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Dear Basketball Gods, please keep Luka Doncic away from the Kings

By Andrew Bernucca

BELGRADE, SERBIA - MAY 18: Bogdan Bogdanovic greeting Luka Doncic, #7 of Real Madrid at the end of 2018 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague F4 Semifnal B game between Semifinal A CSKA Moscow v Real Madrid at Stark Arena on May 18, 2018 in Belgrade, Serbia. (Photo by Luca Sgamellotti/EB via Getty Images)
BELGRADE, SERBIA - MAY 18: Bogdan Bogdanovic greeting Luka Doncic, #7 of Real Madrid at the end of 2018 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague F4 Semifnal B game between Semifinal A CSKA Moscow v Real Madrid at Stark Arena on May 18, 2018 in Belgrade, Serbia. (Photo by Luca Sgamellotti/EB via Getty Images) /
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As stupid as this sounds, NBA front offices are still scared of picking Luka Doncic because he is European. Even though Doncic isn’t similar to any of the European prospects who were early picks and ended up being busts, such as Darko Milicic and Mario Hezonja, some GMs still believe Doncic could be the next Darko and that they’ll never get an NBA job again if he doesn’t reach his full potential.

There is one front office who shouldn’t have this fear, though: The Sacramento Kings. Vlade Divac is currently the Kings’ Vice President of Basketball Operations and Peja Stojakovic is one of their assistant GMs. They were both successful European NBA players, earning four All-Star selections between the two of them. They know nationality is not a deciding factor on whether a player will be a bust or not — talent and work ethic are, and Doncic thrives in both those areas.

However, Kings owner Vivek Ranadive has a lot of say on the franchise’s decisions, and from the looks of it, he tends to weigh in more than he should. I wouldn’t be surprised if Ranadive doesn’t want to select Doncic because he’s European. In general, the Kings look like they have no idea who they want to draft with the second overall pick, which explains why they’re reportedly considering trading the pick for what would probably be a one-year rental on Kawhi Leonard, per Sam Amick.

Read More: Five perfect first round selections in the 2018 NBA Draft

The Kings are also considering drafting Michael Porter Jr. with the second overall selection, per Marc Stein. How can you blame them? Porter has been awesome in one-versus-zero private workouts while Doncic is trying to clinch his second championship this season in the third best league in the world. If only Doncic’s season was over, he could show teams just how awesome he is in an empty gym. The true test of NBA potential.

To be quite frank, the Kings are the only team drafting in the top-five who I want to pass on Doncic. I’m praying that Ranadive flexes his authority as owner one last time and does anything other than selecting the Slovenian youngster.

The Kings are far and away the worst possible landing spot for Doncic in the top-five. They’re actually the worst landing spot for every prospect in this draft. The franchise as a whole has no direction. Zach Randolph was their leading scorer last season and they traded the one All-NBA talent (DeMarcus Cousins) they’ve had since last making the playoffs in 2006 for Buddy Hield and a draft pick.

After Hield, the other two pieces in the Kings’ young core are De’Aaron Fox and Bogdan Bogdanovic. I like Bogdanovic, and I’m sure a lot of people like Fox, but neither of them are pieces that make you excited for the future, meaning nothing on the Kings’ current roster is tantalizing or enticing for any player, not just Doncic. But even so, Doncic is still a fit.

This isn’t because Fox, Bogdanovic and Hield are pieces that fit with Doncic per say. It’s because Doncic is the type of player who can fit anywhere. He’s malleable with every roster because he’s a 6-foot-8 point forward who can run the pick-and-roll, iso and space the floor. Saying Doncic doesn’t fit somewhere is like saying Gordon Hayward doesn’t fit somewhere. (Please don’t interpret that as me saying Doncic=Hayward already because it’s not what I’m saying. They just have a similar game.)

But while Doncic fits in Sacramento, he doesn’t fit nearly as well as he does with the other teams in the top-five. Through the first three articles in this series we’ve discussed the roster pieces each team needs to allow Doncic to thrive — shooters for spacing, an elite pick-and-roll partner, another playmaker who can space the floor off ball and versatility on the defensive end. The Kings don’t bring any of this to the table.

Spacing

The Kings have six players on their books for next season who shot 35-percent or better from deep: Zach Randolph, Skal Labissiere, Frank Mason, Garret Temple, Bogdan Bogdanovic and Buddy Hield.

Labissiere did it on less than one attempt per-game, so we don’t know if his percentage can be trusted. Randolph posted his number while leading the team in scoring and usage rate. I love Z-Bo, but when I think of a winning team, I don’t think of him leading them in usage and scoring anymore. Maybe that’s just me. Frank Mason doesn’t do anything other than shoot and probably isn’t a player you want to be giving consistent minutes to. This leaves Temple, Bogdanovic and Hield. All three are good players who could definitely fit in lineups with Doncic.

A trio of Hield-Bogdanovic-Doncic doesn’t look too bad, but it immediately slots Doncic into small-ball four. While that’s a role I’m looking forward to teams trying him in, it shouldn’t be his primary role, at least not as a rookie. And who’s the other perimeter player you’re playing with that trio? Is it Fox, who shot 30-percent from deep last season? Or is it Temple, who does space the floor but doesn’t offer much else? And if you do that, then you’ve already moved the fifth overall pick from last year’s draft into a bench role. That’s a clear indicator of bad fit.

Elite pick-and-roll partner

Whether head coach Dave Joerger went with Fox or Temple in that lineup, the five spot is still open. With Doncic playing small-ball four, the center in this lineup needs to be a solid pick-and-roll player, and the Kings don’t have that. Their likely options are Randolph and Willie Cauley-Stein.

Randolph — although he’s a solid screener — isn’t explosive as a roll man or a good passer, so he’s not a strong partner. He would also be the anchor of a Fox, Hield, Bogdanovic and Doncic lineup. Their defensive rating would be historically terrible.

If the Kings go with Cauley-Stein … well, he’s Cauley-Stein. If the Kings liked the idea of Cauley-Stein as a pick-and-roll partner and were optimistic about his future in this league as a whole then their thought process for this pick would be a lot clearer. But clearly the Kings know his future in this league isn’t as bright as they need it to be, and he’s not the ideal partner for Doncic or any pick-and-roll player for that matter. That’s why they’re stuck on whether or not they should select Doncic or one of the talented bigs in this class like Mo Bamba or Jaren Jackson Jr.

Other creators who can also shoot

The other piece teams need on the offensive end is a playmaker who can space the floor. Bogdanovic and Hield kind of fit this role, but this makes Doncic the clear cut No. 1 option in the Kings offense. This doesn’t bode well for the future of the franchise as a whole. Doncic projects to be an ideal 1B option for a team or a clear second option, with the primary option being another player who can run the offense and help avoid Doncic getting severe fatigue and sloppy with the basketball.

Fox could take the ball out of Doncic’s hands — he did lead the team in assists last season — but he isn’t a player who projects to be the No. 1 option on a good team, so you can rule him out as well. That points towards the Kings running Doncic into the ground his first couple seasons as they frantically look to add a star to their roster. With Sacramento being a trigger-happy franchise, they’d probably overpay an unthinkable amount of players throughout the search process, setting themselves up for even more losing seasons and summers where they are strapped for cap space.

Defensive versatility

Defensively, the Kings are an even worse fit for Doncic than they are offensively. The lineups we’ve discussed that gives them the best chance of maximizing his offensive talents include some mix of Bogdanovic, Hield, Temple, Fox, Cauley-Stein and Randolph. Any five man lineup you create with those seven players would probably be one of the worst in the league defensively and wouldn’t have anywhere near the offense to shoot their way out of another 50-loss season. They’d be doomed to be a lottery team for ages, continuing to develop bad habits on both sides of the ball that would only get worse and worse with each season.

Conclusion

Sacramento is clearly not a good landing spot for Doncic. A player who has known nothing but winning for the entirety of his career would be joining a franchise who has done nothing but lose for a decade-plus now. Even with the addition of Doncic, a path to relevancy still doesn’t visualize for the Kings. They don’t have any of the pieces that have helped him thrive in Europe and don’t look like they’ll have any of them in the near future either.

Next: How would Luka Doncic fit with the Hawks?

So, basketball gods, I’m praying to you now, please let Ranadive step-in one last team and do anything other than draft Doncic. This is for the betterment of the league and the sport of basketball as a whole.

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