CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Luka Doncic's first NBA All-Star weekend begins with Friday night's MNT DEW ICE Rising Stars game, but as the basketball world has witnessed, he's already risen.

He arrived Thursday in the Queen City as the undisputed majesty of his draft class, with one wagering site announcing it would go ahead and pay Doncic Rookie of the Year bettors now, four months before he officially wins the award.

Entering his first of presumably many All-Star weekends, Doncic is a captivating, 4K-vivid advertisement for the Mavericks, the city of Dallas and himself -- which, auspiciously for each, is not mutually exclusive.

Slovenian teenager Doncic's presence in the Rising Stars game and Saturday's Taco Bell Skills Challenge, both of which will be broadcast to 215 countries and territories in 49 languages, are rewards for his transcendent season, but also maximum exposure for current and future Luka branding.

"Obviously, the phone has not stopped ringing," said Robert Kinnard, executive director of global marketing at BDA Sports Management, which represents Doncic. "He has a litany of opportunities that I constantly evaluate every day.

"But it's really about basketball being a priority, the commitment that he has to the Dallas Mavericks and fan base, as well as just getting acclimated in the NBA. We've been very selective in those partnerships."

His most well-known partnership, with Nike, is in the waning months of a two-year agreement, setting up what industry sources tell The News will be a mother-lode summer for Doncic, as competitive and compelling as the Mavericks' pursuit of free agents with their $30 million of salary cap space.

Other Doncic endorsement deals, several of which have been cemented in recent days, are less-known but will be showcased this weekend -- most visibly a digital advertisement, shot last week in Dallas, trumpeting his ambassadorship of Bose sunglasses with built-in speakers.

On a weekend in which Mavericks icon Dirk Nowitzki, 40, will "coach" Doncic's Rising Stars squad and play in his 14th and likely final All-Star Game, Doncic is poised to succeed Nowitzki as the most famous Maverick -- and soon eclipse him as the most visible global brand in the franchise's 39-year history.

Part of that latter assertion is due to Nowitzki's preference to be a low-key superstar, which in itself has endeared him to millions of fans, but it also it speaks to

instant NBA success, social media-accelerated world popularity and obvious endorsement appeal.

Besides being an awfully good basketball player who still is two weeks from his 20th birthday (Feb. 28), Doncic plays with infectious joy, is charismatic and,

fluently speaks four languages: English, Spanish, Slovenian and Serbian.

"He is appealing to every, and I mean every, demographic and marketer," Kinnard said. "He's a good-looking kid, a phenom on the basketball court and just a great person. When you represent someone like him and his family, it's very easy to be selective."

Peering into the soon-to-distant future, Kinnard describes

marketing potential thusly: "Stratospheric."

Instant hit

FILE - Dallas Mavericks guard Luka Doncic signs autographs for fans as the team departs their hotel for practice on Wednesday, Oct. 3, 2018, in Shanghai. The Mavericks will face the Philadelphia 76ers in Shanghai on Oct. 5th in the first of two NBA China Games 2018 preseason basketball games. (Smiley N. Pool/The Dallas Morning News) (Smiley N. Pool / Staff Photographer)

Is Kinnard unbiased? Obviously not.

Seemingly all of Doncic's rookie-season metrics, however, suggest that Kinnard's statements can be placed in the "not bragging if you're stating facts" category.

Doncic's 4.24 million All-Star fan votes trailed only LeBron James' 4.62 million and Giannis Antetokounmpo's 4.37 million.

According to the NBA's most recent data, Doncic-related in-feed Facebook, Instagram and Twitter posts as of early February surpassed 30 million video views.

His Week 12 video-view average of 2 million was 23 percent higher than James'. That same week, Doncic gained 155,000 Instagram and 27,000 Twitter followers. His 1-million-plus Instagram follower additions since the start of the season trail only James and Steph Curry.

Perhaps the first industry insider to notice the start of Lukamania in this country was Jason Howarth, vice president of marketing for the NBA's exclusive trading card partner, Irving-based Panini America.

Last June 21, within minutes after he was the third player selected in the draft, Doncic stepped backstage into Panini's station and posed for his first NBA trading card, the Panini "instant card," which Doncic then posted to his Instagram account.

A Luka Doncic trading card from Panini America's Prizm Rookie series recently sold for $25,000 on eBay. (Courtesy/Panini America) (Panini America / Courtesy)

"It was amazing to see how engaged fans were with Luka, right from that very early stage, before he even stepped on an NBA court," Howarth said. "There obviously were other guys in the draft that people were paying attention to, but Luka's level of engagement was where I was like, 'Wow, this is interesting.'"

Along with its licensing agreement with the NBA and its players association, Panini America has a separate individual partnership with Doncic. To say the marriage has benefited both is putting it mildly.

Secondary-market eBay sales of Doncic cards include 87 that have drawn bids in excess of $2,500, 33 that have sold for more than $5,000 and five that have fetched $10,000 or more.

The largest Doncic-card eBay purchase, for $25,000, was one of ten Doncic Gold Prizm cards that Panini produced. All of these high-end secondary market sales were of cards that consumers could purchase for $4.99 a pack.

"I always say that the popularity of a player's trading card from a rookie perspective is usually a very good indicator of them rising into top 10 of jersey sales at some point, whether it's by the end of the first season or going into the next season," Howarth said.

According to the NBA, in sales from October through December, Doncic's No. 77 Mavericks jersey debuted at No. 11 league-wide.

Managing Luka's load

FILE - Dallas Mavericks guard Luka Doncic arrives for his first home game at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Saturday, October 20, 2018. The Mavericks are facing the Minnesota Timberwolves. (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News) (Tom Fox / Staff Photographer)

BDA's Kinnard and Alyson Furch, the management firm's senior director of communications, work closely with Doncic to ensure that his partnerships are products that interest him.

BDA and Doncic purposely have structured all of his endorsement contracts to be short-term, one-to-three years, to maintain market flexibility as he grows as a player and person -- and, almost certainly, earning power.

"Does it make sense for him to have 15 partners? No," Furch said. "Could he? Yes. But, realistically, he couldn't activate with 15 partners. There's just not enough time in the day. If he's saturated and partnered with everybody, no one can really say 'I'm his partner.'"

Along with Panini, Doncic has a trading card deal with Upper Deck. This past Monday, Fanatics Authentic became the exclusive distributor of Doncic autographs and collectibles. Fanatics clients include Joel Embiid, Klay Thompson, Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Judge, Jared Goff and Peyton Manning.

On Feb. 6, Himalaya Media, which already had a flourishing partnership with the Mavericks to distribute digital content throughout China, announced a separate subscription-based, content-capture deal with Doncic.

Himalaya's overall network reaches 500 million listeners.

One Doncic partnership wasn't announced and probably won't be. Swiss luxury watch manufacturer Audemars Piguet, whose athlete ambassadors have included Serena Williams, LeBron James and Cristiano Ronaldo, generally prefers its partnerships to be publicly discovered organically.

It wasn't until The News noticed Doncic wearing an AP watch during a recent road trip that an industry source confirmed that, in fact, he is an AP ambassador.

For young NBA stars like Doncic, endorsement contracts can be especially enticing because, under the NBA's Collective Bargaining Agreement, their player-contract salaries are limited by the rookie wage scale.

Doncic's Mavericks contract pays him $6.6 million this season, $7.7 million next season, $8.06 million in 2020-21 and $10.2 million in 2021-22 -- a bargain for what he's already producing on the court and likely will produce under his contract.

"Our goal, which is very achievable, is for Luka to look at his marketing endorsements and go, 'Wow, I don't have to spend a dime out of my team contract,'" BDA's Kinnard said.

What's his potential?

Dallas Mavericks forward Luka Doncic takes the court for an NBA basketball game against the Milwaukee Bucks at American Airlines Center on Friday, Feb. 8, 2019, in Dallas. (Smiley N. Pool/The Dallas Morning News) (Smiley N. Pool / Staff Photographer)

How much, potentially, could Doncic earn in endorsements in the coming years?

Forbes' reported earnings this past week of the NBA's top players provides clues. Of top-earner LeBron's $88.7 million income, $53 million is derived off the court. Immediately behind James in off-the-court earnings are the Warriors' Curry ($42 million) and Kevin Durant ($35 million).

The shoe and apparel contract BDA negotiates for Doncic this summer largely will determine what part of the NBA's stratosphere he'll occupy.

Furch said his years of playing professionally for Spain's Real Madrid, from ages 16 to 19, while Cristiano Ronaldo also starred for Real Madrid's soccer club, gave Doncic a vision of what he could achieve, and wants to achieve, in endorsement partnerships.

"He's 19, and he's doing all these great things, but he's still kind of a chill dude," Furch said, before catching herself and adding with a laugh: "As much as I say that, he looks really good in this Bose campaign. It's a lot more double-oh-seven than it is sitting on my couch, chilling, but it's great."

Man of the people

On January 21 in Milwaukee, as Mavericks players trickled to a bus that would take them from their hotel to that afternoon's game against the Bucks, about a dozen fans waited outside for a chance to get Doncic's autograph.

It was 12 degrees and snowing. Moreover, the Mavericks' bus was parked in a garage that was off-limits to the autographer seekers. Several held up signs, hoping that Doncic would detour into the cold.

Their hopes seemed dashed when Doncic walked straight to the bus, but after putting his backpack and duffel bag onboard, he went out to sign autographs.

"This is why I'm so proud of him," said Doncic's mother, Mirjam Poterbin. "He knows he's playing for the fans, not just for himself. He wants to make people happy. That's special."

So grounded and focused on playing basketball is Doncic that Mavericks owner Mark Cuban doesn't seem concerned, despite so much happening to his prize rookie so quickly, on and off the court.

Cuban pointed out that playing in the NBA in some respects is less pressure for Doncic than playing in Europe, where he was better known, having been in the spotlight since age 16.

"Here, it's a little bit foreign to him," Cuban said. "He's still learning and figuring things out. Every autograph that's coming anywhere near him, he's signing. He's nice. He makes it a point to be nice.

"And he just loves the game. So as long as he loves the game and he works on his game, he's really adapting on his diet and all these little things that are geared toward being a professional, then he's fine. Now, if he starts ignoring those things, that's different.

"I don't see that happening."

Twitter: @Townbrad