker power forwards like carl Landry. I always thought jokic was too soft, too small, and kinda skinny at the time to play center. I couldn't wait until nurkic comes in the game and bullies the opposing players back. Fast forward to today, jokic is easily the biggest and largest guy on the court most of the time
@LeBaby-t3m it seemed like back when they had both guys Denver ran a lot of high post offense and seemed committed to it. I thought maybe that was a reason they moved Nurkic - because he was more a traditional low. Now they seem to mix it up high and low. But who knows, no telling what all caused that move. Joker has definitely become a bit of a bully in the lane. But he is worth paying to watch play.
@LeBaby-t3mfast Howard to today and they all but eliminated defense and physicality. I have seen plenty of Euro big men that that play that exact same game but came into the league when you could be physical and that finesse game didn’t work. Arvydis Sabonis is the best Euro big ever. Exact same game as Jokic except he did it in the league past his prime with way better bigs to go against.
@@romeod7549 a reason why I say Dražen Petrović was one of the most important Euro players ever. Prior to him the perception of the Euro player in the NBA was different - big guys with set shot 3's and not much physicality. But Petrovic showed that some Euro players have the athletic ability to be successful in the NBA as a 2 guard - something many scouts would have said was nearly impossible at the time. This was before the '92 Dream Team which definitely began to open up a European path to the NBA.
-- Also: NBA never got to see 1980s prime SABONIS until the 90s w/ POR. I remember this 31yo No knee / No jump Sabonis cooking players with the long 3. Shaq was afraid to leave the paint and boom, Sabonis drained the 3pter during the playoffs. I was like: "Who is this dude?"
He got drafted 41st, and his greatness keeps getting questioned for his appearance. The fact that he 'slipped' through the cracks tells you the average level of competence of the scouts, analysts, managers, and coaches. For a state-of-the-art scout, it is more important that a player dances well with a ball than to be able to solve the defensive and offensive team puzzles. I am glad that Nikola had Deki and still has Malone as his coach, as both of these gentlemen saw his potential and, more importantly, let it develop.
To be fair, all the entire NBA skipped on him in the first round. I don't think it is about the incompetence of the scouts. Jokic is just so unique and low key good that nobody really knew his ceiling as a player. Hell I don't think even Jokic knew back in 2014 that he'd become one of the GOATs in basketball.
NBA is an entertainment and marketing organisation first, most teams make much of their money from drama and hype from their players rather than trying to win championships. Scouts still place higher priority on hype picks, honestly NBA has always been that, otherwise we wouldn't have gotten busts after busts 1st picks from Simmons, Ayton, etc. If scouts really wanted to pick actually good players the league would be half European by now.
Even sfter his first mvp there were people still saying he was over rated and no good. Even after his second mvp he had plenty of detractors. He has a quiet fury that most people don't pick up on. Intelligence and will power are hard to read, at least for those who don't have any themselves.
@@charles9489 Nobody serious is saying he is better then Kareem. What smart people are saying is that he plays a game that has never been played before. I saw Kareem play many times, jokic is his equal around the basket. Kareem only won championships with other superstars, Robertson, Johnson, etc. Same with Shaq. Jokic plays with average dudes and makes them playoff material.
@@matthewbecker964 were u on the internet the season after his title run, some fans and even TH-camrs were making this claim based on his "stats", due his failings last season cooled some of that narrative, so yes ppl do say he is better than the 4 I mentioned.
It's luck but also good scouting. They had to promise to draft him or he was pulling out of the draft. So it wasn't as if they pulled his name out of a hat. If they knew how it would work out, then yes, they would have taken him ahead of Nurkic and Gary Harris.
As the story goes in Serbia.. when those scouts from Barca came He had a bad day and worst game on purpose because he wanted to go in US to his girlfriend -now wife! That's a big guy love!
@antgoods87 .. Ask around! I can't put my life on it but that is the word in Sombor and you know Nikola enough by now to understand that is exactly thing from his playbook.. 😁
Yes, his girlfriend already enrolled a college in the US... But Jokić himself said it just happened, he didn't even know the people from Barca were at the game: "Predstavnici Barselone su došli sa ugovorom da pogledaju utakmicu sa Cedevitom, ja to tad nisam znao, ali sam odigrao verovatno najgori meč u životu."
But how does that make sense if Jokic could have just refused to sign with Barcelona -- if he only wanted to play in the U.S.? It sounds very romantic so maybe Jokic thought up that explanation after the fact -- just for his future wife. 😃 And @milicaqwrt says even Jokic isn't offering that version ... so maybe just a bad game after all.
Les stats de Jokic lors de sa saison précédent la draft étaient tout de même largement meilleures que celles de Risacher, numéro 1 de la draft 2024, lors de sa dernière saison en France...
You dudes are delusional. He plays in an era when there is NO DEFENSE. NO effort. The entire media talks about this. If he is so good, why don’t people tune in to see someone “Better than Bird” after year 2? I mean..that alone should make people want to watch this PHENOM, right? It is all empty calories, young sir.
@@marcelmarshall4240 you are delusional. Bird played with multiple all stars. Jokic has NONE. I know the rules are different, but it applies to everyone. If everyone was as good as Jokic, then they all be doing triple doubles like him. LeFraud the only "empty calories " stats padder that is taking advantage of this era and the refs. Jokic don't get calls from the refs like LeFraud.
Yeah the signs weren't as obvious like let's say with Luka but you could definitely see he would be an elite passer. Above everything with both Luka and Jokic you could see now and then they were elite processors of the game
@@antgoods87 I am Serbian and also someone who watching basketball a lot an I was working as coach ages ago for a youth players and I remember seeing Jokic in Mega and immediately saying to my friends that Red Star should take this kid instead of Boban(Bobi)Marjanovic but they looked me like I was crazy and yeah at the end Red Star bring Bobi Instead and he played really good but Jokic was something else I knew it when he start playing for Denver that he could have good career but in my mind I was thinking something like a good role player that can have something like 12p 7rb 5as and back then I never could imagine that he will become future(3) MVP and a champion but after first two years I start to believe in his Greatness and here we are....
@@undertheglassmoon2239 problem is there aren't many good comps in the nba for Jokic. A high ball iq dude that is slow and doesn't rely on athleticism at the center position. He is really a one of one. Arvydas Sabonis would pop up for me. But the nba never really got a taste of Arvydas Sabonis in his prime.
I’ve heard that Jokic intentionally played poorly in front of the Barcelona scouts because his girlfriend, now wife, had recently moved to the US. It was presented as a rumor by a local Denver journalist (Adam Mares if I recall) who knows everyone though and he seemed pretty sure of himself.
To be fair, back in the days, we had never seen a center like Jokic yet. It would have been difficult to imagine how he could impact the NBaA, the way he is.
I never get why the top picks get most of the slander when they don't live up to the hype, when the real failures are the scouts and the executives who put them in these positions. With an exception to the players who aren't willing to put any effort into their career, that's another story, since that's less "not living up to the hype" and more "not doing your job", regardless of your supposed level.
GMs do get fired for making mistakes (scouts as well) but few people know them -- so naturally the media is focused on the players. Vlade Divac refusing to take Luka definitely got his butt fired. 😂
Jokic may be the best offensive big (it would definitely between him and Shaq) but I don’t think you can call him the best big ever considering his defensive weaknesses. Kareem and Hakeem were both top 2-way players. An argument can be made for Bill Russell too.
@ I actually do think Jokic is better than Wilt. I personally don’t think he’s better than any of the others I listed, and that is only amongst centers. There have been some elite PFs too, like Duncan. Basically, I think all of the bigs who have more than 1 ring are better than Jokic.
In basketball, small ball is a style of play that sacrifices height, physical strength and low post offense/defense in favor of a lineup of smaller players for speed, agility and increased scoring (often from the three-point line). I would add that none of them shot for three points, did not organize the offense. Except for Wilt, none of them were good assistants. I would like to see those “top defensive” players in today's basketball. Secondly, each of them played with at least one All-Star player, most with HOF players. The shooting of most of those players from the perimeter was bad, Shaquille O'Neal was a catastrophic free throw shooter.
The stats comparison at 7:50 cuts both ways. When people ask if Larry bird could adapt and dominate in todays nba, the jokic comparison is a close match. Remember Bird would have access to more modern conditioning and esp medical treatments too.
A lot of things had to go right for him to succeed. One thing for sure, is that he's very professional. he doesn't treat basketball as a mere hobby that happens to earn him money. It's all work. He doesn't have the baby mindset of a lot of american young talents. When they get big contract extension their game usually just stagnates. Jokic improves every single year and he has the right balance of basketball and his other aspects of life. So he doesn't get burnt out. So yea the horses are important too
I agree. There’s a false narrative that he doesn’t love basketball. He loves the game and studies it like everybody else. He just not into the media and all the other things surrounding basketball. He just wants to play and go home and enjoy his life/family in my opinion
He’s great but we need to chill out when saying someone who’s half way through their career is the best ever at their position. For starters he’s too slow on his feet which limits his defense, so he’s never going to be ahead of Kareem, wilt, Dream … who were beasts on both ends of the floor. And there no insult. We need to chill out and stop being so hyperbolic.
Best big ever? That's Wilt or Kareem. They were so good, that rules were changed so that they would find it harder to dominate. He is very, very good, by being the best long range shooter, and a playmaker. But Wilt was the one who lead the league in assists. This is why Larry Bird said that he would have loved to play against him.
The main reason for his bad game against Barcelona is his future wife Natalija Jokić. There is a Serbian documentary "The Man Who Makes the Difference", Nikola admits that he did it intentionally. The most responsible person from Denver for the transfer is Artūras Karnišovas, no one else was in favor of bringing him.
@Procanin Hakeem, Kareem, shaq,David Robinson, Patrick Ewing, wilt, you think jokic can hold his own vs these guys? Sure jokic is a better 3pt shooter, but all these players were elite defensively also
@@lebarbosa9778 Greatest offense in the history of NBA with him on the court, the worst with him off. Highest +- in the league by some margin in the last couple of seasons despite not playing with any all star team mates. Highest Player Efficiency rating ever. Do they lie? Not impressive to drag a team to a 6th playoff seed with Will Barton as the second best player?
@@andris1335 greatest offense in the history of the NBA based on what? How do you measure that when different eras played by different rules. Btw i was talking about defense.
I haven't watched the video yet but I can tell you in a one on one workout he would look non athletic over weight and fat when a athlete is overweight and fat they asssume he is lazy I would of assumed the same thing
Why the back ground music, bro? Back ground music is only needed for videos that are fictional like movies, science fiction, comedy or any other made up stories or non sense, but this issue you are talking about, in my eyes, is not non sense so why the music? Thanx
Wilt was just a solid player skill wise who was the best relative athlete in NBA history compared to his peers. It was night and day difference. It was like if LeBron was playing against guys with the athleticism of Joe Ingles, Kyle Anderson and the occasional Draymond Green but they were all 6'4" too
I don't know. The 4 year 200 mil contract with Murray rasised a lot of questions and eyebrows. Something doesn't add up. NBA is owned by the the same people who own everything else or run everything else. I myself being a Serb I noticed that Serbia being a basketball powerhouse goes against the narratives they push. Simple. Things are increasingly micromanaged and everything is a pretense of sorts and that's why everything seems fake; because it is. These people understand that power andinfluence is more important than money and since they own everything their investments are diversified so they sacrifice money for maintaining control over everyones perception of what is valuable and what is not. Control of narrative allows that. Without a narrative control, without having control over people's perception of meaning, more is lost on thelong run and inversly more is gained on the long run. So thats why I think that Jokic and Lebron arepawns in a deeper ideological push; a silent unspoken ongoing warfare. Will to power.
Why won't y'all let that go he was drafted 41 Bitcoin and he was doing a Taco Bell commercial why do you all keep hanging on to that that's not news if you got to keep on saying it it must be news for you to the commentator who is whoever you are every last one of y'all will not let that go he was stuck on his first pick doing that Taco Bell commercial come on people you sound like a broken record every last commentator y'all can't move on the man has been in the league almost 10 years almost 10 days on years and y'all still harboring on that can't y'all find something else better that's all I'm asking no more no less I enjoyed what y'all do how y'all do it but y'all keep on on that same note he was drafted 41st pick and he was doing a Taco Bell commercial come on now that sounds like a broken record he was drafted at the 41st pick and he was drafted during the Taco Bell commercial don't that sound like a broken record I'm saying it more than one time so did y'all can hear how you sound when y'all presented to the public and he was drafted 41st pick doing a Taco Bell commercial he was drafted for the first pick doing a Taco Bell commercial don't that sound like a broken record can y'all think of something else better to talk about than just start his career off on how he was drafted
Watching this after Jokic scored 106 points across 2 games. Wild.
Unbelievable!! We are watching greatness
Same
Real man
Not 4 not 3, 2 games
everything I read about Jokic is that he never ever did any self promotion. He was perfectly fine playing on his team in his local village. He was so good though that outsiders noticed and he kept getting promoted
Self promotion over the team is frowned upon in Serbia, and the European game in general compared to US youth development, but Jokić in particular is a real home boy, & probably wont be retiring to Bel Air.
he is not from a village. Sombor is a small city of around 50k people and it's gorgeous.
I remember watching a video - maybe Dee Brown - talking about being an assistant for Denver during the Joker's rookie year. He said his first thoughts were 'this is the best point guard on the team.' He didn't look like Magic bringing the ball down in practice but nobody could steal the ball from him. He doesn't look like he takes great care of the ball when dribbling down the floor. It's usually high and gets wide sometimes. Then he gets focused and does something incredible. I was pretty high on Nurkic early. He could rebound and play some defense. But he could also score and finish. And he seemed like he could be a consistent 16-17 ppg NBA player in the post. I remember the trade that sent him to Portland for Plumlee. My first reaction was that the Joker had to be pretty special for a team to send a quality post player for Plumlee. And that was an in-division trade for a young post player projected to be a starter immediately upon his arrival in Portland. Nurkic has averaged 15/9 against Denver since he left - his 2nd highest ppg against for his career (Nets). Nobody from Denver seems to care. I've read and seen interviews where there's a bad vibe about the Nurkic egomania. That he wears out his welcome pretty quickly - even in a league where people almost have to have big egos to survive.
For me, the Joker is hard to read for natural ability. The first thing I noticed about him were his feet and how coordinated and confident he was moving his feet. He is a post player that acts like he played a lot of soccer growing up. They have a different and more confident mindset about moving their feet it seems (Patrick Ewing/Akeem and others throughout history). His positioning in the post is way ahead of the curve but what helps get him there is the lower half of his body and his 'educated', active and confident feet. In this regard his overall thinking, activity and confidence is literally head to toe.
I was pretty high on jusuf nurkic at first just like a lot nuggets fan. I remember watching jokic getting bullied by smaller but thicker power forwards like carl Landry. I always thought jokic was too soft, too small, and kinda skinny at the time to play center. I couldn't wait until nurkic comes in the game and bullies the opposing players back. Fast forward to today, jokic is easily the biggest and largest guy on the court most of the time
@LeBaby-t3m it seemed like back when they had both guys Denver ran a lot of high post offense and seemed committed to it. I thought maybe that was a reason they moved Nurkic - because he was more a traditional low. Now they seem to mix it up high and low. But who knows, no telling what all caused that move. Joker has definitely become a bit of a bully in the lane. But he is worth paying to watch play.
He grew up with 2 giant brothers and they molded him since he was a little boy (if he ever was😅)
@LeBaby-t3mfast Howard to today and they all but eliminated defense and physicality. I have seen plenty of Euro big men that that play that exact same game but came into the league when you could be physical and that finesse game didn’t work. Arvydis Sabonis is the best Euro big ever. Exact same game as Jokic except he did it in the league past his prime with way better bigs to go against.
@@romeod7549 a reason why I say Dražen Petrović was one of the most important Euro players ever. Prior to him the perception of the Euro player in the NBA was different - big guys with set shot 3's and not much physicality. But Petrovic showed that some Euro players have the athletic ability to be successful in the NBA as a 2 guard - something many scouts would have said was nearly impossible at the time. This was before the '92 Dream Team which definitely began to open up a European path to the NBA.
"player A is Larry Bird" imagine hearing that wow
Crazy story right?! Jokic is unreal. I’m not sure fans really understand what we’re witnessing right now
The way he told the story is dope
And player B was Better..😱
-- Bird is my favorite player along side Hakeem.
But dayum, Jokic is That guy w/ all the Greats.
From a Nuggets fan of 50 years, this video was excellent 👍. No criticism or critique warranted. ⛏️🏀🏆☮️
-- Also: NBA never got to see 1980s prime SABONIS until the 90s w/ POR.
I remember this 31yo No knee / No jump Sabonis cooking players with the long 3. Shaq was afraid to leave the paint and boom, Sabonis drained the 3pter during the playoffs. I was like: "Who is this dude?"
Pozdrav za brata Čarija ! 🔴⚪
Thanks Anthony
I appreciate you watching! Hvala
incredibly insightful video .. thanks for making this dawg
This insider content is so good and unique!! Love the whole video! Keep it up!
He got drafted 41st, and his greatness keeps getting questioned for his appearance. The fact that he 'slipped' through the cracks tells you the average level of competence of the scouts, analysts, managers, and coaches. For a state-of-the-art scout, it is more important that a player dances well with a ball than to be able to solve the defensive and offensive team puzzles. I am glad that Nikola had Deki and still has Malone as his coach, as both of these gentlemen saw his potential and, more importantly, let it develop.
He doesn’t play defense
To be fair, all the entire NBA skipped on him in the first round. I don't think it is about the incompetence of the scouts. Jokic is just so unique and low key good that nobody really knew his ceiling as a player. Hell I don't think even Jokic knew back in 2014 that he'd become one of the GOATs in basketball.
NBA is an entertainment and marketing organisation first, most teams make much of their money from drama and hype from their players rather than trying to win championships. Scouts still place higher priority on hype picks, honestly NBA has always been that, otherwise we wouldn't have gotten busts after busts 1st picks from Simmons, Ayton, etc. If scouts really wanted to pick actually good players the league would be half European by now.
Jokic was not a second rounder, he is a mid second rounder. Thats whats crazy. 10 teams passed on him in the second round.
Great video bro! You doing great!
This is a great explainer. Thank you.
One of the best videos on Jokic I’ve seen 👏🏽
Even sfter his first mvp there were people still saying he was over rated and no good. Even after his second mvp he had plenty of
detractors. He has a quiet fury that most people don't pick up on. Intelligence and will power are hard to read, at least for those who
don't have any themselves.
I think they call it "Inat" in Serbia
He is overrated though, ppl are saying he is better than, Wilt Kareem Hakeem and Shaq with only 1 championship under his belt.
@@charles9489 Nobody serious is saying he is better then Kareem. What smart people are saying
is that he plays a game that has never been played before. I saw Kareem play many times, jokic
is his equal around the basket. Kareem only won championships with other superstars, Robertson,
Johnson, etc. Same with Shaq. Jokic plays with average dudes and makes them playoff material.
@@matthewbecker964 were u on the internet the season after his title run, some fans and even TH-camrs were making this claim based on his "stats", due his failings last season cooled some of that narrative, so yes ppl do say he is better than the 4 I mentioned.
@@charles9489 Failings? Yea, MVP, real failure, you just don't like that's all.
Yeah, let's not give the Nuggets too much credit. They had no idea how good Jokic was going to be. They lucked out and hit the jackpot.
no other nba team knew either. Denver drafted him, nobody wants to just waste a pick in any draft
@@conor2l Lakers drafted Bronny.
It's luck but also good scouting. They had to promise to draft him or he was pulling out of the draft. So it wasn't as if they pulled his name out of a hat.
If they knew how it would work out, then yes, they would have taken him ahead of Nurkic and Gary Harris.
As the story goes in Serbia.. when those scouts from Barca came He had a bad day and worst game on purpose because he wanted to go in US to his girlfriend -now wife! That's a big guy love!
That would be very interesting if that is true! I’ve never heard that. Thanks for sharing
@antgoods87 .. Ask around! I can't put my life on it but that is the word in Sombor and you know Nikola enough by now to understand that is exactly thing from his playbook.. 😁
Yes, his girlfriend already enrolled a college in the US...
But Jokić himself said it just happened, he didn't even know the people from Barca were at the game: "Predstavnici Barselone su došli sa ugovorom da pogledaju utakmicu sa Cedevitom, ja to tad nisam znao, ali sam odigrao verovatno najgori meč u životu."
@ ok got you. Thanks for sharing that!
But how does that make sense if Jokic could have just refused to sign with Barcelona -- if he only wanted to play in the U.S.?
It sounds very romantic so maybe Jokic thought up that explanation after the fact -- just for his future wife. 😃 And @milicaqwrt says even Jokic isn't offering that version ... so maybe just a bad game after all.
Les stats de Jokic lors de sa saison précédent la draft étaient tout de même largement meilleures que celles de Risacher, numéro 1 de la draft 2024, lors de sa dernière saison en France...
2:50 sick dunk for the JOKER!
Lol imagine explaining to your bosses as the Barcelona rep who went to watch him and canceled the deal 😂😂😂😂
Barca hold this L
Hahaha it was almost sweet for them
great video!
When you are better than Bird in year 2, that is goat material!
You dudes are delusional. He plays in an era when there is NO DEFENSE. NO effort. The entire media talks about this. If he is so good, why don’t people tune in to see someone “Better than Bird” after year 2? I mean..that alone should make people want to watch this PHENOM, right? It is all empty calories, young sir.
@@marcelmarshall4240 you are delusional. Bird played with multiple all stars. Jokic has NONE. I know the rules are different, but it applies to everyone. If everyone was as good as Jokic, then they all be doing triple doubles like him. LeFraud the only "empty calories " stats padder that is taking advantage of this era and the refs. Jokic don't get calls from the refs like LeFraud.
Your ignorance is spectacular
Oh great informative video. Never heard some of the stuff in this!
Don't think the scouts dropped the ball, no one could've predicted the player he became today unless they got a crystall ball.
Yeah the signs weren't as obvious like let's say with Luka but you could definitely see he would be an elite passer. Above everything with both Luka and Jokic you could see now and then they were elite processors of the game
@@antgoods87 I am Serbian and also someone who watching basketball a lot an I was working as coach ages ago for a youth players and I remember seeing Jokic in Mega and immediately saying to my friends that Red Star should take this kid instead of Boban(Bobi)Marjanovic but they looked me like I was crazy and yeah at the end Red Star bring Bobi Instead and he played really good but Jokic was something else I knew it when he start playing for Denver that he could have good career but in my mind I was thinking something like a good role player that can have something like 12p 7rb 5as and back then I never could imagine that he will become future(3) MVP and a champion but after first two years I start to believe in his Greatness and here we are....
Thats why they make comparison data, between player A & player B in their first two years.. player B is jokic, and player A is someone else
@@undertheglassmoon2239 problem is there aren't many good comps in the nba for Jokic. A high ball iq dude that is slow and doesn't rely on athleticism at the center position. He is really a one of one. Arvydas Sabonis would pop up for me. But the nba never really got a taste of Arvydas Sabonis in his prime.
I’ve heard that Jokic intentionally played poorly in front of the Barcelona scouts because his girlfriend, now wife, had recently moved to the US. It was presented as a rumor by a local Denver journalist (Adam Mares if I recall) who knows everyone though and he seemed pretty sure of himself.
To be fair, back in the days, we had never seen a center like Jokic yet. It would have been difficult to imagine how he could impact the NBaA, the way he is.
Imagine being Barcelona 🥲
😂Natalija je prvo krenula u SAD .Da je otisla u Spaniju,eto njega.
Appreciate you
Micic is a euroleague mvp btw
He's the goat by far
good info!
I never get why the top picks get most of the slander when they don't live up to the hype, when the real failures are the scouts and the executives who put them in these positions. With an exception to the players who aren't willing to put any effort into their career, that's another story, since that's less "not living up to the hype" and more "not doing your job", regardless of your supposed level.
GMs do get fired for making mistakes (scouts as well) but few people know them -- so naturally the media is focused on the players. Vlade Divac refusing to take Luka definitely got his butt fired. 😂
Jokic may be the best offensive big (it would definitely between him and Shaq) but I don’t think you can call him the best big ever considering his defensive weaknesses. Kareem and Hakeem were both top 2-way players. An argument can be made for Bill Russell too.
And don’t forget about Wilt. The best scorer, rebounder and shot blocker ever. And he could pass the ball too. And the most athletic of them all.
@ I actually do think Jokic is better than Wilt. I personally don’t think he’s better than any of the others I listed, and that is only amongst centers. There have been some elite PFs too, like Duncan. Basically, I think all of the bigs who have more than 1 ring are better than Jokic.
@ better thank wilt? Plz explain.
In basketball, small ball is a style of play that sacrifices height, physical strength and low post offense/defense in favor of a lineup of smaller players for speed, agility and increased scoring (often from the three-point line).
I would add that none of them shot for three points, did not organize the offense. Except for Wilt, none of them were good assistants. I would like to see those “top defensive” players in today's basketball. Secondly, each of them played with at least one All-Star player, most with HOF players. The shooting of most of those players from the perimeter was bad, Shaquille O'Neal was a catastrophic free throw shooter.
Comparison between Player A n B.. lol, whoever doin this data research better they got some bonus
Pay the man! Lol
The stats comparison at 7:50 cuts both ways. When people ask if Larry bird could adapt and dominate in todays nba, the jokic comparison is a close match. Remember Bird would have access to more modern conditioning and esp medical treatments too.
Jokic career is what a good mycareer story should feel like except the ridiculous numbers and records are real
Excellent
Those NBA scouts always look for athleticism and fail to understand basketball skills.
A lot of things had to go right for him to succeed. One thing for sure, is that he's very professional. he doesn't treat basketball as a mere hobby that happens to earn him money. It's all work. He doesn't have the baby mindset of a lot of american young talents. When they get big contract extension their game usually just stagnates. Jokic improves every single year and he has the right balance of basketball and his other aspects of life. So he doesn't get burnt out. So yea the horses are important too
I agree. There’s a false narrative that he doesn’t love basketball. He loves the game and studies it like everybody else. He just not into the media and all the other things surrounding basketball. He just wants to play and go home and enjoy his life/family in my opinion
One big difference between player a abd player b, bird played very good defense and better shooter.
He’s great but we need to chill out when saying someone who’s half way through their career is the best ever at their position. For starters he’s too slow on his feet which limits his defense, so he’s never going to be ahead of Kareem, wilt, Dream … who were beasts on both ends of the floor. And there no insult. We need to chill out and stop being so hyperbolic.
Best big is Hakeem Olajuwon. Joker is great but let's not kid ourselves
It’s pretty simple a lot of Balkan players (Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia) stay overseas and are draft and stash guys
Best big ever? That's Wilt or Kareem. They were so good, that rules were changed so that they would find it harder to dominate.
He is very, very good, by being the best long range shooter, and a playmaker. But Wilt was the one who lead the league in assists. This is why Larry Bird said that he would have loved to play against him.
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Wilt averaged over 50 points for an entire season, and u think Jokeris better😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
I would preferred more analysis on him as a player instead of just telling Jokic’s story.
You’re a scout, let us know how you would’ve scouted Nikola!
You know his salary is per year now 50 million US dollars.😂 Pretty crazy
Bill Russell was the 2nd overall pick.
FC???
8:37
The main reason for his bad game against Barcelona is his future wife Natalija Jokić. There is a Serbian documentary "The Man Who Makes the Difference", Nikola admits that he did it intentionally. The most responsible person from Denver for the transfer is Artūras Karnišovas, no one else was in favor of bringing him.
Very interesting! Thanks for sharing. I didn’t know all of that
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Best big ever? It's tough to say he's a top 5 center
I got him 6-10 as a center,not overall
He just dominates the no quality center generation
He is clearly top 5 big ever.
@Procanin Hakeem, Kareem, shaq,David Robinson, Patrick Ewing, wilt, you think jokic can hold his own vs these guys? Sure jokic is a better 3pt shooter, but all these players were elite defensively also
@@Mickelson40 also the best playmaking centre ever tho. Not even a convo as well btw, regardless of wilts assists numbers
Maybe Jokic knew what he was doing in that bad game.
jokic never played the euroleague
Scouts of nba were still far behind the ones in Europe. Prefering athleticism over brains
I love hoop content, but it feels like youre just reading off a script and monotonous
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Anthony Goods needs to be fired. He is utterly incompetent.
Your prize pick is why I don't gamble ;-) (Mahomes for 210)
Dude 😂
"FC" stands for "football club" so no, he was not going to FC Barcelona 😂
Not Money?
Not the best big ever if he only plays good offense. Sorry.
He had the 3rd best defensive rating last season. Maybe he’s playing better defense than we think
@@antgoods87 not impressive. No bigman to go against. He's not a stopper on the post and can't protect the rim. Stats lie.
@@lebarbosa9778 Greatest offense in the history of NBA with him on the court, the worst with him off. Highest +- in the league by some margin in the last couple of seasons despite not playing with any all star team mates. Highest Player Efficiency rating ever. Do they lie? Not impressive to drag a team to a 6th playoff seed with Will Barton as the second best player?
@@andris1335 greatest offense in the history of the NBA based on what? How do you measure that when different eras played by different rules. Btw i was talking about defense.
@@lebarbosa9778 offensive efficiency points per 100 possessions
NBA scouts are full of it 💩
I haven't watched the video yet but I can tell you in a one on one workout he would look non athletic over weight and fat when a athlete is overweight and fat they asssume he is lazy I would of assumed the same thing
NBA "experts"
The best big ever was Kareem. Stop it.
Why the back ground music, bro? Back ground music is only needed for videos that are fictional like movies, science fiction, comedy or any other made up stories or non sense, but this issue you are talking about, in my eyes, is not non sense so why the music? Thanx
They suck at their jobs.
Because he’s not American. Plain and simple.
Best big ever? No
Wilt scored 100 in one game. He was the most offensive talented big man. This guy’s too young to know diddly!
I don't think that Shack, Robinson, Ewing, Tim or Joker would have problem scoring 100 against 6,9 plumbers
Since the NBA has advanced stats Jokic is an anomaly of efficiency. Wilt's era is hard to evaluate by any accurate metrics.
Wilt was just a solid player skill wise who was the best relative athlete in NBA history compared to his peers. It was night and day difference. It was like if LeBron was playing against guys with the athleticism of Joe Ingles, Kyle Anderson and the occasional Draymond Green but they were all 6'4" too
I don't know. The 4 year 200 mil contract with Murray rasised a lot of questions and eyebrows. Something doesn't add up. NBA is owned by the the same people who own everything else or run everything else. I myself being a Serb I noticed that Serbia being a basketball powerhouse goes against the narratives they push. Simple. Things are increasingly micromanaged and everything is a pretense of sorts and that's why everything seems fake; because it is. These people understand that power andinfluence is more important than money and since they own everything their investments are diversified so they sacrifice money for maintaining control over everyones perception of what is valuable and what is not. Control of narrative allows that. Without a narrative control, without having control over people's perception of meaning, more is lost on thelong run and inversly more is gained on the long run. So thats why I think that Jokic and Lebron arepawns in a deeper ideological push; a silent unspoken ongoing warfare. Will to power.
Why won't y'all let that go he was drafted 41 Bitcoin and he was doing a Taco Bell commercial why do you all keep hanging on to that that's not news if you got to keep on saying it it must be news for you to the commentator who is whoever you are every last one of y'all will not let that go he was stuck on his first pick doing that Taco Bell commercial come on people you sound like a broken record every last commentator y'all can't move on the man has been in the league almost 10 years almost 10 days on years and y'all still harboring on that can't y'all find something else better that's all I'm asking no more no less I enjoyed what y'all do how y'all do it but y'all keep on on that same note he was drafted 41st pick and he was doing a Taco Bell commercial come on now that sounds like a broken record he was drafted at the 41st pick and he was drafted during the Taco Bell commercial don't that sound like a broken record I'm saying it more than one time so did y'all can hear how you sound when y'all presented to the public and he was drafted 41st pick doing a Taco Bell commercial he was drafted for the first pick doing a Taco Bell commercial don't that sound like a broken record can y'all think of something else better to talk about than just start his career off on how he was drafted