Game 6: Orlando vs. Denver 7:00pm

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[NuggetsWY]

I'll wait until after the game to try to figure out what the Nuggets are going to do.

[Coeur]

I'll wait until after the game to try to figure out what the Nuggets are going to do.

What about focus on Aaron Gordon. Picture him in the situations millsap is in. And then be ready to have Gordon/Grant/millsap/Nugs pf conversation?

[The Rebel]

Anybody else watch Craig's guy literally standing on the edge of the paint when he did not have the ball? That is killing this offense, Millsap's guy is a few steps off and that guy are closing the lane and Craig and Millsap cannot make them pay.

We need a shooter at one of the forward positions in with the starters.

[THE J0KER]

-9 deficit after the 1st quarter and Nikola Jokic is still in the "sleeping beauty" mode. Playing 8 minutes in opening quarter and have 0 points, actually, 0 shots, 0 assists, 0 rebounds, 0 everything, while opponent's center Nikola (Vucevic) was 5-5 FG with 4 rebounds already!?

We see "cold strike" behavior like this a few times from Jokic in the past. Whatever is his current problem with Malone, for all-NBA first team superstar is almost childish to act like that, and no matter how deep is our team, the whole system was built around Jokic, so our game collapse without Jokic.

[THE J0KER]

We know already from last season we are so deep that even three injured starters are not so big problem. But Jokic is the exception of that rule, not only because he is an All-NBA first-team player, but because the whole Denver system/offense is based on him. Jokic played his game in the 2nd half, and we outplayed Orlando.

I have no idea what is going behind the scene, and why Nikola almost in every game so far this season playing only one half. Look at his points:
vs POR 0 points in 1st half
vs PHO in both halves scored over 5 points
vs SAC in 1st half scored 5, in 2nd half 4 points
vs DAL 2 points in 2nd half
vs NOP 4 points in 2nd half
vs ORL 4 points in 1st half

In 6 out of 12 halves he played so far Jokic can't score over 5 points which is ridiculous. Do you remember how Jokic finished the previous season? In career first playoff game he scored only 4pts in 1st half, but then in every other 27 halves which Jokic played last postseason, Nikola scored over 5 points. And look at him now!?

The other thing apart from Jokic 1st half shockingly poor 4-1-1 production which irritated me today is the MPJ playing time. Barton is injured, but Porter gets only 8 minutes!? I not telling Denver should be patient and give rookie minutes to improve. He is already our best SF player, and that is the main reason why he should get these SF minutes.

Talking about this game in general, once again defense is our best part of the game. In three out of 6 games so far we didn't allow the opponent to score over 95 points (for Phoenix OT game I counting regular 48min time result).

[TunaFish]

Looked to me like they were sleep walking in the first half. Shooting percentages are bad. Yet, they won so its hard to be too critical.

I too think they need to reduce Craig's minutes and increase MPJ's.

[The Rebel]

I hate to say it but I think Millsap may be done as a truly effective starter, he was a step late on a lot of plays tonight and he is struggling to get to the rim on face ups and cuts. We could use Grant's shooting and help defense, although I do not think you can bring Millsap, Plumlee, and Craig off the bench at the same time.

We need a scorer at forward as well, if you can stop him from isoing so often Barton is not the worst idea as I do not think MPJ is ready to join the starters as of yet. Until then you can bring Millsap off the bench, but it might be best to trade Millsap now.

[Coeur]

I hate to say it but I think Millsap may be done as a truly effective starter, he was a step late on a lot of plays tonight and he is struggling to get to the rim on face ups and cuts. We could use Grant's shooting and help defense, although I do not think you can bring Millsap, Plumlee, and Craig off the bench at the same time.

We need a scorer at forward as well, if you can stop him from isoing so often Barton is not the worst idea as I do not think MPJ is ready to join the starters as of yet. Until then you can bring Millsap off the bench, but it might be best to trade Millsap now.

This team needs a forward scorer without a doubt. And millsap needs traded without a doubt.


Aaron Gordon
Blake Griffin


And need shooting spacing that mpj provides or get more?

Bogdanovic
Bjelica


Really there’s a 3rd need and it’s a super athletic guy from the 2 or 3 to get out ahead and run

Zach Lavine
Wiggins



Yeah it seems like this current roster even as deep as it is is missing some things from becoming really good

[THE J0KER]

I hate to say it but I think Millsap may be done as a truly effective starter, he was a step late on a lot of plays tonight and he is struggling to get to the rim on face ups and cuts. We could use Grant's shooting and help defense, although I do not think you can bring Millsap, Plumlee, and Craig off the bench at the same time.

We need a scorer at forward as well, if you can stop him from isoing so often Barton is not the worst idea as I do not think MPJ is ready to join the starters as of yet. Until then you can bring Millsap off the bench, but it might be best to trade Millsap now.

There is nothing wrong with the Millsap game. He playing very well for his age, despite it is just a shadow of the player he used to be in Atlanta. There is only 13 active players left older than Millsap and half of them not playing even 15 minutes per game. Our FO decided to overpay him $30M this summer and make him untradeable, so now is too late to fix it. If we going to spend some assets to dump some contracts, Barton should be a priority, not some expiring contract like Millsap. Barton seems partly corrected his game style, which is positive, but he is still a bad fit for Nugget's offense.

[NuggetsWY]

First half
Our offense seemed anemic. Jokic didn't touch the ball much and when he did, he was ineffective.

Our defense seemed to be "stand and watch" far too often. Too often our guys would rush an outside shooter and then turn and watch them drive to the basket for an easy shot.

We played with no energy or passion. As the announcers pointed out; the Nuggets had zero second chance points in the first quarter. Even little things like our guys not fighting for rebounds when we were shooting free throws. They'd just turn and head down the court, assuming the shot would go in. (Bench gave an effort here.)

Orlando dominated the paint.
Orlando scored rather easily.
Orlando's defense seemed effective.
Orlando did not play like an 11th place team.


Second half started a little better, and got even better when the bench came in.
Jokic finally started shooting. Murray shot well too. I still think Harris needs more shots.

We won, but it was rather unimpressive.

[The Rebel]

I hate to say it but I think Millsap may be done as a truly effective starter, he was a step late on a lot of plays tonight and he is struggling to get to the rim on face ups and cuts. We could use Grant's shooting and help defense, although I do not think you can bring Millsap, Plumlee, and Craig off the bench at the same time.

We need a scorer at forward as well, if you can stop him from isoing so often Barton is not the worst idea as I do not think MPJ is ready to join the starters as of yet. Until then you can bring Millsap off the bench, but it might be best to trade Millsap now.

There is nothing wrong with the Millsap game. He playing very well for his age, despite it is just a shadow of the player he used to be in Atlanta. There is only 13 active players left older than Millsap and half of them not playing even 15 minutes per game. Our FO decided to overpay him $30M this summer and make him untradeable, so now is too late to fix it. If we going to spend some assets to dump some contracts, Barton should be a priority, not some expiring contract like Millsap. Barton seems partly corrected his game style, which is positive, but he is still a bad fit for Nugget's offense.

There is plenty wrong with Millsap's game, regardless of age if this team wants to be a contender than they cannot be carrying a lot of dead weight in the starting lineup. Millsap so far this year and Barton are both dead weight at this point for different reasons. Millsap not being able to get from the corner or midrange where he is defending his guy to the rim when the roll guy blows by the guards is causing our entire defense to collapse. Jokic is sagging off the ball handler to get back to the big quicker, the guards are not getting around the bigs fast enough to defend the 3, and Millsap is a step slow allowing for the bigs on the pick and roll to get an easy layup. Our entire defensive scheme depends on the forwards helping off the corners so that Jokic and the guards can be aggressive on the pick and roll, if the forwards cannot provide that help than the entire defense breaks down.


Also Millsap's contract has a ton of value, $30 million expiring contracts get you into just about any conversation with any team looking to make a deal, that is a ton of money a team can get off their books by the end of the year. It just depends on whether the front office and Kroenkes are willing to spend future money.

[TunaFish]

I thought Millsap looked bad in this Orlando game. No quickness in traffic and more poor shooting. He did look good in the first two games of the season and seems to be sliding ever since.

The big surprise for me is both Beasley and Morris; neither can find their shooting stroke. The problem is endemic. There are a lot of missed open shots from players known for shooting.