The Rebel wrote:pickaxe wrote:The Rebel wrote:
Just like how many guys were supposed to be the next Michael Jordan? Fact is it is a 50/50 shot that any player drafted in the top 5 is going to be anything more than an above average starter, it is not something to celebrate when a team loses 5 of their top 7 players for large stretches of the season, sure a draft picks help heal those wounds but it is foolish to celebrate a team that had one of their best years in their history last year becoming a nightmare, not to mention the Nuggets are quickly destroying the goodwill they had built around the community over the last decade as people are being reminded of the nightmare that this team was during most of the 90s.
We can chill a little bit knowing we reinforced the roster. The goodwill isn't destroyed, it's just when you see last offseason's trades and don't get to see a huge piece like JaVale and see what he can do you have to be a bit concerned.
The small move of obtaining Brooks allows the team to still function as opposed to building bad habits.
The small move of obtaining Vesely shores up the overall size factor so the team will not run out of size.
Somehow someone is coming to the Nuggets this draft in just a few months, and that someone is very likely to improve the roster.
The biggest ?'s revolve around Gallo & McGee's recoveries. There is very good chemistry between the players on the team.
Could not figure out the dedication to keeping the team strong and now we can see a little light at the end of the tunnel.
For the active roster main thing is build good habits, keep improving, focus on elements of their game that will come into play next season.
You know it is funny despite less postings on this and many other Nuggets boards, many hard core fans are still in denial.
If you guys do not think the goodwill the Nuggets had rebuilt has been seriously damaged then I do not know what to tell you. Over the last few years there were actually people talking about the Nuggets on sports radio in Denver, now you never hear about them and if you do it is to trash them. Attendance went down towards the end of the Melo years, and than was hurt after Melo was traded, finally last year they were getting somewhere once again, and than the failure in the playoffs, firing Karl, and this disaster of a season has hurt them considerably. Add to that the Broncos getting better and the Avalanche starting to become a good team again and what is already an pretty obvious drop off in attendance to the games I have been to this year. I have been to Nuggets games where there could not have been more than 4,000 people in the whole arena and can see it coming again.
You see a light at the end I see dark days ahead. I was fine with the team trying to find a new way to win, trying the superstar route has not worked out for them, now hoping they draft right and sign the right free agents, while having a rookie head coach who thinks he is the smartest guy in the room all the time, sounds an awful lot like 1990 to me, but we will only know over the next few years.
Two personal reasons I could not attend as much as I did in 2007, 2008, and 2009:
1) Everytime I would go on to find an affordable seat they were seemingly automatically sold out as though they were being professionally scalped. I would have gone to many games if I could just get a ticket.
2) The prices went through the roof even though the team had not accomplished enough to justify the price jumps. I felt the 1st round entry was worth some price bump, but not as though the team was at an elite pricing level -yet. Just win one championship then I would understand why even the nosebleed seats were $30 for even games against losing teams.
Other than that I enjoyed myself at all the games I was able to attend. I cheered out of my mind and hoped for the best. The goodwill I felt as a fan is you could see that even though there were some ridiculous contracts the team always had a very good chance to get into the playoffs and if they had come prepared probably could easily made the second round every time.
All I know is I never turned against this team I cheered for. I figure they get enough feedback. What are the players going to do with a bunch of hard to please fans? We're not hard to please -we just want to see effort, desire, intensity, strategy being utilized win or lose.
So we want to go the superstar-less route. I think what we all wanted all along is players that played a superstar level game together but individually did not have overgrown egos. We wanted to see a coach, who with extensive experience and dedication to his craft, come up with something better than losing the same exact way every time the 1st round came up, again.
So now we have Ty, who is in the top ten in the league in assists. He doesn't have a superstar ego. He's playing better than ever and makes it a game. Imagine HE actually gets it. Ty understands the Denver fan base wants to see a product on the court not an ego. And we go quiet? Weird.
We should be happier than ever.