2015-17 Steph Curry vs. 2021-23 Nikola Jokic

[Clyde Frazier]

It's Curry and it's not even that close.

No one in NBA history can claim he's not close to 2021-2023 Jokic, 2 times MVP and finals MVP while shattering every advanced metric record.

I don't really care about advanced metrics, and yes alot of players were much better than Jokic ever has or will be.

Joined on June 3rd. Shocker it comes along with a foolish statement like this.

[DraymondGold]

What a great playoff run from Jokic! Really fun to watch. I’ve been high on Jokic for a while (I helped vote in 2022 Jokic as the 16th greatest peak in the latest peaks project). But I’m also high on Curry.

Part 1: impact metrics may favor Curry
Since both these players come from the same era and have (mostly available) impact metrics, it might be worth trying a statistical comparison. For what it’s worth, Curry looks slightly better in many of our metrics, although it’s not universal.

EPM and DPM/DARKO are commonly considered two of the best one-number metric we have, based on people working in the NBA and based on how well they correlate with wins (https://www.cryptbeam.com/2021/05/21/the-10-best-nba-impact-metrics/, https://hoopshype.com/lists/advanced-stats-nba-real-plus-minus-rapm-win-shares-analytics/, https://www.nbastuffer.com/analytics101/darko-daily-plus-minus/). Which do these all-in-one metrics favor?
-EPM favors Curry: Curry (8.9 in 2015, 10.5 in 2016, 8.2 in 2017; 9.2 average) > Jokic (7.9 in 2021, 9.3 in 2022, 7.9 in 2023; 8.4 average)
-DARKO favors Curry: Curry (7.1, 7.8, 8; 7.6 average) > Jokic (4.9, 5.5, 7.1; 5.8 average)

Some people prefer simpler impact metrics like On-Off/RAPM/PIPM. They’re a bit less of a black box — they just measure impact in a given role/context (unadjusted for teammates, adjusted for teammates/outlier values, and adjusting for luck). Who do they prefer?
-On/off favors Curry: Curry (20.10 average) > Jokic (16.18)
-RAPM favors Curry: Curry (8.13 average) > Jokic (6.6 average) (RAPM source:http://nbashotcharts.com/rapm3?id=507996595)
-PIPM: 15-17 Curry looks better than every Jokic season we have… but we only have until half way through 2021, so PIPM doesn’t really help.

What about playoff-only stats? I don’t have playoff-only EPM/DARKO/RAPM/PIPM, so we need to look at other statistics. I still have on-off, LEBRON is a highly rated all-in-one playoff metric that's available, and AuPM is specifically designed to measure impact like RAPM does but be more accurate in smaller sample sizes like the playoffs.
-Playoff On/off favors Curry (6.71) > Jokic (-3.97)
-Playoff LEBRON favors Curry: Curry (4.93) > Jokic (1.96 in 2020-2022; I expect this to rise quite a bit once 2023 becomes available, but it’s statistically unlikely it will rise enough to change the ranking)
-Playoff AuPM favors Jokic (but 17 Curry is higher than any Jokic year, and Curry pulls ahead if we substitute either of the surrounding healthy playoff runs in 14 or 18 for the injured 2016 run).

This isn’t to say every metric favors Curry. BPM favors Jokic in both the regular season and playoffs, as does fivethirtyeight’s RAPTOR (though not by much in the playoffs). WOWY paints Curry as GOAT level, but we don’t have enough of a WOWY sample for Jokic. And again we're missing some stats for Jokic.

If you happen to value to value the box metrics or the fewer impact metrics that prefer Jokic (like RAPTOR), that’s fine — but most metrics I've seen seem to favor (healthy) Curry over Jokic. Feel free to let me know if I've missed any metrics! From an impact perspective, Curry’s postseason injuries seem like the biggest con to his argument. Eminence pointed out Curry actually played a greater percentage of his games than Jokic during their peak span (which I actually didn’t realize given their reputation!), but more of Curry’s injuries came in the playoffs. Some may argue playoff injuries are more concerning than regular season injuries, and this may be true from championship odds perspective.

Part 2: team building may favor Curry
I wonder how both compare from a team building perspective.

Offensively, Curry’s unique combination of on and off-ball play makes him one of the candidates for GOAT offensive scalability — he’d pair great with any other star. But Jokic is no slouch here. His screening, rebounding, spacing, and passing should pair pretty well with most stars too.

I’m more interested in team building from a defensive perspective. How reasonable is it to build a championship level defense with Jokic compared to Curry?

I’m genuinely interested in hearing people’s thoughts on this. My current take: this narrative that Jokic is a net negative defender against an average opponent has been measurably false for a while now. He has some of the best hands in the league, great defensive rebounding, with solid positioning/awareness when he has the motor and speed to get there. However, he’s a below average rim protector at the center position. He struggles against perimeter quickness. Strong three point shooters can punish his drop coverage and lack of agility on switches. But Curry also struggles defensively when forced into mismatches and when forced to defend strong isolation offensive stars. Which is worse?

Defensive weaknesses limiting team defense: One way to look at this would be to look at the change in their team’s defense rating vs bad matchups. But Curry has better defensive teammates! So let’s look at the change in relative defensive rating, which should correct for this.

The results? Jokic’s weakness to high volume pick and roll shooting (e.g. vs 2021 Suns and 2022 Warriors) seems to cause a greater decline in his team’s defensive ratings vs Curry’s weakness to iso/mismatch offenses (e.g. vs Cavs or 18 Rockets). Check out the change in their team’s relative defensive rating when going against bad matchups for Jokic and Curry:
-Nuggets vs 2021 suns: from 0.1 rDRTG RS average to -7.1 rDRTG (decline of 7.0 rDRTG)
-Nuggets vs 2022 warriors: -0.2 rDRTG RS average to -10.4 rDRTG (decline of 10.2 rDRTG)
-Warriors vs 2017 Cavs: from 4.8 rDRTG RS average to -0.4 rDRTG (decline of 4.4 rDRTG)

-Warriors vs 2018 Rockets: 1.0 rDRTG RS average to 0.8 rDRTG (decline of 0.2 rDRTG)*
*only including first 5 games for Rockets when CP3 is healthy.

This is a noisy measurement -- alone, it's not enough to favor Curry over Jokic defensively. But opponents’ offenses do seem to cause a much greater decline in their team defense when picking on Jokic’s weaknesses compared to when picking on Curry’s weaknesses.

Can you build strong team defenses around them? This year’s Nuggets are a good example of how to build a positive defense around Jokic, with an emphasis on versatility, good communication, and help principles. They were average in the regular season (15/30) and good in the playoffs (4/16), although they did not face any particularly bad matchups that tested Jokic with perimeter speed or strong on-ball pick and roll 3 point shooting this year.

But! While you can build a good defense around Jokic, I believe it’s harder to build a *great* defense with Jokic compared to Curry.

Jokic's defense may be worse than Curry's relative to position. Jokic occupies the center position, where it’s easiest to find defensive value. It’s harder to build a good defensive team if you have a neutral/slight positive defender at the center position vs if you have a neutral/slight positive defender at the guard position. Most defensive lineups with Jokic will have to live with poorer rim protection and a weakness against volume 3 point shooting. While you might help the rim protection by going with a twin towers lineup, this would likely come at the cost of the offense (what rim protectors can also spread the floor and cut to the basket off-ball, like you’d want from Jokic’s ideal offensive teammate?) or possibly make you more susceptible to 3 point shooting (how many rim protectors without those offensive flaws are also good perimeter defenders?).

And this shows in the team results. Curry has been a positive contributor to a defensive dynasty. The Warriors had an above-average defensive rating all 9 years of Curry’s healthy prime (2014-2019, 2021-2023), and have been a top 5 defense in 6/9 years. Yes, this obviously is dependent on Curry’s teammates too. But it gives credence to the idea that you can build a strong defensive team that includes massive minutes for Curry. It seems less likely to build a realistic lineup that could consistently be a Top 5 defense that includes Jokic at center.

So from a scalability/team-building perspective, you’d have to believe Jokic’s offensive lift is great enough to make up for the possible defensive weaknesses. Given how the impact metrics favor Curry overall, this seems like another point in Curry’s favor.

But I’m open to being proved wrong! I’d love see a healthy 2024 Denver Nuggets be successful defensively (or that much more successful offensively) against some harder playoff matchups. If 2024 Jokic starts to seem like less of a liability against perimeter speed or pick and roll shooting, that would absolutely help assuage my concerns. Thoughts?

[No-more-rings]

Playoff stats over the 3 year span:

Jokic: 31.0 PER on .621 TS%, .258 WS/48, 11.5 BPM
Curry: 24.6 PER on .621 TS%, .218 WS/48, 8.5 BPM

See these stats aren’t everything of course, but it’s at least a starting point for his argument. People won’t like to hear this, but everytime Curry is in a reasonable comparison or unfavorable for that matter, people want to start ignoring all stats and start to cherry pick ones or just ignore them altogether. And if it gets really shallow we start to hear about “73 wins” and Curry’s “3 pointerzzz”, “spacinggg”.

Anything legitimately “advanced” does not have him at a GOAT level. Just because PER, WS/48, and BPM are all in an “advanced” section of basketball-reference does not mean they legitimately qualify. His RAPM is no sort of historical standout (admittedly a function of league relativity, but still), and it is much worse in the postseason. If people have access to AuPM records, they can cite those, but there too I am skeptical he is a true historical standout (and I know he is again not in the postseason). In DARKO he has not reached the same heights as Steph and would need to continue at this level for a few years to conceivably do so.

The discourse with Jokic has been fascinating if nothing else than as a confirmation that people ultimately just want the biggest possible box production and a minimum competency at defence (even if that minimum competency qualifies as a positional weakness).

Well that settles it, Curry is better than Jokic because “DARKO” said so . Like wtf even is that and why should we treat it like gospel?

[iggymcfrack]

Anything legitimately “advanced” does not have him at a GOAT level. Just because PER, WS/48, and BPM are all in an “advanced” section of basketball-reference does not mean they legitimately qualify. His RAPM is no sort of historical standout (admittedly a function of league relativity, but still), and it is much worse in the postseason. If people have access to AuPM records, they can cite those, but there too I am skeptical he is a true historical standout (and I know he is again not in the postseason). In DARKO he has not reached the same heights as Steph and would need to continue at this level for a few years to conceivably do so.

The discourse with Jokic has been fascinating if nothing else than as a confirmation that people ultimately just want the biggest possible box production and a minimum competency at defence (even if that minimum competency qualifies as a positional weakness).

RAPTOR’s archivable that far back and includes both regular season and postseason. Here are the seasons in order by RAPTOR:

2022 Jokic +14.6
2023 Jokic +13.2
2016 Curry +12.5
2015 Curry +11.0
2017 Curry +9.2
2021 Jokic +9.2

Also, the box composites you dismissed (other than BPM) are likely to underrate Jokic if anything since both players defense is similar and Joker’s passing lifts his teammates beyond the box score more than Steph’s gravity does.

[DraymondGold]

Also, the box composites you dismissed (other than BPM) are likely to underrate Jokic if anything since both players defense is similar and Joker’s passing lifts his teammates beyond the box score more than Steph’s gravity does.

This seems like a pretty substantial claim -- what makes you think so? Do you have any evidence to support this?

My intuition would almost say the opposite: the value of passing is much easier to pick up on the box score compared to the value of off-ball play and gravity.

Basically every box model on the planet incorporates assists and turnovers. They're far from perfect measures of creation, but two of the top 5 box stats *attempt* to directly measure passing volume (assists) and passing efficiency (assist:tunover ratio). Some box models include a height component, which boosts the value of assists from taller players. On the court, this is roughly meant to connect to the added value taller passers have, given they have more possible passing angles (and thus may find better passes). The better passing models (including box RAPTOR!) also track total number of passes and give extra credit for more valuable passes, like layup/dunk/corner-3 passes compared to midrange passes.

All of these are box stats that attempt to measure the value of passing, and should favor Jokic over Curry. You could argue they're incomplete (I would), and might miss some of the value of Jokic's passing... but there's certainly plenty of box statistics available that correlate with good passing.

Meanwhile, how many statistics do we have that correlate with good shooting/off-ball play? How many are incorporated into box metrics? Obviously you can use True shooting or 3P%. But in the simple box metrics.... that's about it. In the more complex box metrics, you might use Defended 3 point attempts to try to track spacing, which is what RAPTOR uses, but even RAPTOR itself admits this is an imprecise measure of spacing (https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-our-raptor-metric-works/).

You could argue Jokic's passing is more valuable than Curry's spacing/off-ball play/gravity. But to argue that box metrics would underrate Jokic's passing more than it would underrate Curry's off-ball play? I'm not yet convinced of yet. It seems like we have far fewer box metrics that could measure off-ball offense / gravity, which is why I tend to trust true plus-minus based metrics more for Curry. And if true plus-minus based metrics like on-off/RAPM/EPM/DPM seem to favor Curry over Jokic (or at least show Curry as comparable to Jokic in the aggregate if we add RAPTOR to the bunch), I tend to trust that more than just box metrics alone. Do you disagree with this?

[AEnigma]

RAPTOR’s archivable that far back and includes both regular season and postseason.

I do not think RAPTOR is much better, but my point was not to say that Curry has some universal advantage outside of basketball-reference.

Also, the box composites you dismissed (other than BPM) are likely to underrate Jokic if anything since both players defense is similar and Joker’s passing lifts his teammates beyond the box score more than Steph’s gravity does.

If you see their defensive value as similar then how exactly is Jokic being underrated here.

[AEnigma]

Anything legitimately “advanced” does not have him at a GOAT level. Just because PER, WS/48, and BPM are all in an “advanced” section of basketball-reference does not mean they legitimately qualify. His RAPM is no sort of historical standout (admittedly a function of league relativity, but still), and it is much worse in the postseason. If people have access to AuPM records, they can cite those, but there too I am skeptical he is a true historical standout (and I know he is again not in the postseason). In DARKO he has not reached the same heights as Steph and would need to continue at this level for a few years to conceivably do so.

The discourse with Jokic has been fascinating if nothing else than as a confirmation that people ultimately just want the biggest possible box production and a minimum competency at defence (even if that minimum competency qualifies as a positional weakness).

Well that settles it, Curry is better than Jokic because “DARKO” said so . Like wtf even is that and why should we treat it like gospel?

Are you capable of making a genuine post.

“What is that” wow if only there were some way you could learn. What a mystery. How could you possibly hope to figure that out. Boohoo, you might need to look up something (that has existed and been referenced here for years…), better keep parroting PER instead.

“Why should we treat it like gospel” Because you, and many like you, seemingly cannot move past needing composite numbers to guide your player assessments, and if you are going to continually use composite numbers as a crutch, you may as well use the most decently predictive ones — even if, yes, they are slightly less handy to pull up than what basketball-reference offers.

The only reason I ever bother citing things like DPM is because so much of the discourse here is about “who has bigger number,” but I suppose my mistake there was not recognising that the real issue was “who has bigger number on the thing I use most”.

[One_and_Done]

I don't really care about advanced metrics, and yes alot of players were much better than Jokic ever has or will be.

Joined on June 3rd. Shocker it comes along with a foolish statement like this.

I am sure alot of very thoughtful, experienced posters have the same reservation about advanced stats I do. I am equally confident that if CP3 & Booker are at full health this playoffs and the Sun win in round 2 then the average sentiment about Jokic on here is quite different.

Kevin Pelton, an advanced stat guru, has admitted that using his conventional stat models the Nuggets come out as the 2nd weakest champ in 25 years. He notes that as a weakness of methodology, but that all advanced stats have some level of methodological uncertainty.

It's nice we have advancef stats, they provide some insight, but you can't rely too much on them. Some people here are doing exactly that. They say that they're not, but ultimately their opiniom always seems to align with advanced stats. We can be a bit more nuanced than that.

[Cavsfansince84]

I am sure alot of very thoughtful, experienced posters have the same reservation about advanced stats I do. I am equally confident that if CP3 & Booker are at full health this playoffs and the Sun win in round 2 then the average sentiment about Jokic on here is quite different.

Kevin Pelton, an advanced stat guru, has admitted that using his conventional stat models the Nuggets come out as the 2nd weakest champ in 25 years. He notes that as a weakness of methodology, but that all advanced stats have some level of methodological uncertainty.

It's nice we have advancef stats, they provide some insight, but you can't rely too much on them. Some people here are doing exactly that. They say that they're not, but ultimately their opiniom always seems to align with advanced stats. We can be a bit more nuanced than that.

While the bolded part is absolutely true to some degree as someone who's been into stats and metrics for quite a while I think there's always this perception from people who downplay their value that people who do use them are relying on them to the point that nothing else matters which is not how most people use them imo(sure some might but generally it's just one thing to use to evaluate players with). As to where the line is between using them too much and not enough I don't think anyone can say where that is for sure. Personally I've loved stats since the 80's for both baseball and basketball but there is a lot that stats won't catch(way more so in basketball) and I actually find that part of debate more interesting than the purely statistical side of things.

[Clyde Frazier]

I don't really care about advanced metrics, and yes alot of players were much better than Jokic ever has or will be.

Joined on June 3rd. Shocker it comes along with a foolish statement like this.

I am sure alot of very thoughtful, experienced posters have the same reservation about advanced stats I do. I am equally confident that if CP3 & Booker are at full health this playoffs and the Sun win in round 2 then the average sentiment about Jokic on here is quite different.

Kevin Pelton, an advanced stat guru, has admitted that using his conventional stat models the Nuggets come out as the 2nd weakest champ in 25 years. He notes that as a weakness of methodology, but that all advanced stats have some level of methodological uncertainty.

It's nice we have advancef stats, they provide some insight, but you can't rely too much on them. Some people here are doing exactly that. They say that they're not, but ultimately their opiniom always seems to align with advanced stats. We can be a bit more nuanced than that.

That's the thing though: you don't need advanced stats to recognize jokic's dominance over the last several years and in this title run.

[therealbig3]

Jokic is certainly more resilient offensively in the playoffs, and is definitely better defensively.

Pretty clear to me that this is Jokic tbh.

[70sFan]

People start to overrate Jokic defense now because he faced undersized team with no top slashers... interesting.

[Cavsfansince84]

People start to overrate Jokic defense now because he faced undersized team with no top slashers... interesting.

I sort of agree and I think it's similar to what Giannis was able to do against Phx in the 21 finals. Which is why I've always been big on repeated success in the playoffs rather than using one run as the ultimate show of dominance. Playoff resilience against different opponents matters though often guys do end up beating the same 2-3 teams over and over. I think people lean towards 'well he already showed he can win a ring so what does it matter if he lost in year x to team y' when to me that's the best way a player has to cement their status. Showing they can do it year after year against any team.

[AEnigma]

Yep, there is a reason most consensus rankings across the board have broadly coalesced around a “top 11”: everyone there led their teams to multiple titles. There is of course room for exception — Garnett versus Kobe is hardly a given for Kobe here just because Kobe led two title teams and Garnett only led one (although there I will note that the reasons people prefer Garnett are generally because of a standard Jokic has not met) — but part of why 2022 was so important for Curry’s legacy was him definitively proving he belonged in that pantheon outside of Durant’s presence for the 2017 and 2018 titles.

That has only a modicum of relevance to this specific three-year peak question, but worth keeping in mind this immediate desire to elevate players once they win. We saw it with Giannis, but there are echoes with Dirk, Garnett, Wade, Moses, Walton… Hindsight analysis tends to be stronger for a reason. Many people (disingenuously, but still) tried to argue the 2020 Lakers had a fluke run. Three years later, that has been thoroughly discredited, and the real outlier looks more like 2021... but maybe next year will see a Bucks/Hawks and Suns/Clippers repeat just as we saw a conference finals repeat this year. Why assume we know how Jokic and this Nuggets team will be assessed in 2026?

[Peregrine01]

People start to overrate Jokic defense now because he faced undersized team with no top slashers... interesting.

Ant was probably the best slasher they played. He’s also one of the best slashers in the game.

Anyway, I don’t think it’s the slashers that are Jokic’s biggest weakness, it’s the guards who can pull up from deep and really stretch defenses. But that’s really just Steph and Dame. Both these guys are kinda stuck on so-so teams and Jokic already beat a Dame-led team without his second best guy anyway.

[ShotCreator]

ah probably Curry. It's close enough that I would take Jokic on different teams.

Curry's offensive ceiling was just ludicrous though and this is his athletic and motor peak where his defense was good year round.


edit: Thinking harder about this I might have to go Jokic. Much much more resilient IMO. So many counters to his game and he plays a physically dominant style really well that translates to the postseason. Will still say Curry's peak is a touch higher.

[Asianiac_24]

As amazing as Curry was, Jokic is actually better offensively. Defensively even though Jokic doesn’t look like a world beater, his advanced stats suggest he’s actually pretty good on defense too. So it’s hard to go with Curry here

[One_and_Done]

Jokic is a great player. I'd put him around 20ish all-time. He's not Curry, or KD, or Giannis, or even peak Kawhi probably, because those players don't have glaring weaknesses. Kudos to Jokic for getting a good enough team around him, and a lucky draw that didn't exploit his high pick and roll weakness.

If he was playing the Harden Rockets this year he'd have been spanked in the playoffs, and nobody thinks of Harden as some GOAT like player. Similar story if this team had played the 21 Suns; they'd have been crushed.

Maybe those teams forget to check RAPTOR when they embarassed Jokic.

[GSP]

People start to overrate Jokic defense now because he faced undersized team with no top slashers... interesting.

Ant was probably the best slasher they played. He’s also one of the best slashers in the game.

Anyway, I don’t think it’s the slashers that are Jokic’s biggest weakness, it’s the guards who can pull up from deep and really stretch defenses. But that’s really just Steph and Dame. Both these guys are kinda stuck on so-so teams and Jokic already beat a Dame-led team without his second best guy anyway.

Is Steph and Dame pick and rolling and pulling up from 30+ ft a Jokic defensive issue thing...........or a Steph and Dame thing? Besides Ad and Draymond 2 of the most versatile mobile defensive bigs ever............how many bigs today are having success against that? Bam..........maybe Myles or Claxton?

Embiid is seen as one of the best defensive bigs and hes consistently struggled against pick and roll deep shooting offenses that arent on Dame or Steph level. Tatum had 24pts on 10 shots w/ Embiid guarding him in pickandroll in game 7 and that isnt the first pickandroll shooter hes struggled to defend. Rudy also whos won Dpoy 3 times had a "weakness" to Harden and Steph offenses...........

Bears mentioning Jokic perimeter defenders for Dame and Steph series was Monte, Rivers, Facu and Barton..............that looks historically weak..........w/ Kcp and Brown itd give Jokic a better chance at least hes not stopping them like a Draymond or Ad but better chance

[oaktownwarriors87]

People start to overrate Jokic defense now because he faced undersized team with no top slashers... interesting.

The Nuggets had the easiest path to a Championship ever, and it isn't even close. I gave the 2020 Lakers a hard time but these teams the Nuggets faced were well below the standard.

Championship difficulty by average opponent SRS (negatives zeroed out):

HOU 1995 6.44/5.90/3.85/7.76 (5.9875 average)
LAL 2001 3.63/7.92/6.07/4.52 (5.535 average)
CHI 1992 7.97/5.56/5.51/1.77 (5.2025 average)
LAL 2002 3.67/7.61/6.28/3.21 (5.1925 average)
LAL 2000 4.15/6.36/5.24/3.04 (4.6975 average)
DAL 2011 6.76/3.81/6.01/1.84 (4.605 average)
CLE 2016 10.38/4.08/3.49/0.43 (4.595 average)
SAS 2014 4.15/6.66/4.44/2.91 (4.54 average)
HOU 1994 6.48/4.10/4.68/2.59 (4.4625 average)
CHI 1996 6.27/5.87/6.30/(-0.67) (4.6100 average)
GSW 2022 7.02/3.12/5.37/2.15(4.415 average)
TOR 2019 6.42/8.04/2.25/0.28 (4.2475 average)
LAL 2010 3.37/4.67/5.33/3.55 (4.23 average)
SAS 2003 4.42/7.90/2.71/1.56 (4.1475 average)
CHI 1993 7.40/5.40/2.24/1.46 (4.125 average)
CHI 1991 5.73/6.25/2.45/1.88 (4.0775 average)
CHI 1997 6.94/5.34/3.67/(-3.94) (3.9875 average)
LAL 2009 6.48/3.12/3.73/2.31 (3.9075 average)
SAS 2007 3.33/3.06/7.28/1.69 (3.84 average)
SAS 2005 3.31/7.08/2.59/2.23 (3.8025 average)
BOS 2008 7.34/6.67/(-0.53)/(-2.23) (3.5025 average)
GSW 2017 2.87/7.13/4.00/(-0.23) (3.5 average)
DET 1989 6.38/2.13/4.11/1.26 (3.47 average)
MIA 2006 5.96/6.24/1.11/0.51 (3.455 average)
MIA 2012 6.44/2.26/2.59/2.39 (3.42 average)
BOS 1986 2.10/8.69/2.59/(-3.12) (3.345 average)
GSW 2018 0.59/8.21/1.48/2.89 (3.2925 average)
GSW 2015 4.08/3.82/3.62/1.13 (3.1625 average)
MIL 2021 5.67/2.14/4.24/-0.6 (3.0125 average)
LAL 1988 5.46/3.59/2.96/(-5.02) (3.0025 average)
DET 2004 4.35/4.93/1.88/0.42 (2.895 average)
LAL 1985 6.46/2.05/2.80/(-2.34) (2.8275 average)
BOS 1984 3.32/4.04/3.79/(-2.36) (2.7875 average)
MIA 2013 6.67/3.34/(-0.02)/(-1.83) (2.5025 average)
DET 1990 6.48/2.74/0.78/(-0.18) (2.500 average)
CHI 1998 6.73/3.08/(-0.39)/(-0.43) (2.4525 average)
SAS 1999 1.45/5.67/2.67/(-0.17) (2.4475 average)
LAL 2020 2.59/2.35/3.13/(-0.61) (2.0175 average)
LAL 1987 6.57/0.08/(-2.54)/(-1.14) (1.6625 average)
DEN 2023 (-0.13)/0.22/2.08/(-0.43) (0.575 average)

Not only did they face weaker competition, they themselves only had an SRS of 3.04. In modern basketball history only the 94/95 Rockets have a lower SRS, but they had to go though teams that were rated 3.85, 5.90, 6.44 & 7.76 (5.9875 average).

These Nuggets were a statistical anomaly. I wouldn't use this Championship to rank them next to the all time greats until the can prove it's more than just an anomaly.