Dating back to last season's NBA Playoffs, there has been a lot of talk about the defense of Luka Doncic. Many have tried to highlight it as an area of his game where there is a glaring weakness to be exploited. That just simply is not the case.
No one is going to sit here and pretend Doncic is an all-world defender like a Herb Jones, Luguentz Dort , or someone of the sort. However, the discussions around Luka's poor perimeter defense have been largely overdone.
Perhaps it feels easy to point of some of Doncic's shortcomings on the defensive end when comparing that to his otherworldly offensive game. There is certainly a notable difference between how great the five-time All-NBA player is on either end of the court. That being said, to consider Doncic a poor defender just feels disingenuous.
Luka's limitations and why the Lakers can (and will) overcome them
Being completely up front, Luka's athletic limitations do hinder his defensive ceiling. That is just an obvious part of the equation. Doncic does not possess the lateral quickness or foot speed that certain elite defenders make a living from.
However, there is one important aspect to Doncic's defense that has more than kept him afloat throughout his time in the NBA: his basketball IQ.
Bill Simmons pointed that fact out on an episode of his most recent podcast. The generational talent makes the most of his great insticts and turns it into more than serviceable defense.
"Everyone makes fun of Luka's defense," Simmons opened up. "But he's still a really smart basketball player, right? ... I think JJ [Redick]'s a legitimately good coach, and I thought what they did last night to Joker [Nikola Jokic], who was terrible because they made him terrible, ... if I was a Laker fan, I'd be excited."
That same game that Simmons was referring to was one where Doncic registered four steals and one block on the defensive end. The NBA media personality rightly pointed out that Redick's gameplan for slowing down Jokic does not work without intelligent players who are capable of executing that.
Doncic does not have to look further than his superstar teammate for an example of how to utilize his smarts to hold his own defensively. Sure, LeBron James is a significantly better athlete than Luka. However, especially in his older years, James has utilized his IQ for smart positioning and tended to play the percentages, as opposed to relying on the athleticism that has slowed down over the years.
There is never going to be a time where a coach throws the Slovenian superstar against the other team's best offensive player with the intention of eliminating him from the game. However, that has never been the calling card of what makes Doncic an top tier talent.
The Dallas Mavericks managed to crank it up in last year's postseason and despite falling short in the NBA Finals, they possessed a top five defense throughout the 2024 NBA Playoffs. Doncic registered a respectable 109.4 individual defensive rating during that run.
The Lakers are coached well and have proven themselves capable of playing elite defense over the last 15 games. Integrating their new superstar into that mix will not be the doomsday scenario that some would have you think.