Post-Mortem: 2020-21 Denver Nuggets

[ElectricMayhem]

I thought this would be a good idea to do for all of the eliminated teams. Each day I will post one team that did not make the playoffs and any playoff teams that were eliminated that day. Answer as many of the following questions as you'd like:

GM: Change or keep?
Coach: Change or keep?
Relative to expectations, how did they fare this year?
Rising, falling, or treadmill?
If you were in charge, what would you do this offseason?

Notes:
Players under contract next year:
Jamal Murray ($32m)
Nikola Jokic ($31m)
Aaron Gordon ($16m)
Monte Morris ($8m)
JaMychal Green ($8m)
Michael Porter Jr. ($5m)
Facundo Campazzo ($4m)
Zeke Nnaji ($2m)
Bol Bol ($2m)
Vlatko Cancar ($2m) (Not fully guaranteed)

Player Option:
Will Barton ($15m)

Free Agents:
Paul Millsap
JaVale McGee
Austin Rivers
PJ Dozier
Shaquille Harrison
Markus Howard

[MindState]

Great team, but without their 2nd best player and 6th man of the year out with injury they had no chance to advance to the finals, or WCF. Just the way it is. Injured teams dont make it far.

They are gonna be absolute beasts next year if they stay healthy.

[IAMZOOTED2]

Nuggets have disappointed in the last few playoffs... I like Post Malone, but I can't help but wonder what another coach would have done differently. And before you get your panties in a bunch, yes I know Murry is out, Barton and MPJ is hurt. But lets not act like the Suns playing as they are right now wouldn't have won either...

[ItsDanger]

Their bench was better last yr. Need more shooting.

[Duke4life831]

Nuggets have disappointed in the last few playoffs... I like Post Malone, but I can't help but wonder what another coach would have done differently. And before you get your panties in a bunch, yes I know Murry is out, Barton and MPJ is hurt. But lets not act like the Suns playing as they are right now wouldn't have won either...

Sarcasm? The Nuggets have made it out of the 1st round the last 3 years and made it to the WCF last season. How have they disappointed?

[NZB2323]

Jokic: 25
Murray: 23
Porter: 22
Gordon: 25
Morris: 25

The Nuggets are in great shape for years to come. They don’t have to change anything.

[IAMZOOTED2]

Nuggets have disappointed in the last few playoffs... I like Post Malone, but I can't help but wonder what another coach would have done differently. And before you get your panties in a bunch, yes I know Murry is out, Barton and MPJ is hurt. But lets not act like the Suns playing as they are right now wouldn't have won either...

Sarcasm? The Nuggets have made it out of the 1st round the last 3 years and made it to the WCF last season. How have they disappointed?

I expect and expected more... they have a good squad and feel they could have done better all things considered. What are your thoughts? Or, are you content with things as they are??

[sanima233]

i mean did they ever really lose to a worse team? what teams were they expected to beat?

[Sharkboy242]

Nuggets have disappointed in the last few playoffs... I like Post Malone, but I can't help but wonder what another coach would have done differently. And before you get your panties in a bunch, yes I know Murry is out, Barton and MPJ is hurt. But lets not act like the Suns playing as they are right now wouldn't have won either...

Sarcasm? The Nuggets have made it out of the 1st round the last 3 years and made it to the WCF last season. How have they disappointed?

I expect and expected more... they have a good squad and feel they could have done better all things considered. What are your thoughts? Or, are you content with things as they are??

They made it the furthest out of the final 4 bubble teams, who were all eliminated round 1, to put things into context. Injuries just decimated a lot of teams and despite it the Nuggets went further than most.

[Chuck Everett]

Nuggets have disappointed in the last few playoffs... I like Post Malone, but I can't help but wonder what another coach would have done differently. And before you get your panties in a bunch, yes I know Murry is out, Barton and MPJ is hurt. But lets not act like the Suns playing as they are right now wouldn't have won either...

Sarcasm? The Nuggets have made it out of the 1st round the last 3 years and made it to the WCF last season. How have they disappointed?

I expect and expected more... they have a good squad and feel they could have done better all things considered. What are your thoughts? Or, are you content with things as they are??

The only thing I can say to this is you must have expected the Nuggets to win the title in 2019 or 2020, which would be absurd.

[Wallace_Wallace]

Definitely keep:
Jokic, Murray, Porter, Gordon, Morris, Campazzo & Rivers.

Under the right contracts:
Barton & Milsap & Dozier

Everyone else can go. Jokic and Porter will get better next season and the Nuggets’ main goal is to stay health

[slicedbread2]

-Keep the GM and coach. Tim Connelly has done a hell of a job assembling this team and finding great talent late in the draft and developing them extremely well. Coach Malone has done very well and this team has made it to the 2nd round twice and the 3rd round once.
-They performed about as well as you could. After Murray got hurt, expectations were lowered and everybody thought they'd falter, but they not only stayed the course, but they won a series against a team that's back court in Lillard and C.J. should've killed the Nuggets. Instead MVP Jokic did a hell of a job in keeping everybody on the same page and won in 6. Sadly the Suns were a terrible match up for them as they had the personnel to force Jokic to be a scorer and eliminated his passing lanes plus having 2 All-NBA calibre guards in Booker and CP3 killed them. I thought it'd be Suns in 6, but wow.
-They are a rising team that will have to play w/o Murray for all of next year and I don't think they should bring him back for the playoffs next year as he should take the year off to properly rehab his Achilles. Don't play around and take your time.

As for what they should do going forward they have some major decisions to make:
'
-JaMychal Green and Will Barton. Both have P/O and will likely opt out. Barton is a good dude and I like his game, but man the injuries are concerning. If he's willing to take a little less to stay in Denver and be the 6th man that the Nuggets need which is his ideal role, I think you bring him back. Green is good for soaking up minutes in the regular season, but he wasn't that great in the P/O. I really liked what I saw from Zeke Nnaji in the few minutes he played and think he should take Green's minutes going forward especially if Green opts out.
-Millsap and Rivers' FA. I'd bring back Millsap on the Udonis Haslem special AKA vet min as quite frankly Father time has caught up to him and it's not pretty to watch. He's been a great glue guy in the locker room and you always need those type of dudes especially for the young ones. Rivers is good as an 11th-12th guy on the bench that can get you buckets, but he was forced to punch above his weight due to injuries to Murray, Barton and Dozier.
-Finding a stopgap to fill in for Murray as he rehabs his body. I love Monte Morris and he's a starter in this league. Personally if it were possible, the Nuggets should find a way to try and lure in Lonzo Ball. Dude to me has the size and length to practically be Shaun Livingston with a 3pt shot. He's improved his FT shot significantly and I think he'd really flourish. Dunno what happened in NOLA but this dude will be a hot commodity this summer.
-Michael Porter Jr.'s contract. He's gonna be an RFA next year and he'll definitely get a 4 year deal(they already used their 5 year deals on Murray(1st) and Jokic(2nd) as you only get 2 choices when it comes to the 5 year max). If they can get him at the right price, they'll have stability going forward.
-Aaron Gordon's deal. He's the perfect guy to round out a starting 5. I think the Nuggets will take their time and see how he performs with a full year in Denver to learn the system and see how he flourishes with the rest of the team. Calling out the team during game 1 and looking bad for most of the series wasn't a good look, but oh well.

With this year's draft, they have their 1st round pick(26th) and their 2nd will be going to OKC. It'll be interesting to see where they go from here.

[IAMZOOTED2]

Sarcasm? The Nuggets have made it out of the 1st round the last 3 years and made it to the WCF last season. How have they disappointed?

I expect and expected more... they have a good squad and feel they could have done better all things considered. What are your thoughts? Or, are you content with things as they are??

The only thing I can say to this is you must have expected the Nuggets to win the title in 2019 or 2020, which would be absurd.

Any more absurd than firing a coach after he wins COY?

[lebron stopper]

The Nuggets need to improve their defense drastically and get smarter/more versatile players on the roster. There are too many one-dimensional players on the roster, and almost all of them are offense-only guys like MPJ/Rivers/Morris/Campazzo. Aaron Gordon is the one defense-only guy on the roster, and he doesn't give you much of anything outside of matching up with superstar wings on-ball. The Nuggets won't be able to contend for a championship if their defense (in particular, pick-and-roll defense) is utterly atrocious.

A Ben Simmons/Draymond Green/Anthony Davis type of player would help the Nuggets significantly. A defensive ace that can switch onto almost any player, protect the rim, and really just anchor the defense next to Jokic. These kinds of players (who usually play PF) are very rare, but they're the kind of players you need to surround Jokic with. The Nuggets signed Paul Millsap for this kind of stuff, but he's too old to do much of anything nowadays, and it seems like Aaron Gordon hasn't been able to fill the role that Millsap used to. The front office should also look for a Gary Harris replacement: a shooting guard who can defend the perimeter, knock down threes, cut to the rim, and provide additional playmaking.

Michael Porter Jr. is a catastrophically bad defender that the Blazers and Suns happily hunted down on every possession, because of his terrible defensive IQ/awareness, poor mobility, and inability to stay in front of players. He's also not that great of an offensive player too: poor shot selection, poor handles, poor playmaking, tunnel vision, can't post up. The Nuggets will have to make a tough call on him this offseason. I would personally move on from him myself and try to find a better roster fit, but I can kind of see the case for keeping him around.

[tmorgan]

Interesting that the post before mine kinda took what I wanted to say: MPJ needs some serious development to become a positive impact player. Other than getting his shot up and rebounding, he isn’t bringing much to the table. Weak shot selection, weak awareness on both ends, weak mobility. I know his back isn’t ever going to be 100% right, I get that, but it’s the brain part that worries me more.

Perhaps Denver should do what Miami wasn’t willing to do last off-season — sell high on a young player that isn’t as good as they appear.

[RB34]

Do the Nuggets get the injury excuse or is that strictly reserved for the Lakers?

I think they performed well, everyone wrote them off when Murray went down. They ended up moving up a spot or two and solidified their position.

MPJ was clearly banged up there which is concerning. Their 2nd and 3rd options are damaged goods.

[jlokine]

I expect and expected more... they have a good squad and feel they could have done better all things considered. What are your thoughts? Or, are you content with things as they are??

The only thing I can say to this is you must have expected the Nuggets to win the title in 2019 or 2020, which would be absurd.

Any more absurd than firing a coach after he wins COY?

*cough cough* dwane casey *cough cough*

[LloydFree]

The Nuggets are a Regular Season team. Their best players are all 1-way players. Nobody respects them. It comes out every year, when teams are jockeying for playoff position, without any regard for playing the Nuggets.

[JoeyLightYears]

I don't know much about the Nuggets but Mike Malone calling his team pussies after every loss seems like bad management in the Gen Z era. Kids today are fragile yo

[nomansland]

I don't know much about the Nuggets but Mike Malone calling his team pussies after every loss seems like bad management in the Gen Z era. Kids today are fragile yo

The players love Mike Malone.