Almost every rabid basketball fan, regardless of "affiliation," loves to watch Nikola Jokic. It's because he is such a unique player.
The Denver Nuggets' superstar starts by being 6-foot-11 and 284 pounds ... although it's safe to say that last number has varied over the years. Yet his skill set is completely different than the stereotype of the position.
Not only does Jokic like to pass the ball more than most big men, but he's creative at it. He might be the best passing big man ever. If one of his teammates is open, Jokic will figure out a way to get him the ball - no matter where that teammate on the court. If it takes a looping, cross-court, diagonal pass to get a good shot, he will figure out a way to do it.
The Denver center has a wide range of shot techniques, inside and outside. Nikola has a little hop step on his outside shots that is usually unexpected, and effective. If the team needs to bring the ball upcourt due to some matchup problems, well, Jokic can do that too. Add it up, and he's probably the first- or second-most enjoyable player in the NBA to watch - depending on whether Steph Curry is shooting the ball well on a given night.
Where did this odd collection of talent come from? How was it developed? What does it do for a team?
That, in a sense, is why Mike Singer wrote this book. The former newspaper reporter from Denver takes a good-sized dive into Jokic's life in "Why So Serious?" By the way, the book's title is based on Jokic's nickname of "The Joker," and it also matches nicely with his personality.
Jokic grew up in Serbia in an athletic family. He had a couple of brothers who played basketball too, and it sounds like they were tough on their "little brother" while watching out for him. Nikola slowly moved up the ladder in the club system of that country. He certainly was a prospect, but it was tough to gauge what his ceiling might be. That was partly because it's a big and relatively unconventional step from Serbia to the NBA. It's also fair to say that Jokic liked to have a good time, and wasn't too concerned as a youngster about nutrition and conditioning.
But the big man eventually built up a basketball support system around him, and he figured out what he needed to do to improve ... and did it. The short version of the story is that he was good enough to be a second-round draft choice of the Nuggets in 2014, when he was only 19 years old. Denver's front office thought he could develop into something, but you never know about such things.
Sure enough, Jokic didn't need a great deal of time to improve after spending an extra year in Europe. He averaged 10 points a game in limited action as a rookie in 1985-86, and became a focal point of the team by 2018 or so. Nikola took a giant step forward in 2020-21, averaging 26.4 points per game. Jokic has won three MVP trophies in his career - the only second-round draft pick to win even one of them - and managed to be the league leader in rebounds and assists in 2025-26.
Along the way, of course, the center led the Nuggets to their only NBA championship in 2024. He hasn't been able to repeat that accomplishment yet, but Denver always will have a chance while Jokic is playing top-flight basketball.
Singer made one decision about writing this book right away. He has a lot of chapters in it. There are 95 of them, not including an introduction, epilogue and acknowledgments. I think that's a record for a book under 400 pages.
Jokic comes off really, really well here. Admittedly, there's not much to criticize in his basketball career to date. But books written in the middle of someone's career usually are like that. We usually need some time after retirement to put things in perspective. Sometimes that's done by an author, and sometimes that's done by a subject him with some help. We'll see.
For those who try not to miss Jokic's games whenever possible, "Why So Serious?" no doubt will work quite nicely. It covers the highlights and gives some details about the formative years and the glory days. It's probably not anything more satisfying than that; we'll have to wait a while to put some more pieces together.
Three stars
Learn more about this book from Amazon.com. (As an Amazon affiliate, I earn money from qualifying purchases.)
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