About supernova Doncic, what little-known secrets does he have?

Before Doncic came to the NBA, he began to travel halfway around the world to study his biomechanics. Now he is the league's star rookie and a representative figure in the NBA data era.

Marcus Elliott is a doctor who founded a sports science company. Elliott freely admits that he doesn’t watch sports very much, but in the weeks before the NBA draft the year before last, he learned about the league’s 30 teams. Things you don’t know. He has secret information about the best young basketball player in the world. Doncic is still a little-known Slovenian boy, and he has only played a few games in Real Madrid. At that time, he began to fly halfway around the world and came to Peak Performance Project, which is more familiar to everyone, P3, and spent his summer. He's here because Elliott's gym is at the forefront of collecting biomechanical measurements that accurately detail how professional athletes work. And his time in P3 produced so much useful information that a team with a lottery pick in last year's draft proposed that it pay a premium for Elliott's intelligence.

He turned down the offer, but it probably wouldn't be the last. Doncic is now the face of a new generation in the NBA, and the reasons for his success began long before his dazzling rookie season. He is among the talents that have poured into the league and have already had a deeper understanding of their own economic value, that is, they understand their own bodies.

P3’s headquarters is located in an unassuming building at the end of a quiet street that houses a surf shop, art gallery and beer shop. Doncic, who just turned 21 last month, has had a long journey here. At the beginning of each trip, he undergoes a series of tests that break down his physical fitness, injury risk and biomechanical habits, and he comes away knowing more about himself than most NBA veterans.

Doncic is not like the experienced basketball players around him. With his baby face and blond hair, he looks more like a surfer on his way to the beach. But the bigger difference between Doncic and those old players is that they discovered P3 only after entering the NBA, not when. The star rookie learned during his journey here that he can't jump high and doesn't have great sideways speed. But he does have a hidden athleticism that explains his unstoppable moves. It turns out that Doncic is a younger version of James Harden.

Among NBA players, Harden ranks in the top 1 in an indicator called "centrifugal force". Centrifugal force means that Harden's deceleration speed is the fastest in the league. Doncic is in the top 8, not far behind him. The same thing is that they also use their own talents to improve their playing methods. The shooting method that best benefits from their lower body strength is the step-back three-pointer, and Harden and Doncic rank first and second respectively in step-back three-pointers this season. It's going to be difficult to figure out how they take so many difficult shots. But that's also why they visit P3: to make the intangible more tangible.

Although he scored many breathtaking dunks in training, the most surprising thing about Doncic's first visit to P3 was how he arranged himself in P3. Appear. Doncic used his special status to do just that: He was already a professional basketball player before he entered the draft, so he didn't need to bother with those rules to maintain his college eligibility. Doncic's job at Real Madrid brought him a good salary to cover the thousands of dollars in P3 evaluation fees, and his agent also helped him arrange travel away from home.

There will be more players participating in the NBA Draft with the same amount of information.

P3 has an agreement with the NBA to evaluate young players in a joint lab during the draft, and Elliott's team began collecting players like Duke freshmen Zion Williamson and R.J. Barre a few years ago. data on college stars like Te, trying to track players early in their careers. These data can also become a powerful weapon in the hands of players. For example, Chicago Bulls guard Zach LaVine encountered the injury that a player whose main focus is on explosiveness least wants to encounter: a torn cruciate ligament.

Fortunately, he had already left some basic data in P3 before the injury, so LaVine does not need to wait until he fully recovers to know how well he can play. All he needs to do is look at the data. . His agent even cited P3's data as a bargaining chip in contract negotiations, and these data won him an $80 million contract. When this data becomes unique, it will inevitably raise concerns about privacy, but Elliott insists that only players have access to their data and he understands the importance of protecting it.

Before the Mavericks drafted Doncic, his statistics were still a mystery to the team. Obviously, the Lone Ranger won this bet. Only three rookies in NBA history have averaged 20 points, 5.5 rebounds and 5 assists per game. They are Oscar Robertson, Michael Jordan and LeBron James, and the fourth is Luka Doncic.

Doncic won the European Championship with the Slovenian national team and the European League Championship with Real Madrid. The Mavericks already have a full understanding of his scouting report and are very confident that he is a Good choice. But no one, including the top management of the Mavericks, expected him to perform like this as soon as he came on the court. But people who know him from P3 are not surprised because they saw this earlier than anyone else. He has been on this road for a long time. Bucks guard Korver, who has been training with Doncic since the beginning, said that he was born for basketball.

The age difference between Korver and Doncic is a bit different, but they formed an indissoluble bond because of P3. Korver went to P3 to extend his NBA career, while Doncic went to P3 before he had an NBA career. Doncic won't need to use his imagination to imagine his future, he'll be able to trace his development through his numbers. He was one of the first players whose basketball careers were quantified. One afternoon, P3 employees gathered around the computer screen of Eric Leidersdorf, the lab's director of biomechanics. He clicked on Doncic's file and opened the standing high jump video.