The new Luka Doncic replaces Wilt Chamberlain as leader of the Lakers | Basketball | Sport

200 points in five games to start the season, 40 points per game on average. These are Luka Doncic’s exorbitant numbers to start his first full season as headliner of the Los Angeles Lakers. These are unprecedented numbers since the NBA was broadcast in color and that only the man with all the records of the American championship, Wilt Chamberlain, had achieved in the past, in 1961 and 1962. Not even Michael Jordan, with 197, reached the Slovenian’s numbers.

Yesterday morning, the 26-year-old star showed off again with 35 points, nine rebounds, 13 assists, two blocks and five steals, defeating another of the stars who have shone the brightest at the start of the season, the Frenchman Victor Wembanyama. The Lakers were able to suffer in a game marked by the accumulation of fouls and, although Doncic was not particularly good at shooting (9 of 27 in field goals; 4 of 11 in triples), he was once again the man who made the difference for LA

Los Angeles delights in the impossible shots and magical assists of the boy from Ljubljana, even more of a protagonist in LeBron’s absence due to sciatica. The veteran king of the NBA, who will turn 41 in December, began his record twenty-third season in the infirmary, paradoxically the first in which he will not be the number one of his team, a role fully embraced by a Doncic determined to silence any hint of criticism.

Although he had to miss four games due to a sore leg and a sprained left finger, the group responded through Austin Reaves and a motivated army of secondary players under the command of JJ Redick. The Angelenos currently have the second-best record in the competition (seven wins and two losses) behind the champions Oklahoma City Thunder (8-1) despite still not having James. The victory over the San Antonio Spurs (5-2) was also inspired. Wembythe good moment of LA and Doncic was reconfirmed.

After the transfer that left the NBA universe, him and the entire world speechless in the middle of last season, Doncic planned a summer of restart in which he also played in the Eurobasket. There he was visited by then-team owner Jeanie Buss and general manager Rob Pelinka. “His skills are like those of an illusionist. You have to be on the pitch to understand the magnitude of what Luka does on the pitch. There are always several moments when you ask yourself: ‘what happened?'”, marveled the manager, in the front row during his shows with Slovenia. His team fell in the quarterfinals to the champions Germany.

The Lakers’ elimination at the first opportunity in playoffs It gave the player a lot of time to give his preparation another twist. The underlying philosophy was to reshape his physique, with a very strict training and diet regime that led him to pose and show off Men’s health. “Just visually, my body already looks so much better,” she said with a smile.

Lots of proteins, little sugar and zero gluten to fuel your body in the two daily training sessions during your summer holidays on the Croatian coast, the first always fasting. No food from dinner until noon to reduce inflammation in the body. Even though the holiday had started early, Doncic was almost immobile. In mid-May he carried out a complete study of his body, with blood and urine samples, as well as medical tests of all kinds, which determined his work plan for this course, including the European one in August. For him the team and his country are non-negotiable.

For the first time in his life he didn’t touch a ball for an entire month. Only weights, elastic bands and various exercises, with some sessions of competitive paddle tennis. Doncic has been inspired in recent years by the work regimes of Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan, and at his side he has the example of the oldest elite player in history, LeBron. “They sacrificed a lot,” he says, thinking of them. The echoes of his tumultuous and unexpected departure from the Dallas Mavericks still serve as a competitive fire. Even if it hurts him when the topic is brought up. “It will always be strange, I don’t know if I will ever be able to close that wound,” he acknowledged in a profile of THE Wall Street Journalwhere he characterized his time with the Lakers as a “new beginning”.

With a contract extended for another three years at a price of 165 million dollars, Doncic knows he has the most profitable franchise in the NBA at his feet. Although he will never admit it as long as one of his idols, James, is still part of the team. The league’s Board of Governors just approved the sale of the team for $10 billion to investor Mark Walter, the highest value in history for any sports team. In this context, the Slovenian star is already the main protagonist of the competition, the one that makes the most news between betting scandals, bonuses and the usual string of performances and outcry in a championship that is as much sport as it is business and entertainment.

Practically without wanting it (if he could control it he would still be in Dallas), number 77 is now at the center of the American basketball universe, and his start to the season has lived up to enormous expectations. The Lakers, which once consisted of Jerry West, Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, now enter the Luka Doncic era.