Even back then you could see he had Yang Hansen-like potential in his game.
Let's not go too far now. Jokic is not on Yang's level
Serbian Yang Hansen
Kon Kneuppel
PLEASE
The first step of Skinny Jokic is like 30% faster than current Jokic.
You know what's funny I was just thinking he could play for as long as he would like with that old men game. But he probably going to just say nah I will play with my horses
"Look at my horse. My horse is amazing."
- Jokic
"Give it a lick, mm, it tastes just like raisins"
It reminds me of his mvp speech “i fucking hate basketball and adam silver” i never knew what he meant till now
Jokic only improves with extra weight lol
I think this video is slightly sped up. Looks to me like the ball is falling a little too fast. I could be wrong though.
Craziest part to me is how identical it is to his game now. Obviously he’s much much better, but the footwork, the pivots, the turnaround jumpers, the pumpfakes, the crazy court vision is all 100% there already
He still does that same exact stuff today
He's just fatter and more skilled now
Bigger honey
HoneyBadger Honeybigger
When you put it in perspective, this is what the defence prepares for before every game against him. For 10 years. Granted, not as dominant for the whole time as lately, but the Player A/Player B comparison with Bird is just such a telling sign in hindsight.
Right after being drafted in the second round lol. How was this dude overlooked because he should have been dominating whatever league he was in
He did play 1 year overseas after getting drafted.
and he was in fact MVP of the adriatic league in that one year.
Okay that context helps. Thank you!
As much as I love the "drafted during a Taco Bell commercial" meme, it is worth noting that a big part of the reason he fell was that he was still playing in Euroleague. He was drafted in the 2014 draft, but didn't actually join the Nuggets until a year later in 2015
If he'd said that he was going to leave the Euroleage and come to the States in 2014, he definitely would have been a first-rounder
Ahhhh that makes more sense. I guess I never revisited the Jokic backstory. Still nothing better than during a taco bell commercial lol
Scouting is tough, but it’s weird, for some reason, you do this stuff against grown adults in another league and there’s question marks on the talent you went against. But if he did this against children in the ncaa he would have been a top ten pick.
yeah, it's his hands and how quickly he moves the ball/makes his reads that's really blowing me away here. dude just immediately picks up on when he has the advantage and moves correctly on it.
He looks more sped up here. He's still doing the same thing but he's exerting more energy. Now the game is so slow for him he can just methodically move the right chess pieces whenever.
For me it's how unprepared all the other teams were back then.
For like three years teams have been sitting on all this stuff but nobody on the defending teams has the slightest clue in these clips. It's great
I remember when people were debating Jokic and Nurkic.
Similar to when GS was choosing between Curry and Monta.
I could see why Denver thought they could play together at first. Skinny Jokic didn’t feel like a center. Obviously now that’s silly.
Word these highlights he plays and moves like a PF. Definitely a center now.
Well Nurkic was more a traditional Center at the time. I remember thinking Malone was crazy for not committing to starting Jokic full time until like December the following season
It's funny how many plays in the highlights they were on the court at the same time. I'm guessing Jokic was playing PF and Nurk at C?
If you haven’t seen the story about Denver picking between the two, it’s pretty great:
lol hilarious he’s talking about per 36 and being that up in this sub and everybody writes it off.
That's great. What I don't quite get though is why they traded Nurkic and a 1st for Mason Plumlee? I'm assuming Nurkic was traded to clear way for Jokic, but then they traded for another center. I'm not a Nuggets fan so maybe there's more to it than I realize or something.
Imagine if they'd traded Jokic instead...
One of the best parts about them being on the same team was DownToBuck writing fan fiction about the two of them having a feud.
His rookie tape is better than a lot of guys career tape
That's what I was thinking. This would be a solid career highlight reel for 99% of guys that have played the game
That just shows how many levels above the average NBA player Jokic is. And this is probably true for all the goats. I would imagine MJ and LeBron rookie highlight tapes are better than most careers too.
The pass to Faried at the 37 second mark 🤯
The brain has always been there, but look how skinny and athletic he was back then. Very quick on his heel in the low post. Some of his moves look really, really fast. These days, he's more surgical and methodical, and can back down anyone.
Part of his strength now is being able to bully a lot of people inside. He needed to pack on more weight/muscle to get where he is now even if it took a bit of his speed away
My brother in Christ does that say Emmanuel Mudiay 😭
Rookie Jokic brought the real Nuggets fans out the woodworks
The spin is still really fast these days.
But yeah I had the same impression.
Super confused. I coulda sworn he was fatter at the start than he his now, but no, apparently not. He was quite quick-footed for his height back then, which was especially useful in transition, it seems.
Btw, every single one of those jerseys is sick, so bad re-brand by the Nuggets.
He was fatter for a couple seasons right after this then he started taking his conditioning pretty seriously
"pretty seriously. Ok, somewhat seriously..."
Jokic is one of the best conditioned player in the league
Jokic has played 65 minutes in a quadruple OT playoff game, plays almost every game heavy minutes in regular season and almost all the game in the playoffs.
The dude is the definition of a workhorse, production over style.
Guy was literally talking about his weight. He's bigger today than he was then. That's it.
Conditioning <> Weight.
They are certainly related, but cardiovascular stamina is its own thing.
You guys are a bunch of pedantic losers. I'm literally responding to a comment using his own words which are about his weight. And you geeks need to chime in "well ackshually..."
Calling people geeks is some real nerd shit
For real, powder blue was a more iconic look, we have tons of blue/red/white teams.
Going from that gorgeous powder blue and yellow to dark blue and maroon gotta be against the Geneva conventions
And a lot of his movements looked more coordinated too. I think he intentionally moves weird to throw opponents’ timing off
Maybe not 3x MVP but you could definitely see how special he was then
That ability to just play the game at your own pace and slow it down when you want and speed it up when you want so that it looks like you are playing with the video speed multiplayer is such a insane skill. Shai and Luka do it a bit, Bron used to do it all the time too. But theres really not that many guys in the last two decades who could just play the game at whatever speed they wanted and force the defence to fuck up. Such a good viewing experience
What was funny is that the people who had never seen him play (most NBA “fans”) would tell anyone who saw how good he was to “watch the games” as their entire argument against acknowledging how good he was.
Someone linked to an old thread ranking young centers after this season, and to say r/NBA was still not impressed and thought Nuggets fans were delusional homers would be an understatement. Most people were aghast that anyone would put him over Okafor even haha (NBA voters were smarter, Jokic came in 3rd for ROY, Okafor 5th despite averaging 7 more points a game. KAT and Porzingis came 1st and 2nd.)
Fingers crossed for my boy Sengun
needs to figure out his shot, no?
he needs to get his touch back first
That steal on Melo was nasty.
“That 15 is mine now”
0:35 in the video is such an awesome play. Offensive rebound between the Grizzlies 2 big men, followed by just 1 dribble away from the rim and then an immediate behind the back drop off to Faried, who just relocated to that spot once Jokic pulled the soft double team from Gasol.
The bounce pass goes right under Gasol's arm and he turns around to see Faried already gathering for the shot and has no time to contest because of how accurate and quick the pass was.
The whole sequence takes just 3 seconds, but it's one of best in this highlight reel.
That's always been one of my favorite Jokic passes. It was crazy how long it took everybody on this sub to admit that he was great.
It’s so fun to see superstars before they got the superstar treatment from opposition defences.
The fact that he has had this touch from his rookie year is insane
My lord his passing game is next level.
kenneth faried ran so AG could fly
he had his post up moves even as a rookie, but man wow he was slim
Skinny Jokic might be the best basketball player ever
Dude is playing like a 3 time MVP.
When I first saw him I was mfer is just getting getting lucky. Lucky for almost a decade now
If you take away Jokic's passing, court vision, BBIQ, ballhandling, leadership, rebounding, defensive positioning, horse affinity, then he's basically just Big Al with a jump shot.
Nico would have traded him
Gallo was FEASTING with Jokic
Gallo Mohawk >>>>>
This is like Magic Shaq. Kind of wish Jokic went back to this weight. I get the benefit of added Serbian weight but man he's quick and those big guys could not keep up.
Nice trip down memory lane seeing some now retired great players, plus amazing Jokic highlights.
Goddamit I miss Gallo and Millsap on this team. No I will not ellaborate
VOTE 4 MILLSAP
Did I see a near 3/4 court no look pass in there?
Why didn’t he get more minutes?!?
"Everybody is hitting shots now" is such a perfect ending to this video lmfao.
I can't imagine a better non-all star small forward than prime Danilo Gallinari for a Jokic-led team
He doesn't have a bag, he has Santa's sack
He’s so fucking good
When you mix basketball with art.
wow, its all there. was he missing consistency or just opportunity?
It’s a mixture of consistency, tempo, and stability. The guy was smooth as hell from day one, but you can tell that a lot of these clips are done just a little bit faster than he would today. He’s not quite as under control, he rushes at times where today he’d slow down to a crawl. Same thing with the body control, all that extra muscle helps keep him balanced and upright where his younger self is a little more unstable.
Unreal
Bro was skinny
That haircut from Gallinari was a choice
Nikola "White Chocolate" Jokic
He’s gonna be good. Notice how he can finish with both hands; incredible BBIQ - he’s good.
what if jokic stayed as athletic as he was then.... a big what if
this was the season i fell in love with his game and he became my favorite player. i can’t believe people didn’t see it at the time.
It must be so hard to be his teammate lol.
That shit just be flying in random directions constantly
I can't get enough of jokic man. I love his game. My favorite non-thunder player.
His fans though, worst ever.
To be fair his fans were watching these plays happen and being told here that he wasn't a top player for years. Fools thought Okafor or Porzingis were better. So we got a chip on our shoulder. Even after his first MVP half of the media still couldn't pronounce his name correctly.
Any one who says he's not a top player are idiots. He's been the best player in the world for the past 5 years i think. When he retires, he'll easily be a top 10 goat.
If Danilo and millsap was a tad bit younger that team would’ve been amazing to watch bloom
i was really into nurkic and his Big Dad so i was invested in Jokic not actually being good and had never seen his early career film... damn. dude's such a killer.
Why was he such a late draft pick? Was he just really unknown?
Kg was lost
kg wasn't in the video that was gorgui dieng
Kg wish he was going up against Bynum
Jokic needs to find a balance between this Jokic and his current self in terms of weight.
i think hes doing fine lol
Yea lol, hes now unstoppable to getting to the rim even if he's slower. I don't think the 3x mvp who was the #2 contender for 2 more needs to do more.
Ngl it's kinda funny seeing him get some height for dunks here though.
Nah, current Jokic is fine. He's extremely durable, and a slight loss in speed is compensated by the fact his post moves are even more polished now, plus he's way stronger and can bully any 1v1 matchup without no significant help - Zubac might be the closest to being an exception.
The seasons after his rookie year he got too fat, but now he's more strong than exactly overweight
Bro he is literally the best player in the NBA, and one of the best conditioned. Rough take.
Honestly he needs to be given the Luka treatment. If this guy weren't fat, he'd probably be the best player in the world.
do I have news for you
Replays/alternate angles
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.