photo: ap photoIs the number of titles won the only measure of how great a player you are in NBA history? Charles Barkley, Allen Iverson, Patrick Ewing, Reggie Miller, John Stockton, Karl Malone, Pete Maravich and many others failed to do so. The Denver Nuggets with Nikola Jokić are in the NBA Finals. If Jokić takes the title, by American standards, he will become one of the best centers in history. There is no center who has had a greater impact on the game of a team, and that is obvious, but it is even more clear that he changed the history of basketball
When the signatory of these lines started to fall in love with basketball and follow it regularly, the center position was not the most important lever in the game. Centers, with a few exceptions, usually did the mining job of pushing and diving under the basket to eventually hand the ball to the nearest short player. Simply, genetic predispositions and sports medicine of that time did not allow players 210 centimeters tall to be mobile. Playmakers and guards ruled world basketball. A little later, wing players entered the scene, especially when basketball had progressed so much that it was not too strange that players over 203 centimeters tall had a technique good enough to have a decisive influence on the game. Older basketball fans will tell you the same thing every time: "What about Krešimir Ćosić?" Just as many times he will hear the answer from the younger ones: "I didn't watch basketball when he was playing, but I think that today a slightly better center would put him in his pocket."
The NBA league was so far away from us that during the seventies and early eighties of the last century, we could not see in which direction basketball was going. The video tapes with the Lakers and Celtics games that came to Yugoslavia in the mid-eighties were food for the eyes. Usually overdubbed to the point of invisibility, they gave an insight into where basketball is going. Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, a wing and point guard with a height of 206 centimeters, looked like aliens to us. Listen, playmaker with 206 centimeters!
EUROPEAN BASKETBALL REVOLUTION
From the mid-1980s, there was a generation in Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union that changed everything in European basketball. On one side, Vlade Divac and Dino Rađa, and on the other, Arvidas Sabonis - superb central technique packed into moving bodies. The basketball revolution could begin. Speed, overview of the game, assists, jumps and running out of the counterattack in European basketball had not been seen until then. Basketball has moved in the direction of additional acceleration of the game where every player, be it guard, wing or center, must know everything about basketball basics. If he is a guard, he must, in addition to technique and shooting, jump well and it is certainly desirable that he be taller than two meters. A good example is Luka Dončić. If he is a winger, in addition to shooting and technique, he must often have more jumps than the centers themselves. And finally, if he is a top center, he must have great technique in the racket and the ability to come out of it and be a threat in the three-point shot.
All this was the basis of the modern basketball game until the appearance of a center who, in addition to all the listed abilities, raised basketball to an even higher level and became one of the best assistants in the strongest league in the world. Nikola Jokić is the new benchmark for a modern player in the central position. The only problem is that he is so unique that it is difficult to find a young player who would follow in his footsteps.
NIKOLA AND THE NBA LEAGUE
At the moment when Jokić was selected by the Denver Nuggets as the 41st pick of the second round of the Draft, a commercial for Tacos, or the American version of the Mexican dish, was playing on the television broadcasting this event. So much for the fact that much was expected of him. It is now widely known that he was not physically ready to compete in the league with the best centers. However, Mike Malone, as Denver's head coach, saw something in him that all other coaches and teams in the NBA missed.
The Americans strive to bring every player to the physically best version of themselves, often at the expense of speed. They gave Nikola a year to get his body in a condition that would allow him to be an NBA player through physical and fitness training, along with a sports lifestyle and diet. Already after four months he was the club's best player. Everything that follows is Denver history. Michael Malone had a conversation with club management that changed the entire Denver franchise. He thanked Jusuf Nurkić, who until then shared the minutes in the center position, and made Nikola not only the first center of the team, but the first player of the entire franchise, i.e. the player around whom a new team will be built in the future.
The big question is how Nikola Jokić's career would look like today if there was no understanding of the coach and owner of the Nuggets. He would certainly be an excellent centre, but the big question is whether and when he would get so much freedom in the game and support. Great coaching knowledge and faith in the player led to the fact that for the first time in the history of the NBA, the Denver Nuggets put a player in the center position to be the main organizer of the game in the attack.
From the beginning of his career, sports journalists in America have never managed to mold him into the standard called the NBA league. He himself gave them terrible trouble. He's not fast, he's not jumpy, he doesn't like social media, he doesn't stand out in front of the team and he doesn't live a lavish life off the court like any average NBA player. On top of all that, he plays in a small club and comes from a country with almost no marketing potential. How to make him a star?
Statistics, as the mother of all indicators in the NBA, spoke more about him year after year than any journalist. America did not have the opportunity to see such a basketball superstar, and such a humble guy. They reluctantly admitted to him twice that he is the best player of the league part of the league. Each time he modestly collected the MVP award, but still did not stand out on any occasion, always apostrophizing his team. It was enough to bring up the issue of skin color and the huge desire for the MVP title of Joel Embiid, an undeniably great player, so that he was left without the third associated award. And again, Nikola Jokić accepted all the fuss almost disinterestedly. He waited for the playoffs to prove that he is still the best player in the world.
PLAY OF
At the beginning of November last year, the Denver Nuggets took first place in the Western Conference standings of the NBA League and did not relinquish it until the end of the league part of the championship. It was seen that Denver has matured as a team with the return of Jamal Murray and Michael Porter Jr. and will not be satisfied with this result. After the ugly episode that was reflected in the awarding of the MVP award to Joel Embiid, sports journalists in America raced to announce the quick elimination of the Nuggets from the playoffs, all to justify their choice of the best player in the league. As it exists only in the American media, every future meeting is presented as a fight between Jokić and the "insufficiently recovered" Murray against the two best players of the opposing teams. It's as if basketball is played two-on-two and the other players don't really have much influence on the final result! The first opponents were the Minnesota Timberwolves with Anthony Edwards and Carl Anthony Towns, certainly more media attractive players than the Denver duo. Looking back, apart from the great role of Edwards, the whole series was not very interesting, the Nuggets won it 4:1. Denver is a far better team, and nobody could guard Jokić.
But don't lie down. It was the Phoenix Suns' turn with one of the best players in the center position – Deandre Ayton and a spectacular duo – Kevin Durant and Devin Booker. Basketball shows are arranged on the biggest TV stations in America, where the most famous basketball players who once played in the NBA are guests. "There is not even the slightest chance of Denver beating the Phoenix Suns" - that could be the theme of all shows before the start of the Western Conference semifinals. Only Charles Barkley said after the first round that the Denver Nuggets will be NBA champions. They looked at him as if he had fallen from Mars. In his opinion, there isn't a player in the league who can lessen Nikola Jokic's impact on the bottom line, and Denver has great players who can help Jokic better than anyone in the league. Simply put, the Nuggets are the best team in the league. Nikola Jokić is so much during the semi-final series unlearned Ayton from basketball that it was sad to watch at times. It was a bit more interesting than in the first round of the playoffs with Minnesota, but certainly not so uncertain - 4:2 for Denver.
Mike Malone, as we mentioned, is probably one of the most important people in Nikola Jokić's sports career. He always likes to highlight the merits of his coach for the success he has achieved. That relationship doesn't just end on the field and it's not just the coach-player relationship. Over the years, it grew into a friendship, not only between him and Jokić, but also their families.
Unusually for American coaches, Malone has been visiting Serbia for years during the summer during the NBA league break. In the beginning, he probably came to justify the trust he had by deciding to put his entire career and an entire basketball team on Nicole's back. Later, together with assistant coach Ognjen Stojaković, he followed Jokić's summer routine to maintain his physical and fitness abilities. When he saw that there were no problems, visits to Serbia became routine.
The readers of "Vremen" can hardly imagine the situation when you meet the coach of an NBA team in slippers, with a beard of four days, in the company of an equally relaxed assistant coach of Denver, sitting with locals and at the invitation of always hospitable people at Ada Međica, in New Belgrade. the people on the rafts there talk about everything but basketball. The only problem is that this is a basketball country, so sooner or later they recognize him. Nothing, he behaves as if he is the owner of one of the rafts or just another fan of Međica. It is not strange that he and Nikola found each other in life. Humble, great workers, but above all ordinary people.
Nikola Jokić has brought his body to a condition that allows him to be one of the physically strongest and physically most durable players in the NBA today. The fact that Jokić weighs 130 kilograms is very often overlooked. It's the same 130 kg he came to the NBA with, which at the time served to make fun of his abilities, this time wrapped in much more muscle mass and mobility. There is no player in the NBA who can physically dominate Jokic. Likewise, the finals of the Western Conference showed that Nikola is in incredible condition. He organizes the attack, plays very decent defense, assists, jumps, is often doubled, and he is in the game almost 40 minutes per match on average. We only hope that this year's consumption of materials will not prevent him from joining the Serbian national team at the upcoming World Cup. Whatever we do there, the beauty of watching him play is enough for anyone who loves basketball.
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