2023-11-02 13:00:00
Bruno Altieri November 2, 2023, 8:00 a.m. ETLectura: 3 min.
One thing is clear: Luka Doncic is not making his Mavericks teammates better. He mightn’t do it with Kristaps Porzingis before and he mightn’t get Kyrie Irving involved now.
For some time now, we naturalized the genius of Luka Doncic. Basketball-art in slow motion, that craftsman’s sleight of hand made with a ball that provokes ecstasy in whoever observes it. The eye of the camera, sagacious, powerful, unequivocal, never finished discovering the trick: friends, it cannot be slowed down.
Who doesn’t enjoy someone like that, capable of provoking applause every time a curtain opens? In times of electronic music, of continuous noise, Doncic arrived from Europe and brought with him the finesse of Chopin. Romanticism in times of heartbreak. Fidelity in times of uprooting. Technique over speed. The awakening of genius forced many to change perceptions. From frenetic pace to countercyclical basketball.
Dress me slowly because I’m in a hurry.
However, following the euphoria of the initial surprise, of the first hours of flight of the genius, passed, the purity of a beautiful idea in its conception began to mutate into something worrying. In general terms, Doncic shines but Dallas does not. You will say that the Mavericks started the 2023-24 season with three wins in a row and with Luka in an overwhelming fashion, and you will be right. But the short term cannot beat the long term. And what seems like gold, sooner or later, will end up being mud for a franchise that needs much more content than form.
” data-captioned width=”1″ height=”1″ layout=”responsive”>
Doncic’s almighty game went from being a virtue to becoming a problem. The lack of company that was claimed for him from the beginning seems like a confusing illusion. We all sigh with each luxury assist from Doncic, but Dallas is lacking the predictable. The best passes are not the impossible ones, but the necessary ones. For the Mavericks to win, they need something extraordinary every night. And that, sooner or later, won’t work. In short, you cannot be Vincent Van Gogh in every stroke.
Doncic’s beautiful music looks like the symphony on the Titanic before it crashed into the iceberg. Luka, perhaps one of the most fantastic talents that Europe has produced in its history, believes that he can do everything with his own hands. He rebounds, assists, scores, steals balls and has the ball very, very much in every attack. One thing is clear: he is not making his teammates better. He mightn’t do it with Kristaps Porzingis before—he had to go to the Washington Wizards to revive his career—and he mightn’t get Kyrie Irving involved now either. What seemed at first to be one for all, is now all for one. At the price you have to pay.
Then, in this exaggerated one-person, the logic of the messiah is produced. Doncic will save us with something out of the ordinary. With an action out of script. If it happens, he becomes the outspoken superhero. And if it doesn’t happen, what we have already seen with the Slovenian happens: the fault lies with the referees, the teammates, the wind or the lights that dazzled him. No one can be happy alone.
Doncic has to stop being a siren song before it’s too late. Avoid contaminating yourself with applause and pats on the back. The supernatural scores he shows night following night won’t help him become a better player. He has to go back to the origins of the essence of him as a basketball player, when he made others better. The MVP is not the goal: the goal is the championship. Instead of everyone else playing for him, he has to play for everyone else.
He should, then, look more at Nikola Jokic, the panopticon player who makes everyone better, and less at Giannis Antetokoumpo. More Magic Johnson and less Michael Jordan. Its fluidity, its value, its power does not lie in enriching the environment. It is in establishing himself in the environment itself. Mutate from gold beetle to Aleph.
Rubén Magnano says, in the recent biography published by Gabriel Rosenbaun, that “talent is useful if it is shared.” And he adds an eloquent phrase: “In solitude you can go faster, but together we can go further.”
Doncic needs to stop and think. Change the times. Reflect. Modify the roadmap, stop looking inward and start looking outward. In short, lead.
Maturation begins with learning. Humility will allow you to take the new leap.
It is never too late.
1698935973
#Luka #Doncics #almighty #play #virtue #problem #Mavericks