Why Luka Doncic is among great scorers of all time

It’s easy to overlook what Luka Dončić is doing.He’s so good it’s almost hard to see it. He has been putting up video game numbers for so long that we’re almost inured to them in the same way our olfactory senses stop responding to a constant smell. But Giannis Antetokounmpo slapped us out of our slumber following Dončić’s fourth 40-point performance in five days in the Lakers’ 138-117 win over the Heat on Monday. “Obviously he’s one of the best scorers to ever play this game, if not the best,” Antetokounmpo said.“Not right now.

Of all time.I feel like some people are scared to say that.

But it’s got to be out there.”Dončić has led the league in scoring twice and is on pace to do so a third time.He’s averaging a blistering 38.3 points per game, 8.3 points more than second-place Stephen Curry. Here are the points Dončić has put up in the last five games: 42, 45, 37, 41, 52. Yet somehow we’ve never thought of Dončić as an all-time scorer. That needs to change. While Curry is the consensus greatest shooter ever, different players have been thrown into the conversation for all-time greatest scorer, including Michael Jordan, Wilt Chamberlain and even Kevin Durant, the latter of whom is a beacon of consistency but isn’t going to regularly explode for 50-plus points. Dončić deserves to be in that club.He has a career scoring average of 29.32 points, trailing only Jordan (30.12) and Chamberlain (30.07).And Dončić is only 27 years old.

He’s still in his prime. He’s only getting better. Before JJ Redick became the Lakers’ coach in June 2024, he said Dončić “has the best brakes in the fu–king world” on his former podcast, “The Old Man & The Three.”“What he does is there’s a constant change of pace,” Redick said.“He’s on-balance.

He’s trying to get you off-balance.Once you’re off-balance, he’s still on-balance, he changes his pace.”In layman’s terms: Dončić is impossible...