Dorian Finney-Smith hasn’t been with the Los Angeles Lakers very long, but he gets to join a familiar face in Luka Doncic soon after the latter was traded this past weekend.
It’s been a whirlwind for the Lakers, who traded away Anthony Davis to land a superstar like Doncic that can lead them in their post-LeBron James era, a bold move for the franchise that could pay dividends for years to come.
Doncic knows Finney-Smith well from their time together in Dallas and expressed how excited he is to reunite. Finney-Smith reciprocated the love when asked what the past few days have been like for him.
“Man, these last couple days have been crazy,” Finney-Smith said after practice on Wednesday. “Getting to play a couple games with AD, a great player, All-Star, that was fun. But playing with Luka, everybody knows that’s my guy. Even though I don’t like the way things went down, I felt like he definitely should have got that money. But I’m happy on my side now.”
There was plenty of reporting regarding Dallas’ concerns with Doncic’s conditioning and weight, though Finney-Smith dismissed those issues because of the star guard’s production.
“I know him, man. He want to play the whole game. Now I think he played like 40 minutes every game last playoffs. So that’s one thing about L, he a hooper, he want to play. So I don’t really look at the noise, I look at his production and he produced. Shit, if I’m putting up them type of numbers, maybe I need to be 270.”
Incorporating Doncic while the team is humming will be an adjustment, but Finney-Smith believes he’ll make everyone’s life easier.
“We’ve been trending in the right direction, adding a guy like that, it’s gonna make it so much easier for us, especially on the offensive end. We got LD and LeBron, they’re gonna draw so much attention. It’s gonna make it real easy for guys like me, who just gotta catch and shoot and defend. So I’m definitely excited. I know Gabe gonna enjoy it, Rui, AR, so it’s gonna be fun. They’re gonna get, AR gonna probably start getting weaker defenders guarding him. They’re gonna put the main matchup on Luka and LeBron. It’s gonna be a lot of opportunity out there.”
Finney-Smith added that he thinks the Lakers roster as currently constructed can win big ,especially now that Doncic is on board.
“We got enough,” Finney-Smith said. “I feel like we got enough to make some noise. I’m excited, man. We got the shooting, we got the defense [with] Gabe, Vandy, me, and everybody else. Jaxson is playing well, so everybody’s been picking it up. We’ve been playing with a lot of juice, we just gotta keep it going.”
Finney-Smith knows better than anyone what it’s like to play alongside Doncic and it’ll be exciting to see the two play in purple and gold potentially as soon as this weekend.
Dorian Finney-Smith praises Luka Doncic’s leadership skills
The Mavericks noted they also had concerns regarding Luka Doncic’s fit with their culture and Dorian Finney-Smith once again came to his defense.
“Luka does a good job of building his own relationship with everybody in the locker room. I would say that he’s been like that since I seen him his rookie year. You could tell he had a pro approach early on and he was a pro for a long time before he got to the NBA… Everybody keeps talking about how him and LeBron may not work, but if you know Luka’s personality, he gels well with anybody. He’s a competitor. He smiles a lot but once he’s on the court, he turns into a dog and that’s what I like.”
Doncic is a ruthless competitor on the court and he should be motivated more than ever to prove doubters like Dallas wrong.
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