How strong is Nikola Jokic?

[elementally morale]

At first he doesn't look strong at all. He is tall. Kinda big. 290 pounds, okay, that's a lot. But he looks like a pedestrian 7 foot fan out there.

On the other hand, other centers and power forwards just bounce off him. He seems to be able to bully everyone in the paint, even Giannis and Embiid (who do look strong). Steven Adams, too, and he looks to be very strong. And Jokic doesn't just do it with his lower body but upper as well. many times he is strong enough to play through heavy contact and still finish ot at least take a shot be it 2 or 12 feet from the rim.

So this is a question I have no answer to.

How strong do you think Jokic is? Which tier does he belong?

[FultzNationRISE]

They dont call him Thickola SoThicć for nothin ;)

[elementally morale]

They dont call him Thickola SoThicć for nothin ;)

He doesn't look like someone who would excel in bench press or anything gym related. Sure, I've seen some strongman competitions when marshmellow looking guys proved to be very strong. In armwrestling, too, many a times the more muscular guy is just weaker. But I'm not sure about Jokic. I think his shoulders are broader than Embiid's and Giannis' which is strange. Ican't put my finger on his real strength level though. Looks weak yet bodies everyone. And when he uses his hand (he often does) he looks very strong. All that without any muscle definition.

[Im Still Ballin]

He's got that farm boy strength. He's built like those big linemen from the Midwest.

[tontoz]

Jokic has a couple of hardcore brothers. One of them is a MMA fighter.

[elementally morale]

Jokic has a couple of hardcore brothers. One of them is a MMA fighter.

Yeah, I know. He is not his brother though. ;)

I guess he is very strong but there is absolutely no visible sign of that strength. In a way that's also true for his speed. He looks slow. But somehow manages to get up and down and his first step is very very fast. He looks weak and unathletic. Like a big fatty that has nothing to do with sports.

Onto some other question: who do you think is stronger? Embiid or Giannis? Giannis or Jokic? Adams or? I really don't know.

[tontoz]

Yeah, I know. He is not his brother though. ;)

I guess he is very strong but there is absolutely no visible sign of that strength. In a way that's also true for his speed. He looks slow. But somehow manages to get up and down and his first step is very very fast. He looks weak and unathletic. Like a big fatty that has nothing to do with sports.

Onto some other question: who do you think is stronger? Embiid or Giannis? Giannis or Jokic? Adams or? I really don't know.


The players say Adams is the strongest guy in the league, by a lot.

Bird was similar to Jokic he didn't look to have any muscle definition at all but bullied other players routinely.

[FultzNationRISE]

Yeah, I know. He is not his brother though. ;)

I guess he is very strong but there is absolutely no visible sign of that strength. In a way that's also true for his speed. He looks slow. But somehow manages to get up and down and his first step is very very fast. He looks weak and unathletic. Like a big fatty that has nothing to do with sports.

Onto some other question: who do you think is stronger? Embiid or Giannis? Giannis or Jokic? Adams or? I really don't know.

Muscle definition doesnt really determine the kind of upright leverage you have. Duncan didnt look shredded and he had great leverage. Things like bone density and overall mass are more important than how much you bench. If you have slim hips and modest bone density, big gunz arent gonna keep you from getting bumped off a spot. The girth has to come from your body, or in Lebron’s case, his *****.

Jokic is a polar bear. Most opponents just dont have the mass to bang with him, doesnt matter if they look cut and bench pressy.

[iamgine]

Jokic most likely has average raw strength for NBA player with his body type (which is already stronger than 90% of the league) and he knows how to use his massive body. You don't need much strength if you have mass and knows how to use it.

[elementally morale]

The players say Adams is the strongest guy in the league, by a lot.

Yes, I can totally believe that. He looks to be very strong. So then: Embiid or Jokic or Giannis?



Bird was similar to Jokic he didn't look to have any muscle definition at all but bullied other players routinely.

Good example. What kind of strength do you need to do that? I'm 6'1 and played organized basketball for 10+ years. But I didn't need strength as I was a PG/SG. Then as an adult I went to practice krav maga any muay thai. I guess I'm not weak for my size (220 pounds) but not being a 7 foot 300 pound guy I don't have much experience when it comes to this kind of strength.

[tpols]

He doesnt have the huge forearms or biceps which are the "show" muscles people typically associate with strength.

Kblaze posted a thread before showing how his upper side delt areas are always scratched up. That's because that's where jokic strength lays. In his shoulders, torso, and hips. That's where his power lies. And when guys get banged they claw at that area.

[highwhey]

well does it really matter? bc he only seems to want to get in a fight with much smaller players. dude's a bitch, lmk when he tries the same shit on embiid or adams. newsflash, the fatboi won't bc he's an emotional bitch that would get decked by someone his size.

[elementally morale]

Muscle definition doesnt really determine the kind of upright leverage you have. Duncan didnt look shredded and he had great leverage. Things like bone density and overall mass are more important than how much you bench. If you have slim hips and modest bone density, big gunz arent gonna keep you from getting bumped off a spot. The girth has to come from your body, or in Lebron’s case, his *****.

Jokic is a polar bear. Most opponents just dont have the mass to bang with him, doesnt matter if they look cut and bench pressy.


I totally agree with that. Still strange. Recently I started watching armwrestling. It's a very technical sport. I was just stunned when saw some matches won by seemingly much weaker guys. The last was Genadi Kvikvinia vs. Devon Laratt like a week ago.

And yes, I undestand the mass and momentum kinda thing and as momentum involves mass times velocity squared speed is also an important part. It still amazes me. You can work on your strength. Jokic doesn't look like someone spending much time in the gym though.

[tontoz]

well does it really matter? bc he only seems to want to get in a fight with much smaller players. dude's a bitch, lmk when he tries the same shit on embiid or adams. newsflash, the fatboi won't bc he's an emotional bitch that would get decked by someone his size.


There aren't many guys his size in the league.

[imdaman99]

Got that Tyson Fury type strength.

[elementally morale]

well does it really matter? bc he only seems to want to get in a fight with much smaller players. dude's a bitch, lmk when he tries the same shit on embiid or adams. newsflash, the fatboi won't bc he's an emotional bitch that would get decked by someone his size.

No, it doesn't really matter. I was just curious and asked for other opinions. BTW I'm not sure Jokic isn't stronger than Embiid. He doesn't seem to be stronger at first... I'm still not sure.

[elementally morale]

Got that Tyson Fury type strength.

Another great example. :cheers:

[highwhey]

There aren't many guys his size in the league.

sure. but he seems to go off on smaller players only. never once seen him make eye contact with embiid or adams, he knows the moment he tries his bullying on them, it will not end well for tubs.

[highwhey]

No, it doesn't really matter. I was just curious and asked for other opinions. BTW I'm not sure Jokic isn't stronger than Embiid. He doesn't seem to be stronger at first... I'm still not sure.

well, he's big and knows how to properly leverage his weight on you, so in that sense he's really strong because trying to hold up 340lbs isn't easy...but he's extremely slow compared to athletic bigs. he looks like he has the meat sweats all the time.

[tontoz]

sure. but he seems to go off on smaller players only. never once seen him make eye contact with embiid or adams, he knows the moment he tries his bullying on them, it will not end well for tubs.


I have seen him play embiid and those two seem to be on good terms. Adams is a pretty mellow guy he doesn't really get mad. The only time he starts flexing is to protect a teammate.

[elementally morale]

well, he's big and knows how to properly leverage his weight on you, so in that sense he's really strong because trying to hold up 340lbs isn't easy...but he's extremely slow compared to athletic bigs. he looks like he has the meat sweats all the time.

I agree with you he looks like that. But he still manages to run with his teammates. It's not like he is left behind every possession. So he is surprisingly fast compared to the way he looks. And his first two steps are very quick. So while I agree he doesn't seem strong or fast he just somehow always gets there. I'm oftentimes surprised he is but he is.

[highwhey]

I agree with you he looks like that. But he still manages to run with his teammates. It's not like he is left behind every possession. So he is surprisingly fast compared to the way he looks. And his first two steps are very quick. So while I agree he doesn't seem strong or fast he just somehow always gets there. I'm oftentimes surprised he is but he is.

he has some sneaky athelticism for sure. he's not like shaq was in 2007 where every possesion he was left behind by the rest of the team running back to offense lol. but the suns did expose the nuggets in those 2 games where they ran a higher paced offense, jokic isn't going to keep up with that...luckily for him he plays at such a high altitude that homecourt he always has an advantage. but yeah, he spins pretty quickly for being that big and can still catch people offguard. i expect his game to age well bc he's not relying on explosiveness.

[elementally morale]

he has some sneaky athelticism for sure. he's not like shaq was in 2007 where every possesion he was left behind by the rest of the team running back to offense lol. but the suns did expose the nuggets in those 2 games where they ran a higher paced offense, jokic isn't going to keep up with that...luckily for him he plays at such a high altitude that homecourt he always has an advantage. but yeah, he spins pretty quickly for being that big and can still catch people offguard. i expect his game to age well bc he's not relying on explosiveness.

He sure can't run with Booker. But how many big men in history could've done so? Wilt and David Robinson come to mind first... LeBron as well if you count him as a big. Giannis... maybe. I guess Embiid could run but he just won't. Not on offense which is strange... the guy runs faster on defense. Agree with you Jokic has this level of basketball in him for like 10 years. His game can't really age or not fast. And the way he plays he is not an injury waiting to happen. BTW his relative health at his size is also a rarity. I guess he is just built different than most of us.

[Atlantis]

He's stronger than anyone not named Shaquille O'Neal.

[Micku]

Muscle mass and strength aren't the same thing. There are some videos where people have a lot of muscle mass, but a person who isn't as big as them could lift more.

Jokic had some videos where it showed him training and such. He's pretty strong. Idk how strong tho.

[Carbine]

Yeah, I know. He is not his brother though. ;)

I guess he is very strong but there is absolutely no visible sign of that strength. In a way that's also true for his speed. He looks slow. But somehow manages to get up and down and his first step is very very fast. He looks weak and unathletic. Like a big fatty that has nothing to do with sports.

Onto some other question: who do you think is stronger? Embiid or Giannis? Giannis or Jokic? Adams or? I really don't know.

There is definitely visible signs of his strength. He bullies people down low and unless he's flipping trying to get a call, barely ever gets moved off his spot.

That's all the visual you need.

[elementally morale]

There is definitely visible signs of his strength. He bullies people down low and unless he's flipping trying to get a call, barely ever gets moved off his spot.

That's all the visual you need.

That's true. I thought he doesn't look strong when is on his own or in a photo. Yet he is very strong.

[highwhey]

He sure can't run with Booker. But how many big men in history could've done so? Wilt and David Robinson come to mind first... LeBron as well if you count him as a big. Giannis... maybe. I guess Embiid could run but he just won't. Not on offense which is strange... the guy runs faster on defense. Agree with you Jokic has this level of basketball in him for like 10 years. His game can't really age or not fast. And the way he plays he is not an injury waiting to happen. BTW his relative health at his size is also a rarity. I guess he is just built different than most of us.

haha, as a suns fan i am not looking forward to another 8 years of jokic.

[warriorfan]

well, he's big and knows how to properly leverage his weight on you, so in that sense he's really strong because trying to hold up 340lbs isn't easy...but he's extremely slow compared to athletic bigs. he looks like he has the meat sweats all the time.

https://i.postimg.cc/NFDZcTtT/B238-B289-35-DE-4919-BD81-8-BD1-A1-FB59-C7.jpg

[Im Still Ballin]

He's a big-boned guy. You're focusing too much on muscle and not enough on the frame. His legs are also relatively short, indicating a proportionately large torso and low center of gravity. He has a barrel torso and is very wide across the shoulders.

Like Tyson Fury, he just doesn't have excessive muscle mass that is visually/aesthetically pleasing. This means things like insertion points and muscle separation. He does, however, have a lot of muscle simply because he's a large human being. Larger bones have more muscle mass - at baseline and maximal relative amounts.

[elementally morale]

He's a big-boned guy. You're focusing too much on muscle and not enough on the frame. His legs are also relatively short, indicating a proportionately large torso and low center of gravity. He has a barrel torso and is very wide across the shoulders.

Like Tyson Fury, he just doesn't have excessive muscle mass that is visually/aesthetically pleasing. This means things like insertion points and muscle separation. He does, however, have a lot of muscle simply because he's a large human being. Larger bones have larger muscle mass - at baseline and maximal relative amounts.

I agree with all that. It still is kinda surprising. Not that he is strong... he is huge. But the fact he is actually stronger than guys as big as him. Or at least appears to be stronger in practice while looking weaker.

[Im Still Ballin]

I agree with all that. It still is kinda surprising. Not that he is strong... he is huge. But the fact he is actually stronger than guys as big as him. Or at least appears to be stronger in practice while looking weaker.

I imagine that growing up on a farm has a lot to do with it. His build and strength on the court remind me of big farmers. Like wrestling Olympic gold medalist Rulon Gardner, who was raised on a dairy farm.

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTj-Y2g88XkF1qjeuriQayNQy-GC28LOHZn5BCJYFXPLjBFXekhmU0S3zEY5LpP3zPYylw&usqp=CAU

I think we underrate how important upbringing is when it comes to physical development. The "grew up on a farm" factor is legit when it comes to sports.

[warriorfan]

To me an NFL example of this is Deebo Samuel. He is a strong dude i’m guessing 6 feet and 200 - 215 pounds. But he plays much bigger than that. He runs like a freight train and defenders bounce off of him. There’s some x factor there.

[post]

super strong

https://i.ibb.co/yWJQjh6/stay-strong.gif

[tpols]

He's a big-boned guy. You're focusing too much on muscle and not enough on the frame. His legs are also relatively short, indicating a proportionately large torso and low center of gravity. He has a barrel torso and is very wide across the shoulders.

Like Tyson Fury, he just doesn't have excessive muscle mass that is visually/aesthetically pleasing. This means things like insertion points and muscle separation. He does, however, have a lot of muscle simply because he's a large human being. Larger bones have more muscle mass - at baseline and maximal relative amounts.

It's like comparing a grizzly bear to a tiger. Tigers have a much lower body fat %.

Grizzly bears have a lot of fat on their immense skeletal frames. Their muscle isn't visible yet they're unbelievably strong.

[j3lademaster]

Adams is the strongest per the players. I’m sure Jokic is up there, but I doubt he’s stronger than Embiid. Jokic is a master of creating leverage for himself. He makes a quick step or spin to get you slightly off balance before he overpowers you. Sometimes you play against a big dude who you can’t back down, if you constantly move and force them to shift their weight in order to anticipate you, you can find opportunities to overpower them.

[BarberSchool]

Got that Tyson Fury type strength.
If the Nuggets can do what I think they will, and win the chip this year, that comparison will be in every hood in America. Jokic will be the Tyson Fury of the NBA. Similar body fat levels, don’t look particularly strong at all, but they just can’t lose. Even when down bad, they come back.

Jokic in the weight room can’t lift what most other NBA centers can lift, but since he’s Slavic/central-eastern-European, I don’t doubt that his tendon and ligament strength are very very good/durable, and that his natural ability to instinctively use lots of leverage and throw his weight around catch most other players on the floor by surprise. His arms and hands aren’t muscular at all, and his hands have fine touch, but he instinctively knows how to leverage Mass big time, and his bone density, wide heavy shoulders, big rib cage, and wide heavy hips and heavy legs, make him immovable in the same way Kevon Looney is.

Plus, he has to have some great natural ability in a scrap, given his pro kickboxer/mma older brother probably toughened his little chubby kid self up frequently. Also being mentally tough and growing up in a genocidal warzone in the 90’s will create very strong mental strength in all who don’t get crushed by the trauma of death and danger around them.

So short answer is NO. He is def not weight room strong. But he has all the unseen intangible elements of strength, and has a lot of mass to throw around.

[elementally morale]

Adams is the strongest per the players. I’m sure Jokic is up there, but I doubt he’s stronger than Embiid. Jokic is a master of creating leverage for himself. He makes a quick step or spin to get you slightly off balance before he overpowers you. Sometimes you play against a big dude who you can’t back down, if you constantly move and force them to shift their weight in order to anticipate you, you can find opportunities to overpower them.

Makes sense. Sumo in a way. If Jokic packed another 150 pounds hu could be a great sumo practitioner.

[Im Still Ballin]

Jokic could be a World's Strongest Man contender if he lifted weights and juiced up. Hafthor Bjornsson was a naturally much smaller guy than Nikola and he became the most dominant ever maybe in strongman. Same with Brian Shaw - another basketball player turned GOAT-level strongman.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/4BHifeAeBk4/hqdefault.jpg

https://www.sportbible.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=648,quality=70,format=jpeg,fit=contain,dpr=1/https%3A%2F%2Fs3-images.sportbible.com%2Fs3%2Fcontent%2Fe74b19a8605 6f8ffe85070d9286faa15.png

https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/rapidcityjournal.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/b/3b/b3b32d4f-7663-5326-9c59-3a0c3db787dd/527c02b564bbd.image.jpg?resize=334%2C500

It's like what was said about Andre The Giant:


Asked about Andre's physical abilities, Valois hesitates a moment, then says, "Listen, I tell you this not because Andre is almost a son to me, but because it is true. Many men were afraid to go in the ring with him, especially after he reached his twenties, because he was so large and strong. For all his height and weight, he could run and jump and do moves that made seasoned wrestlers fearful. Not so much fearful that he would hurt them with malice but that he might hurt them with exuberance. He was incroyable. Even his playing was like that.

He discovered one day in Paris that he could move a small car by himself, and for quite a while after that he amused himself by moving his friends' cars while they were having a meal or a drink, placing them in a small space between a lamppost and a building, or turning them around to face the other way. His strength was so natural to him that he had no interest in lifting weights. He was interested in having a joke on his friends, not in showing how strong he was. I have lived among strong men all my life. I come from Quebec, the cradle of strongmen, home of Louis Cyr and the six Baillargeon brothers, but I have never seen a man with the raw strength of Andre."

Perhaps this could all be dismissed in light of the often hyperbolic nature of one friend's memory of another, except for the validation of people like Ken Patera, four-time U.S. national weightlifting champion and still the U.S. record holder in the superheavyweight clean and jerk and total.

Patera was the first American to clean and jerk 500 pounds, and many knowledgeable observers consider him to have been stronger than the Soviet Union's legendary Vasily Alexeyev during the early 1970s, when they vied for the world and Olympic championships. Standing 6'1" and often weighing well over 300 pounds, Patera entered professional wrestling following the Munich Olympics. He has wrestled Andre often and has seen him work on many cards. Patera is a rugged man from a rugged family, and he understands strength as few men do.

"Let's put it this way," he responded recently to a question about the Brobdingnagian Frenchman. "I honestly believe that if Andre took a couple of years away from the game to train like the top lifters do, and if he developed a close personal relationship with his friendly neighborhood pharmacist, the world powerlifting records in both the squat and the deadlift would fall. No question. Think about it. He already weighs almost 500 pounds, with no lifting and no help from steroids. Hell, he'd weigh 600 or 700 pounds and not be any fatter than he is now, and let me tell you, that's not very damn fat. He's a wonder of nature. I've seen him pick up a 250-pound guy like you'd pick up your overcoat. I guess you know what he did to Wepner."

[plowking]

Mass in a lot of ways is equal to strength. He is a heavy guy.

Underrated athlete, big torso, big lungs, etc. He has a quick first step, but pair that with great static strength. Someone who is hard to move because as someone said for such a tall guy, he has a low centre of gravity.

He makes the other guys carry his weight during the game well. He is constantly leaning, pushing and just making guys move him, and he tires them out over the course of the game.