Video Of A Steph Curry And Luka Doncic Workout Shows The Rookie Honing His Killer Stepback

Offseason workouts for NBA players have become quite the business as the trainers to the stars pit their clients against each other in pickup games and carefully curate highlight videos to ensure everyone comes out of the games looking like they’re ready to play their best basketball of their career.

Social media is flooded with videos of July, August, and September gatherings of the NBA’s elite, showing the time and effort being put in the gym to get better. Not everyone’s workouts are made available for public consumption, notably the fabled workouts of Steph Curry. However, Tom Haberstroh of NBC Sports recently got footage of a workout from August that featured Curry, 2020 prospect Jalen Green, and Luka Doncic that shows the Mavs’ star rookie honing his shooting and dribbling craft next to one of the best to ever do it.

According to Haberstroh, who spoke with Curry’s trainer Brandon Payne about the workout, it was a three-hour long session in the Bay that wowed Payne and showed him the flashes of what Doncic could do. Doncic had never gone through a workout like that, and there were at times some struggles, but you can see the raw ability and natural gift Doncic has with a basketball, like in his footwork on complicated dribble-and-shoot drills.

Bill Duffy, Doncic’s agent told Haberstroh the goal was simple, to show Doncic that even the most elite players in the world like Curry take instruction.

“I wanted to show him that someone at that level can take instruction too, be corrected,” Duffy said. “Brandon is up here telling Steph, do this, don’t do that, correcting him. I think someone like Luka, was like, ‘Woah — Steph is top 2-3 players in basketball and he has someone pushing him to be the best he can be?’ To be exposed to that, was special.”

For Payne, he marveled at how quickly Doncic was able to pick up on things, calling him a “basketball savant,” as he was put through every drill Curry was doing that was planned and curated before Luka was added to the mix. He also noted that Curry did something rare with Doncic, being a fellow pro, in that he took on a bit of a mentorship role — something typically reserved just for prospects and campers that get the chance to work with him.

In the video you can see Doncic dialing in his stepback jumper that has become his trademarked move in his rookie season, and given another full offseason of work — without needing to take significant time off due to a EuroLeague competition — he figures to only add more tricks to his bag.