With the Lakers acquiring Luka Dončić to carry the franchise forward, how will he slot alongside a highly productive LeBron James?
Luka Dončić has finished in the top eight in Kia MVP voting in each of the last five seasons, and he’s only 25 years old.
Players like that don’t get traded. But on Sunday, Dončić was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, joining LeBron James and becoming the latest future Hall of Famer to wear the purple and gold.
Here are some numbers to know about the Slovenian superstar …
All stats are through Feb. 9, 2025.
1. Dončić is third all-time in points per game, averaging 28.6 points over his 422 career regular-season games. He’s one of nine players (six of them active) with multiple games of 60-plus points, with his 73 points in Atlanta last January tied for the fourth most ever scored in a game.
2. His 33.9 points per game last season was the sixth-highest scoring average for any player in the last 50 years.
3. He’s second all-time in playoff points per game at 30.9 over 50 career playoff games. He has eight playoff games of 40 points or more, including 42 in his playoff debut in 2020.
4. Dončić (27.6, 8.6 and 8.0) is the only player in NBA history who’s averaged at least 25 points, eight rebounds and eight assists throughout his career. LeBron James and Oscar Robertson are the only other players who’ve averaged at least 25, six and six.
5. He ranks seventh all-time with 80 career triple-doubles. Only Nikola Jokić (137) and Russell Westbrook (98) have had more over Dončić’s seven seasons in the NBA.
6. Dončić has accounted for 48.8 points per game via his points (27.6) and assists (20.1), the highest career average for any player in the 29 seasons of play-by-play data. His average of 57.2 per game last season is the highest single-season mark in that time.
7. His 3.6 assists per game on 3-pointers is also the most for any player in the 29 seasons for which we have play-by-play data. Over the last 3 1/2 seasons, Mavs teammates shot 38.2% from 3-point range off his passes (according to Second Spectrum tracking) and 36.1% otherwise.
8. Dončić’s usage rate of 31.9% ranks seventh among players who’ve played at least 500 minutes this season and is his lowest rate since his rookie year. He ranked in the top three in each of the last five seasons.
9. His time of possession (6.3 minutes per game) ranks 12th and has been the lowest rate of his career. He had led the league in 2020-21, ’21-22 and ’22-23, and his 12.1 minutes of possession in the 2021 playoffs is the highest mark in the 11 postseasons for which we’ve had tracking data.
10. He’s been assisted on 34.7% of his field goals this season, the ninth lowest rate among 236 players with at least 100 made field goals, but by far the highest rate of his career. His rate over the previous five seasons (17.0%) was less than half that.
11. Over the last two seasons (2023-24 and ’24-25), Dončić has taken just 37% of his shots in the paint, down from 47% through his first five years in the league.
12. His true shooting percentage of 61.7% last season was the highest mark of his career, with the key being a career-best mark (by a wide margin) from 3-point range (38.2%). He made 54 more pull-up 3-pointers (221) than any other player.
13. Dončić has averaged 3.4 deflections per 36 minutes, a rate which ranks 43rd among 298 players who’ve played at least 500 minutes and is the highest rate of his career by a healthy margin.
14. Opponents have shot 45.4% on shots Dončić has defended, with the expected field goal percentage on those shots being 46.2%. That’s the best differential in his career and just the second time in his seven seasons that opponents have shot worse than expected on shots he’s defended.
15. Over his career (including the postseason), Dončić has shot just 58-for-219 (26.5%) on clutch 3-pointers. That ranks 217th among 239 players with at least 100 clutch 3-point attempts over the 29 seasons for which we have play-by-play data.
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John Schuhmann is a senior stats analyst for NBA.com. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on X.
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