Luka Dončić nabs fifth consecutive all-NBA First Team selection
LeBron James is now the youngest — and the oldest — player to make an All-NBA team. And Dallas' Luka Dončić and Oklahoma City's Shai Gilgeous-Alexander are in a position to make around $1 million per game a few years from now.
Denver's Nikola Jokic and Gilgeous-Alexander were the only unanimous first-team selections on this season's All-NBA team, which was revealed by the league on Wednesday night. They were joined on the first team by Dončić, Milwaukee's Giannis Antetokounmpo and Boston's Jayson Tatum.
On the second team: New York's Jalen Brunson, Minnesota's Anthony Edwards, Phoenix's Kevin Durant, the Los Angeles Clippers' Kawhi Leonard and James' Los Angeles Lakers teammate, Anthony Davis.
The third team had James, Golden State's Stephen Curry, Sacramento's Domantas Sabonis, Indiana's Tyrese Haliburton and Phoenix's Devin Booker.
The NBA changed the rules starting with this season and All-NBA voting is now positionless — as opposed to having two guards, two forwards and one center on each of the teams, a formula that had been in place since the 1950s. Players also had to appear in a minimum number of games, in most cases, to be eligible for award consideration from the panel of 99 broadcasters and writers who served as the voting panel.
For James, who was the youngest player to make the All-NBA when he was voted onto the team for the 2004-05 season, another selection only added to his list of accomplishments.
The 20 All-NBA overall picks extended his record, a total that's now five more than Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. His 20 consecutive selections is obviously another record, and he's the first player to be age 39 or older during what became an All-NBA regular season.
Abdul-Jabbar and Duncan were both just a few days from turning 39 when the regular seasons ended in what became their final All-NBA campaigns, Abdul-Jabbar's being 1985-86 and Duncan's being 2014-15. James — the NBA's career scoring leader — played in 71 games this season, the last 42 of those coming after he turned 39.
And for Dončić and Gilgeous-Alexander, the All-NBA nods mean they are poised for supermax extensions that can be signed in 2025, both of which would set records.
Dončić can sign a five-year deal worth about $347 million, starting at nearly $60 million in 2026-27 and ending at about $79 million in 2030-31.
Gilgeous-Alexander will be eligible to sign a four-year extension worth about $294 million. His would start in 2027-28 at around $65 million — and the final year, 2030-31, would see him earning just over $81 million, or nearly $1 million per game. It would be the first time an NBA player's annual salary has topped $80 million.
Also seeing major financial boosts from their All-NBA selections were Edwards and Haliburton, both of whom agreed to extensions last summer that were to be worth about $205 million — and now will be worth about $245 million over the next five seasons.
Durant made All-NBA for the 11th time, tying for the 12th-most in NBA history.