Nikola Jokić's Genius Playmaking: Earning Assists Without Passing? | 2023-24 NBA Film Study

What's up, way up sportsmen? It's Lamont. We are back. Another podcast video. Another NBA film study breakdown. And today we got some content on Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets. And I've been having a lot of conversations about Nikola Jokic. I've talked about how underrated he's been defensively, but since they've won a championship, there's been this odd narrative that the success of the Denver Nuggets is all contingent upon this great duo in Denver and the non-all-star, non-NBA player Jamal Murray and the superstar two-time MVP, Finals MVP, Nikola Jokic. I'm going to show you guys a play that clearly details Nikola Jokic's mastery of the game and why this man is solely responsible for the Denver Nuggets success and why a lot of the guys surrounding him are only having success because of Nikola Jokic's direction, high IQ, and attention to detail. Let me go ahead and pull the film up. Okay. So we have a play right here. Obviously, as we know, the Miami Heat being undersized against this Denver Nugget team, they ran a ton of zone looks and zone reads. And so as we progress through this, I want you guys to watch. I want you guys to identify how Denver is guarding the Denver. I mean, how Miami is guarding the Denver Nuggets. And then we're going to detail the mastery of Nikola Jokic and why they were able to dominate the Miami Heat. So we're going to play through this right here. Obviously, there's a pick and roll right here. We see the screen by Jokic, but what are the Miami Heat doing off of that screen? They're blitzing the ball handler, which is a very common strategy, especially when you're dealing with a player who's not an elite passer. And then when you know you got sharks in those passing lanes, if he throws it, Eric passes going the other way. So they're blitzing Jamal Murray. Now, this play was actually blown dead because of a defensive three-second call. But what we're going to see is we're going to see Jokic. He's yelling over to Aaron Gordon. I need you to cut to the basket. I need you to flash. He's yelling at him. He's telling him what to do because he sees a breakdown in the zone that he can exploit as they are trying to blitz this screen. So again, they're running it again. Jokic is going to screen the top of the zone. Obviously, Jokic rolls out. Murray throws the pass to the weak side, which is what you're supposed to do in the zone. In the zone, you need to reverse the ball. You need to get that zone to shift. Jokic, he does his job. Jokic flashes middle. A lot of people say the way you defeat the zone is by getting to the middle of the zone. But this is a particular play where Jokic actually got an assist without even touching the ball. And I'm going to show you why he's responsible for what you guys are about to see. Jokic flashes to the middle. But as he flashes to the middle, look at him. He's pointing to the guard. His back is turned. He doesn't even know what's going on behind him. The only thing that he knows is that I told my teammate to flash and cut to the basket. I'm going to handle the rest. This is not high level. This was not a high level play by the guard out there. Jokic is telling him just throw it. He's going to be there. Just throw it. What does he do? With Jokic eyes behind his head, he throws the lob. Aaron Gordon gets the dunk at the rim, all at the direction of Nikola Jokic. This is how you get an assist without even touching the basketball. Now, obviously, on the stat sheet, he didn't get an assist. But it's just very odd to me how people, in this particular instance, are trying to take away from Nikola Jokic's greatness. And they're trying to split the success of the Denver Nuggets with Jamal Murray. Now look, Jamal Murray had a great run in the playoffs. He's a great young talent. But at the end of the day, I can't say a guy who's not an all-star, who's not an all-level, all-NBA player on any side of the basketball, offensively or defensively, cannot be the other half of what a lot of people are claiming to be the best duo in the NBA. A few good rounds in the playoffs don't equate to you being the other half of a great duo on a championship team. It takes a lot more than that. And as we saw right there, this was not Jamal Murray or any of the players on that team breaking that Miami Heat zone down. This is a Miami Heat zone that the Boston Celtics couldn't figure out, that a lot of the elite teams in the East could not figure out. Nikola Jokic, coming from international play, where he saw a lot of these zones, understood how to break it. And he's out there directing traffic, telling guys where to pass it and who to pass it to without even touching the ball. But again, as I tell you guys, these are things that a lot of the haters, a lot of the people that like to throw out narratives, don't watch, nor will they tell you about these things, but they will push narratives. A lot of people are just looking at the end result of a lot of these plays. Yes, Aaron Gordon had a lot of success in the NBA finals, but Nikola Jokic had a lot to do with his individual success. The same with Jamal Murray. Jamal Murray offensively, who was the end result, the recipient of a lot of these high IQ Nikola Jokic plays, he was the recipient of all these things. And he was blessed to be able to go finish a ton of easy shots and get a lot of high quality looks off due to the extremely high IQ of none other than Nikola Jokic. So again, let's stop trying to take away from these players what they do great and try to split their successes with others because you don't necessarily understand the game. Over here at FYF Sports, we actually do real research and then we showed a video to support it. Can you guys do that? But look, you guys, it's FYF Sports, man. It's been another great podcast episode. We got more film study to come, so you guys need to stay tuned. We're going to be dropping gems daily on this channel. But it's FYF Sports, man, another great podcast episode. We're going to be back with more sports news and breakdowns. But until then, it's FYF Sports, and we out. Transcribed by https://otter.ai