DALLAS — Jason Kidd offered an impassioned defense of his star player, claiming the media has gone too far with its “personal attacks” on Luka Doncic.
“This is a free country. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. But sometimes people take it a little too far. If you put yourself in their shoes, would you be able to stand a barbecue?,” Kidd said. “Sometimes you want to fry someone, but if it was the other way around and you were being fried, would you want that? Probably not.
“That’s the nature of this business.
“But this young man has done nothing for anybody except the game of basketball. And when he was asked a question, he never ran away. He has answered it. And he’s 25 years old. What disappoints me more is that we want to criticize him for not doing well when he’s on the biggest stage, one of the best players in the world playing the game the right way. But if he does well, we want to come back and talk to him, but if he says, ‘No, I’ll pass,’ then what happens?”
“I think sometimes it’s unfair or unjust to say those things. Nobody in this room is perfect.”
Kidd didn’t address any specific critics or members of the media when asked, but did mention “free agents in the media industry” looking for “new contracts, likes and clicks.”
Doncic’s defensive struggles became the hottest topic on network sports programming, with conversation turning to the 25-year-old’s defensive struggles, his conditioning, whining about the officiating and whether he’s a superstar.
“Sports isn’t about being perfect, it’s about winning,” Kidd said. “If you look at the results the last few days, if you’ve watched the Mavs games, you’ve seen Luka’s defense improve, but we, or some of us, are asking him to be a shutdown defender.
“Well, he’s never been selected to the All-Defensive Team, but he’s been selected to the All-Pro Team, the First Team five times. So that means he’s one of the top five players in the world and he plays the right way to find the open guy. But when you get to the biggest stage, somebody’s got to fill the hole.”
Doncic entered Game 4 on Friday trailing 0-3 but averaged nearly 30 points, nine rebounds and six assists per game.
He also said he has been battling multiple injuries and receives painkiller injections before matches.
But Game 3 was the worst game.
He again struggled defensively, got into an argument with an official and fouled out with about four minutes left.
Then the Mavericks lost in the closing stages.
Kidd believes this “aggression” will only make Doncic better.
“LeBron, Michael, all the greats, the GOATs, they’ve taken a hit and come back stronger, better,” Kidd, a Hall of Famer, said.
On Thursday, one day after his Game 3 fiasco, Doncic acknowledged he needed to approach the officiating differently.
“I just want to win. Sometimes I don’t show it the right way, but at the end of the day I want to win,” he said. “I just have to show it differently and better.”
