{"id":951493,"date":"2026-11-03T21:04:21","date_gmt":"2026-11-03T21:04:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/951493\/"},"modified":"2026-11-03T21:04:21","modified_gmt":"2026-11-03T21:04:21","slug":"visualizing-the-game-nikola-jokics-200-triple-doubles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/951493\/","title":{"rendered":"Visualizing the Game: Nikola Joki\u0107\u2019s 200 triple-doubles"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

Nikola Joki\u0107 drops 21 points, 13 rebounds & 10 assists to secure his 200th career regular-season triple-double.<\/p>\n

Last Wednesday in New Orleans, Nikola Joki\u0107 reached a milestone that only one player in NBA history has ever matched \u2014 200 career triple-doubles.<\/p>\n

After posting 21 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists to lead the Denver Nuggets to a wire-to-wire win<\/a> over the Pelicans, Joki\u0107 sits just nine triple-doubles shy of the all-time record of 209, which is held by the recently retired Russell Westbrook.<\/p>\n

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Joki\u0107 has a commanding lead on all other active players when it comes to stuffing the stat sheet. The next closest player to Joki\u0107 is LeBron James, who has 75 fewer triple-doubles while playing nearly twice as many games (1,628 to Joki\u0107\u2019s 816).<\/p>\n

When comparing Joki\u0107\u2019s climb up the triple-double mountain, his trajectory does not mimic that of any other player in the top five on the all-time list.<\/p>\n

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Westbrook started slow before forming a bell curve with the highest peak of any player (42 triple-doubles in his MVP season of 2016-17).
\nRobertson began racking up triple-doubles from Year 1, peaking in his second season before a steady decline down into single digits within five years)
\nJohnson was a consistent triple-double threat \u2014 his play helped spark use of the statistic \u2014 but he did not hit the peaks of the three players above him.
\nJames mostly resembles Johnson, with nearly twice as many years to accumulate triple-doubles, but with a lower year-to-year average<\/p>\n

For Joki\u0107, his triple-double total climbed over each of his first seven seasons, followed by a minor one-season dip, before back-to-back seasons at a career-best 34 per year.<\/p>\n

Those two seasons connected him to Robertson (1961-62) and Westbrook (four times) as the only players to average a triple-double over a full NBA season.<\/p>\n

Where Joki\u0107 strays from Robertson, Westbrook and every other member of the leaderboard, is in triple-double rate. On average, Joki\u0107 records a triple-double once in every four times he takes the court.<\/p>\n

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If we do the math, Joki\u0107\u2019s percentage of games with a triple-double comes to 24.5% (200 triple-doubles in 816 games played). Here\u2019s how the rest of the top five on the all-time list stacks up:<\/p>\n

Robertson: 17.4% (181 triple-doubles in 1,040 games)
\nWestbrook: 16.1% (209 triple-doubles in 1,301 games)
\nJohnson: 15.2% (138 triple-doubles in 906 games)
\nJames: 7.7% (125 triple-doubles in 1,628 games)<\/p>\n

So what does a triple-double from Joki\u0107 look like? He has just one triple-double in his career in which he met the minimum standard of 10s in points, rebounds and assists. In fact, in his 200 career triple-doubles, Joki\u0107 has averaged 25.8 points, 14.3 rebounds and 12.0 assists.<\/p>\n

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Over a quarter of Joki\u0107\u2019s triple-doubles have seen him score at least 30 points, including eight with at least 40 points, two above 50 and a career-best 61, which came on April 1, 2025, in an overtime loss to the Timberwolves.<\/p>\n

That game against Minnesota marked the second-highest cumulative total of points, rebounds and assists that Joki\u0107 has put together in a triple-double effort.<\/p>\n

The top mark on that list also came against the Timberwolves as Joki\u0107 put together a Christmas Day game for the ages, producing a stat line never seen in NBA history on Christmas or any other day of the year: 56 points, 16 rebounds and 15 assists in an overtime win.<\/p>\n

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To lessen Joki\u0107\u2019s impact, opponents have tried to limit his playmaking and force him to score rather than pass. The logic behind that strategy can be found in the chart below, which shows just how much Joki\u0107 triple-doubles correlate with Denver wins.<\/p>\n

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Since he entered the league in 2015, Joki\u0107 has a win percentage of .610 over his 816 career games. But look at the disparity in win percentage among the 200 games in which Joki\u0107 posts a triple-double (.770) and the other 616 games when he does not (.558).<\/p>\n

Playing in Denver for his entire career, the Nuggets are the only team Joki\u0107 has never recorded at least one triple-double against. While he has just one triple-double against the Wizards (in 19 career games), he has at least three triple-doubles against every other team in the NBA.<\/p>\n

His most frequent victims reside in the Western Conference (124 total), with his 200th triple-double coming against the team at the top of that list \u2014 the Pelicans, who have witnessed 16 Joki\u0107 triple-doubles. That is followed by a three-way tie for second place among the Wolves, Kings and Thunder. See how the rest of the league stacks up below.<\/p>\n

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