{"id":603591,"date":"2026-02-14T23:38:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T23:38:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/603591\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T23:38:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T23:38:20","slug":"lakers-luka-doncic-hopefull-hell-play-in-nba-all-star-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/603591\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers’ Luka Doncic hopefull he’ll play in NBA All-Star Game"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Lakers star Luka Doncic<\/a> missed their last four games because of a strained left hamstring, but he has plans on playing the NBA All-Star Game<\/a> tournament on Sunday at the Intuit Dome.<\/p>\n

Doncic, who was injured when the Lakers<\/a> played the Philadelphia 76ers 1\u00bd weeks ago, worked out before L.A. played the Dallas Mavericks on Thursday at Crypto.com Arena and has played some five-on-five recently.<\/p>\n

Doncic was the leading vote-getter for the All-Star Game, which will be his sixth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel pretty good,\u201d Doncic said Saturday during his media season. \u201cYou know, I\u2019ve been working to get back. Obviously [I] wanted to play the last game, but it wasn\u2019t possible. I was almost there, so I think I\u2019ll play a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

His Lakers teammate, LeBron James<\/a>, was selected as a Western Conference reserve by the coaches, his first time in 21 years not being chosen a starter. James, who didn\u2019t attend the media sessions on Saturday but will talk before the game Sunday, extended his NBA record All-Star selections to 22 in a row.<\/p>\n

Doncic, who will play for Team World, was jokingly asked that if he does play will he try to dunk on James, who will be on Team USA Stripes.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, I will not try to dunk on LeBron,\u201d Doncic said, smiling.<\/p>\n

This will be Doncic\u2019s first time representing the Lakers as an All-Star. His other five came when he played for the Dallas Mavericks, who traded Doncic to the Lakers last February for Anthony Davis.<\/p>\n

Doncic was asked about his emotions.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery All-Star, just blessed,\u201d he said. \u201c I\u2019m going to look back at it. I\u2019m a six-time All-Star now, and not everybody can say they\u2019re an All-Star. So just take everything into the moment and enjoy this.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the NBA coaches selected the All-Star reserves, Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard<\/a> was not chosen despite playing some of the best basketball of his career.<\/p>\n

But NBA commissioner Adam Silver added Leonard to the roster, allowing him to play in his seventh All-Star Game that will be played in his home arena.<\/p>\n

Leonard was asked at his media session on Saturday if not being selected at first was because of his role in the NBA\u2019s investigation of the Clippers and owner Steve Ballmer from allegations that the team circumvented the salary cap<\/a> by paying Leonard under the table through an endorsement deal with a companyAspiration.<\/p>\n

\"Clippers <\/p>\n

Clippers star Kawhi Leonard talks to reporters during the NBA All-Star Game media day. He\u2019ll be appearing in his seventh All-Star game on Sunday at Intuit Dome.<\/p>\n

(Jae C. Hong \/ Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Aspiration, which has since filed for bankruptcy, agreed to pay Leonard $28 million over four years. The Clippers have denied the allegations.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not sure,\u201d said Leonard, who is eighth in the NBA in scoring at 27.9 points a game. \u201cI don\u2019t think Adam Silver would let something like that play into how a player is playing on the court, especially me. I\u2019m not doing anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

The NBA has a new format for the All-Star Game, \u201cU.S. vs. the \u201cWorld.\u201d It will be a round-robin tournament with four 12-minute games.<\/p>\n

There are two U.S. teams. Leonard will be on the USA Stripes with some of the veterans like James and Kevin Durant.<\/p>\n

Leonard was asked about his view of the new format.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t say I hate it or I love it, cause I really don\u2019t know what the situation is,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cI know it\u2019s three teams and is it like a pick-up game where we wait until somebody scores? But I\u2019d rather it just be East and West and just go out there and compete and see what the outcome is. I don\u2019t think no format can make you compete\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

With Stephen Curry, James and Durant near the end of their careers, Durant was asked why the NBA saw the need to make improvements to the All-Star games.<\/p>\n

Fans and media have complained because they say the players don\u2019t play hard enough and don\u2019t seem to care.<\/p>\n

Durant was asked to share his thoughts on the All-Star Game.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just feel like fans and media need something to complain about, and the All-Star Game don\u2019t make them feel like they felt when they were kids,\u201d Durant said. \u201cThey need something to complain about. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s that big of a deal, to be honest \u2014 the All-Star Game, All-Star weekend. Just here to celebrate the game of basketball.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople [are] still coming to celebrate the game of basketball. They\u2019re coming to watch. People at home are complaining about the game and the intensity of it. I don\u2019t think we\u2019ll ever get past that, but to see everybody still here, showing up, doing their jobs, pushing the game forward through this weekend, you go around the city, it\u2019s so much energy in the city, so many past greats. \u2026 I just think it\u2019s way bigger than that this weekend. We can talk about who plays harder or the U.S. team versus the World.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lakers star Luka Doncic missed their last four games because of a strained left hamstring, but he has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":603592,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3790],"tags":[31909,7,8437,559,509,80484,529,938,4034,1698,300,4044,185,251,150,4033,4043,80482,80483,6,7218,80485,1163,17654],"class_list":{"0":"post-603591","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-lakers","8":"tag-all-star-weekend","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-career","11":"tag-clippers","12":"tag-doncic","13":"tag-good-basketball","14":"tag-kawhi-leonard","15":"tag-kevin-durant","16":"tag-la","17":"tag-la-lakers","18":"tag-lakers","19":"tag-lalakers","20":"tag-lebron-james","21":"tag-los-angeles","22":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","23":"tag-losangeles","24":"tag-losangeleslakers","25":"tag-luka-doncic-hopefull","26":"tag-medium-season","27":"tag-nba","28":"tag-nba-all-star-game","29":"tag-new-format","30":"tag-saturday","31":"tag-team-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116071623840526553","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=603591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/603592"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=603591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=603591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=603591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}