Luka Dončić, Los Angeles Lakers2 of 5Adam Pantozzi/NBAE via Getty ImagesIt won't happen this season, which means LeBron James probably won't be around to see it, but Luka Dončić is going to get the Los Angeles Lakers back into contention at some point in the relatively near future. His early-career performance to this point, which included five straight All-NBA first team nods from 2019-20 to 2023-24, is simply too overwhelming to ignore. The key to Dončić's case is that we know he doesn't need all that much around him to contend for a championship. The Dallas Mavericks squad he hauled to the Finals in 2024 featured a 31-year-old Kyrie Irving and absolutely no one else you'd even consider calling a star. Dallas had a good defense and decent support pieces; it's not going to be that hard for the Lakers to build a far more dangerous roster around Dončić than that one.