You wouldn't get rid of someone like Luka because they like food, would you? He's a guy who lives for the moment. When the lights are on, he's locked in. He might not be obsessed with his body like Kobe or LeBron, but he hates losing. That makes him dangerous.zgolfz85 said:Many said the same about Jordan in the 80s....and some cocky kid from Philly in his early days in LA....and some nerdy/awkward looking white boy from Indiana.....and Giannis was never going to develop his body enough to be dominant....and Tatum didn't have the cutthroat mentality needed to lead a championship team....and same for Dirk and on and on we go. You just don't piss away generational talent DNA...they'll prove you wrong more often than not.shack009 said:It isn't there enough to make him not gain weight from the final regular season game to the playoffs. It isn't there enough to get his body right in the offseason to the point where you don't get injured in a pickup game before training camp.zgolfz85 said:Guitarsoup said:I think you can give the F You effort short term, but I am doubtful that a player can change their entire life around it for a decade. Luka may drop 100 on Feb 25th, but I don't think he will develop Mamba Mentality for the rest of his career to prove Nico wrong.shack009 said:Yep, this is the only thing that will give Mavs fans peace, long term. Have to be able to look back and say "Nico was right about Luka's lifestyle and commitment to basketball." We won't have the answer for another 10 years probably.Guitarsoup said:
But for it to really make sense long term, Luka needs to drink himself into Embiid-type of missed games. Embiid's contract is catastrophically the worst in the NBA by a long shot and no one else is even close. Making that bet that Luka turns into is wild from the outside looking in and without the insider knowledge that Kidd, etc would have.
The weird thing is, we will have no way of knowing if Luka ever would have gotten his ass in gear while he was here. If he does it in LA, it will probably be because of his "F you" mentality that the trade created.
I don't think he needs to. The dude might not have the conditioning ethic we wanted, but the holding himself to legendary standards for wins and losses and the generational talent ego and hatred for losses is clearly there, fat boy or not. The dude is 25. I was a 3 night a week bar binge drinker at 25. My bet would be on playing good cop bad cop with him internally to make him revenge body for the Mavs and betting on his maturation. Losing makes people like Luka angry. There was too much meat on the bone and upside there to throw it away…and that's just the on court stuff. There's not a single justification for off court business stuff, unless you like devaluing a brand, especially in a football first town.
Like GS said above, he doesn't have that long term singular focus/discipline. He only has it when he's on the court.
It's possible he wins a championship and maybe multiple championships. I just disagree with most people's thoughts on the likelihood of it happening.
People love rewriting history, and they said the same about loads of other all-time greats who weren't "serious enough" until they were.Shaq was out of shape every other summer, Jokic was "too lazy" and "didn't care enough," and Dirk "wasn't cutthroat."Guess what? Rings talk.Luka is still learning how to handle the long-term grind, but he's already an all-time playoff performer.
And as for the Mavs, you don't let go of one of the most marketable, box-office superstars in the league just because he spends the offseason eating steak and playing pick-up in Slovenia.You work with him, you play the long game, and you make sure he has the structure to reach his peak.If he gets that "revenge body" and locks in, we're looking at a guy who could be the face of the league. You can't just throw that away.
