Luka Doncic entered the NBA with quite a bit of hype. As the third overall pick of the 2018 NBA Draft, he was billed as the next great European basketball player, and it's safe to say that to this point, he has lived up to that billing.
Doncic's first year in the league coincided with Dirk Nowitzki 's final year, and they spent it playing together for the Dallas Mavericks . According to the legendary big man, it didn't take long for him to recognize how skilled Luka was.
Dirk knew Luka would be a star
In a lot of ways, Nowitzki was the perfect mentor for Doncic as he transitioned to the NBA. A fellow overseas prospect himself, the legendary German had quite a bit of hype surrounding his entry to the league. Still, it wasn't the same level as what the Slovenian guard had to deal with.
Nowitzki realized pretty quickly that the youngster wasn't really going to need his help. Right from the get-go, the talented youngster was torching the Mavs during their early practices, which let the veteran big man know right away that Luka was for real.
"Before camp, he got there a few weeks before, and you know everybody's already there in the gym, you lift together, and you play some controlled scrimmages, and I think guys were testing him a bit, seeing what he's made of, the high draft pick coming in," Nowitzki said on The Big Podcast. "I think everybody was surprised, especially how he read the game. He made passes look easy, I'm like, 'What?'"
"An 18, 19-year old shouldn't be able to see the floor like that and do behind the back passes, between the leg passes in a scrimmage where guys were actually trying to come at him. That was really my first, 'Wow, OK, this kid is built different and is built to be here, and he's got the swag and the confidence about him.' But I didn't even envision that he could go to that level where he's at now; it's just been unbelievable," Nowitzki added.
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Doncic has managed to exceed expectations
From the get-go, Slovenian proved himself to be one of the best players in the NBA. He won the Rookie of the Year award in 2019 and has followed that up by reeling off five straight All-Star and first-team All-NBA selections.
The scary thing is that it doesn't seem like Doncic intends on slowing down anytime soon, either. He just averaged career highs in points and assists last season while also shooting a career-high 38.2 percent from behind the arc.
That culminated in Luka Magic leading Dallas all the way to the 2024 NBA Finals. Still, they ended up losing in five games to the Boston Celtics. To reach the same heights Nowitzki reached, winning an MVP award and a title would help put him in that conversation.
In some ways, Doncic has already passed Nowitzki, but it's not worth getting ahead of ourselves because he's still only 25 years old and has played just six seasons in the NBA. Dirk knew Luka was a star, but he couldn't even predict all that he'd accomplished so far in his career.
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