Atlanta Hawks star Jalen Johnson and Nikola Jokic are the only two players in the entire league to have racked up at least 600 assists and 600 rebounds in the 2025-2026 NBA regular season - a feat demonstrating each player's excellent versatility on the hardwood. You've probably been living under a rock if you don't believe Nikola Jokic is - at minimum - a top three player in today's NBA, and unquestionably the single best player of the 2020's.
Jokic's size, astronomical IQ, and elite efficiency have led to season after season of the Serbian Sensation topping MVP rankings - or at least finishing top two in what I'd argue was nothing short of a blatant robbery (in both the Embiid MVP and SGA MVP years, 2022-2023 and 2024-25, respectively).
As a result, Jokic has been the best player in the world for five years running, since taking the crown from Giannis in the beginning of the 2021-2022 season. Thus, when a statistic arises that includes only the world's best player and one other - I'm extremely interested to see who's joined him, especially when it's a player he's given high praise to very recently.
Given the rarified air that Johnson finds himself in, it begs the question - what role should Johnson be playing in the Atlanta system going forward?
Is Jalen Johnson the Hawks' Nikola Jokic?
The short answer is, unfortunately, a resounding no.
Jokic is a once-in-a-generation type player - despite Johnson's excellent play, the argument that he could play a similar offensive role to Jokic just isn't sound. While the raw assist and rebounding metrics are similar this year for the two MVP candidates, Jokic possesses something that Johnson simply doesn't - incomprehensible efficiency.
Jokic's efficiency has been well-documented over the last five years, and it just gets better and better after each passing season. In fact, since the beginning of the aforementioned 2021-2022 NBA season, Jokic hasn't finished below 60.0 EFG%, averaging 62.4 percent across all six seasons, including a whopping 66.0 percent in his championship 2022-2023 season.
Johnson isn't even in the same stratosphere. Despite having a much lighter shot diet than the three-time MVP, Johnson's 54.2 percent EFG represents a stark drop-off. That being said, there's one key item Johnson possesses that isn't being utilized as much at present, something Nikola Jokic could only dream of.
Jalen Johnson's defense has been a hot topic over the last two seasons, and for good reason. The typical phenomenon of an elite defender seeing a significant increase in offensive opportunity, and simultaneously dropping their defensive effort quite visibly, is a perfect depiction of Johnson.
When Jalen has had the opportunity to have secondary and tertiary scorers take more of the offensive burden, however, his defense often shines through. While it might not be as elite as Jokic's, Johnson's two-way versatility could lift the Hawks to new heights over the coming seasons.
I'd be elated if the Hawks keep building around Johnson's versatile play and keep providing him with secondary scoring options that lessen his offensive load. At his best, Johnson is a two-way monster, stuffing both stat sheets and driving guards at the rim alike.