The Step Back Composite NBA Draft Big Board: The best 30 draft prospects of the 2010s

No. 3 overall pick, Atlanta Hawks, 2018

The case for Luka Doncic over Wall: Doncic’s size and decision-making elevate his other skills, many of which Wall had an advantage in. Big wing initiators are the gold standard for team-building today, because they allow you to play bigger lineups, have better versatility on defense, and it’s that much more difficult to defend the point of attack because you have the added threats of the bigger player shooting over the top of you, seeing over the defender to make reads, and getting bumped off their spot less frequently. Doncic is the best wing initiator prospect of the decade, and you could see how his added size would help his skills translate to the NBA during his time in Euroleague.

Doncic was also the most skilled prospect of the cohort, which has helped him overcome his physical limitations with ease. The main reasons Doncic wasn’t drafted first overall were mostly due to his sub-elite burst, agility and vertical pop, but he compensates for those things with skills that are much more functional than those raw traits. He’s the most advanced decision-maker that has probably ever come in to the league, and the threat of his passing opens up a ton of extra space for him. He’s also a well-polished finisher, able to absorb contact on the level of Dwyane Wade and Kyle Lowry and keep getting to the line.

Add in the advancements that were sure to come with how fluid his jumper mechanics off the bounce were in Spain, and there was not much question that Doncic had a nearly limitless offensive ceiling, even if he wasn’t built like a cyborg. Doncic was passed on because he had physical limitations, but he certainly met the thresholds necessary to play in the NBA, and his skill play was so hilariously dominant that to not see how he could impact the league with it was a failure of many members of the NBA scouting apparatus.