{"id":591349,"date":"2026-04-07T13:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T13:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/591349\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T13:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T13:54:15","slug":"nba-legends-back-luka-doncic-in-awards-debate-amid-controversial-rule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/591349\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA legends back Luka Doncic in awards debate amid controversial rule"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Tracy McGrady and Carmelo Anthony believe Luka Doncic should still be eligible for NBA awards, arguing that missing games for the birth of his child is a valid reason and shouldn&#8217;t be held against him.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/teams\/357-los-angeles-lakers.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> superstar <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/players\/18340-luka-doncic.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Luka Doncic<\/a> has played 64 games this season, putting up incredible numbers with a league-leading 33.5 points per game. However, he may be ineligible for major awards like MVP and All-NBA due to the NBA&#8217;s 65-game rule.<\/p>\n<p>\t\tLos Angeles Lakers \/ Schedule<\/p>\n<p>Doncic is expected to miss the remainder of the regular season as he recovers from a Grade 2 hamstring strain. He is currently in Spain, working to speed up his recovery process.<\/p>\n<p>Still, there is a glimmer of hope.<\/p>\n<p>Doncic&#8217;s agent, Bill Duffy of WME Basketball, revealed that Luka plans to file an &#8220;Extraordinary Circumstances Challenge,&#8221; a provision included in the NBA&#8217;s participation policy.<\/p>\n<p>This rule allows players to appeal if exceptional circumstances made it impractical for them to play in certain games.<\/p>\n<p>In Luka&#8217;s case, he missed two games earlier this season due to the birth of his second daughter.<\/p>\n<p>NBA legends Tracy McGrady and Carmelo Anthony <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/LukaUpdates\/status\/2040941999226757243\" rel=\"nofollow\">believe that should count in his favor<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s the birth of his child, it&#8217;s not an injury, it&#8217;s not load management,&#8221; McGrady said. <br \/>&#8220;This is the birth of his child. Where you gotta fly to another country. I&#8217;m sure the league is gonna do right by that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is the international players. If they need to get back to take care of family matters and they&#8217;re missing games, they shouldn&#8217;t be penalized for that,&#8221; Anthony added.<\/p>\n<p>While Doncic is set to miss the rest of the regular season, <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/news-244550-latest-luka-doncic-injury-update-why-he-chose-spain-for-treatment.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">he is doing everything possible to return sooner than expected<\/a> and could still be available for the first round of the playoffs.<\/p>\n<p>                                                    <a href=\"https:\/\/basketnews.com\/plus?utm_source=basketnews_com&amp;utm_medium=bn_plus&amp;utm_id=UA-259273-31&amp;utm_campaign=banners_free_content_for_not_members_bottom_3\" class=\"banners_paid_content_info_block_white banners-paid-content-info-block-white\" data-google-interstitial=\"false\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>                                                <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"bn-plus-img img-fluid\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/bn-plus.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>                                            Support BasketNews so we could make even better content.<\/p>\n<p>                                                            <\/a><\/p>\n<p>                                If you like our content, please <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=basketnews.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a> and add us as your preferred source. It helps us a lot, and we are committed to delivering you the very latest basketball news.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tracy McGrady and Carmelo Anthony believe Luka Doncic should still be eligible for NBA awards, arguing that missing&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591350,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-591349","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}