{"id":180008,"date":"2025-09-25T03:50:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T03:50:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/180008\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T03:50:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T03:50:07","slug":"slovenia-teammate-says-luka-doncic-has-improved-in-one-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/180008\/","title":{"rendered":"Slovenia teammate says Luka Doncic has improved in one area"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the first time since he came to the Los Angeles Lakers<\/a> in 2018, LeBron James is not the cornerstone of the franchise. That unofficial title now belongs to Luka Doncic, the 26-year-old generational superstar whom the team acquired in that blockbuster early February trade.<\/p>\n

Although Doncic put up his usual monster numbers with the Lakers through the rest of last season, he was fat, out of shape and a bit hobbled. He had been dogged by criticism for his lack of fitness and conditioning, but he dropped a considerable amount of weight and is now in fantastic shape.<\/p>\n

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With the start of training camp for the Lakers less than a week away, the team will lean on Doncic not only for on-court production but also for some leadership. Leadership is an area in which the superstar has improved, according to Edo Muri\u0107, one of his teammates on the Slovenian national team.<\/p>\n

Via The Athletic<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery year, he\u2019s more vocal and even more patient with the players because he\u2019s coming from a different level than we are,\u201d Muri\u0107 said. \u201cAnd sometimes (the mistakes), it\u2019s not acceptable for him. Maybe he used to expect too much from us because he comes from another world that we come from, you know?<\/p>\n

\u201cBut now as he\u2019s maturing as he\u2019s older, he gets that. And he\u2019s giving us more and more trust.\u201d<\/p>\n

Doncic has admitted that he needs to be more of a leader at this point in his career.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, it was probably just something I need to do \u2014 especially since I\u2019ve seen a lot of basketball now,\u201d Don\u010di\u0107 said. \u201cSo I\u2019ve been through a lot \u2014 so it was kind of something like, I need to do this to help, to help others.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also admitted that being a leader also means telling others what they need but don’t want to hear.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Being a leader), sometimes it\u2019s comfortable, sometimes not,\u201d he said. \u201cSometimes it\u2019s great to be a leader and sometimes you have to say things that you don\u2019t want to, but that\u2019s part of being a leader.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Lakers have a roster that may be able to contend in the Western Conference if several things go their way. If that happens, perhaps this new and improved version of Doncic can fill in the blanks, as he has proven in the past that he’s the rare superstar who will elevate his team above the sum of its parts when it matters most.<\/p>\n

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This article originally appeared on LeBron Wire: Slovenia teammate says Luka Doncic has improved in one area<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the first time since he came to the Los Angeles Lakers in 2018, LeBron James is not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":180009,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[3013,1055,3014,355,99],"class_list":["post-180008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-lebron-james","tag-los-angeles-lakers","tag-luka-doncic","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180008\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180009"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}