The most alternative Jokic is the strongest cornerstone Why did he fall to the 41st pick that year

There is no shortage of interior strategy masters in NBA history, and Divac, Sabonis and Brad Miller can satisfy all our imaginations of responding to the inside.

In recent years, the concept of "big core with the ball" has emerged, Russell Westbrook has made it no longer a luxury to average a triple-double per game in a single season, and juniors such as Luka Doncic are also interpreting this concept with actions.

What does the combination of a responsive interior line and a big core with a ball handle look like?

Just look at Jokic.

Jokic is playing a very new kind of basketball. Looking simply at the data of average triple-doubles per game in the regular season and triple-doubles per game in the playoffs, Jokic is the big core of the ball. But others play such statistics by dominating the ball, they are strictly "sticky ball big core", but Jokic is different, he pursues the ball over, but after the pass, he leaves.

Jokic has the ability to carry the ball that most other tactic interior linemen don't have, while at the same time being able to play perverted numbers without taking up too much possession. This kind of playing method avoids the shortcomings of "the ball is too concentrated in one person's hands", "the style of play is easy to be predicted", and "the attack is too dependent on one person".

To say that Jokic, who has no dead ends on the offensive end, is the best team-building core of the era, who is for and who is against?

The most offbeat Jokic

Jokic averaged 24.5 points, 11.8 rebounds, and 9.8 assists in the regular season, averaging just 14.8 shots per game and just 27.2 percent of the ball. For a destructive superstar, this shot and ball usage is clearly not high enough.

In the playoffs, Jokic's average increased to 29.9 points, 13.3 rebounds, 10.3 assists, and 21.2 shots, but looking at the ball utilization rate, Jokic only used 31.6% of the ball usage in exchange for such data.

For comparison, in the 2016-17 season, Wei Shao averaged 30+ points and triple-doubles per game, which used 41.7% of the anti-sky ball utilization rate.

Contemporary big names, regardless of whether he is a finishing type (such as alphabet brother) or a ball type (such as Doncic), the ball is generally high. Antetokounmpo has used nearly 39 percent of the ball this season, with both Doncic and Embiid surpassing 37 percent.

Since 1968, only four players have averaged at least 25 points plus eight assists per game with less than 30% regular-season possession usage, with the exception of Jokic this season and Jokic in 2020-21, LeBron James in 2016-17 and Michael Adams in 1990-91.

Jokic's unusual thing is that he does touch the ball a lot, but he doesn't hold the ball in his hand for long. In the playoffs, Jokic averaged 114.1 touches per game, ranking first in the league, but he averaged only 5.3 minutes of time on his hands.

By comparison, Trae Young averaged 89.8 fewer touches per game than Jokic, but averaged 9.1 minutes of time on hand. Brunson, Young, Harden, etc. all like to take the ball and dribble, but Jokic only averaged 1.42 dribbles per touch, and Young and Harden both had more than 5.

The data website "538 Net" believes that the same is playing gorgeous data, many other stars are through a large number of ball holdings, but Jokic does not stick to the ball and has no ball dominance attributes.

The key person behind Jokic

Jokic is able to become such a unique existence thanks to his mentor, Milojevic. From 2012 to 2015, Milojevic coached Jokic, and as a player, Milojevic earned the nickname "Serbian Barkley" because of his excellent low footwork, which he passed on to Jokic.

Jokic learns faster than expected, Milojevic said: "Jokic learns fast, I showed him some techniques, and a week later, he was better than me. ”

Jokic likes to study and try all kinds of crazy passes in Serbia, and Milojevic does not suppress Jokic's creativity, he allows Jokic to pass, even if he makes mistakes.

"He made a lot of mistakes when he was younger, I had to put up with a lot of his mistakes, he would send all kinds of ridiculous passes, which drove me crazy. But I also saw some wonderful things, and I didn't want him to focus on those mistakes, I just let those mistakes turn the page so that he could grow and learn from them. ”

Milojevic's development of Jokic has made him the most unique center in the NBA today, and Jokic's passing ability is at the top level in the league. Milojevic said: "Now he stands out, there are a lot of good players in the league, there are superstars, but there are few people who can make his teammates around him better, that's all Jokic wants, he enjoys passing more than scoring, his creativity sets him apart from other stars. So, I don't stop him when he sends all kinds of passes, few people can do what he can do, so why should I stop him? ”

Why Jokic fell to the 41st pick

At the 2014 Nike Basketball Summit, there was a gathering of talent. At that time, Jokic participated as a member of the World League, and in addition to his current Nuggets teammates Murray, Moudia, and Downs, there were also Chinese players who were noble. The U.S. team includes Jahir Okafor, Miles Turner and others.

In the official game, Jokic played 15 minutes and scored five points and seven rebounds on 1-of-3 shooting, and he did not do much to defend Okafor. Draft Express said of him as "he built up fame in training, but struggled defensively in official games." ”

ESPN draft expert Mike Schmitz followed Jokic's journey from fame to drafting, and he interpreted Jokic's 41st pick in the 2014 draft.

In that year's draft, the Rockets selected Clint Capela with the 25th pick, and it can be seen from this choice that most teams will choose players with rough technique but better athletic talent, rather than players with superior technique but lack of athletic talent, because technology can be practiced, but athletic talent cannot be taught by coaches.

Jokic was placed backward, in large part because the teams considered his athleticism to be too poor and his defensive ceiling was not high. Even if they saw how Jokic used flashy tricks to blast Downs and Capela at the Nike Basketball Summit, and even if they saw how Jokic used these techniques against Joel Embiid and Rudy Gobert in later NBA team tryouts, they still didn't dare to use high picks to select Jokic.

Until Jokic blows the "Jokic whirlwind".

Jokic's rise has changed not only the league, but also some teams' draft strategies. Industry insiders, who have historically valued athleticism and physical talent when evaluating rising stars, began to reflect, and the result of this reflection was:

In the 2021 draft, the Rockets traded for the Thunder's No. 16 pick and took Shenjing.

In the 2022 draft, the Heat selected Jovic with the No. 27 pick.

They don't have the height of Jokic, but their ball sense, creativity, soft touch, and skillful footsteps contain the same endless possibilities as Jokic in the past.

"No one wants to miss the next Jokic." An industry insider said.