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Luka Dončić MVP Campaign Taken to New Heights With Times Square Billboard

The Mavericks superstar is hoping to bring home the hardware after the season.

Liam McKeone

Luka Doncic
Luka Doncic / Andrew Dieb-USA TODAY Sports
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Luka Dončić has been his typical self this season, averaging 33.9 points, 9.2 rebounds, and 9.8 assists per game for the Dallas Mavericks. Dončić has always put up tremendous stats, but in recent weeks, wins have followed.

Since the beginning of March, the Mavs have gone 16–4 to cement their place in the middle of the Western Conference playoff standings. Dončić averaged a triple-double over that stretch. He and his team are heating up at the right time.

So is Dončić's MVP campaign. With the NBA regular season coming to a close this weekend, Dallas is making a concentrated effort to push Dončić's name into serious MVP consideration. On Friday, the campaign was taken to another level. A giant billboard featuring the Slovenian superstar appeared in Times Square advocating for his candidacy as the league's most valuable player, with the tagline "Pravi MVP." Translated from Slovenian, that means "Real MVP."

"Pravi MVP" has become the tagline for the MVP campaign being run by Dončić's teammates. On Wednesday, the roster participated in a pregame shootaround wearing shirts emblazoned with the same slogan.

It's an honest effort from the Mavericks, and Dončić's statistical output means there's merit to any MVP conversation surrounding the superstar forward. He is going to be hard-pressed to actually win the award at this point, though. Nikola Jokić has been the front-runner for most of the season, and the latest straw polls suggest he will run away with his third MVP trophy.

Dončić is just about out of time to convince voters that he deserves the league's most prestigious individual award. But a PR campaign can be very effective, and it's obvious the Mavericks are doing everything they can in that realm to get Dončić's name in the running. Everyone will learn how successful they've been when the end-of-season awards are announced sometime during the playoffs.

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Liam McKeone
LIAM MCKEONE

Liam McKeone is a senior writer for the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He has been in the industry as a content creator since 2017, and prior to joining SI in May 2024, McKeone worked for NBC Sports Boston and The Big Lead. In addition to his work as a writer, he has hosted the Press Pass Podcast covering sports media and The Big Stream covering pop culture. A graduate of Fordham University, he is always up for a good debate and enjoys loudly arguing about sports, rap music, books and video games. McKeone has been a member of the National Sports Media Association since 2020.

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