Luka Doncic vs. Giannis Antetokounmpo

This season’s NBA All-Star voting will be mainly divided between “Slovenia Wonderboy” Luka Doncic of the Dallas Mavericks and “Greek Freak” Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks.

According to the interim voting results released by the National Basketball Association (NBA) on Friday, Doncic has won 1,073,957 votes placing himself in the No. 1 position, narrowly followed by Antetokounmpo with 1,073,358 votes. As the difference between the two candidates for this regular season’s MVP is only 599 votes, a fierce competition is expected until the very last day of voting on January 20 (local time).

Doncic had recorded more than 20 points, five assists, and five rebounds for 20 games in a row in December 2019, which surpasses legendary basketball player Michael Jordan’s records in the 1988-89 season. The Slovenia-born player who can aptly play as a point guard and a power forward has shown skills far exceeding his short experience of less than two years in NBA, presenting himself as the next-generation superstar.

Antetokounmpo who was the winner of the MVP award last year has been leading his team, the Milwaukee Bucks, to the highest winning percentage – 31 wins and five losses – of the season by recording the second-highest scores (30.4 points) and the sixth-highest rebounds (13).

According to the prediction by basketball statistics site Basketball-Reference.com as of Friday, Antetokounmpo has the highest probability to win the MVP award at 42.6 percent, followed by James Harden at 31.8 percent and LeBron James at 9.1 percent. This season, the Greek Freak has been showing even more mature play by improving his three-point percentage from 25.6 percent to 33.1 percent.


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