At what point does familiarity become fatigue? When does the spark and sizzle of chemistry go flat? After last year’s demoralizing defeat to the Timberwolves in Game 7 of the second round, the Denver Nuggets are hoping that they won’t find out the answer anytime soon.
Although the Nuggets won a championship only 15 months ago, their future suddenly doesn’t seem quite as bulletproof as their past. For starters, the team is worse. Back-to-back summers of thriftiness (read: miserly-ness) and shoddy drafting have led the Nuggets to jettison key veterans—Bruce Brown and Jeff Green last year, now Kentavious Caldwell-Pope—without having adequate replacements waiting in the wings. Outside the core four of Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon and Michael Porter Jr., the Nuggets don’t have a fifth good player.
For the most part, Denver has been able to cut corners because Jokic is so good it’s almost immaterial who his teammates are. But by letting important players walk in free agency and failing to replace them, the Nuggets have become a less versatile, less dynamic version of themselves. They’re no longer built around Jokic; they’re held up by him.
But being so Jokic-centric presents inherent difficulties. Since Jokic does his damage almost exclusively inside the arc, the Nuggets put up the fewest threes of any team last season. What’s more, Jokic shoots relatively few free throws compared to other high-octane offensive engines and lacks the craft/moral depravity to foul bait effectively. By effectively scorning two of the most efficient forms of offense, the Nuggets spot their opponent a few points before the game even begins.
While the Nuggets’ unique style doesn’t necessarily lend itself to high-volume three-point shooting, the bigger issue is that they have fewer good shooters than any contender in recent memory. With Caldwell-Pope off to Orlando, the Nuggets have just two players who made more than 1.5 threes per game last season. Porter stands as Denver’s best—and maybe only—hope to tilt the math in their favor.
Once the most decorated teenage basketball player in the country, Porter has seen his career scuppered by a hobbled back. A series of gnarly spinal surgeries have robbed him of any wiggle and shake, forcing him to reimagine himself as an elite off-ball player.
Since joining the Nuggets, he’s adopted a leaner offensive approach: he only shoots. Among the league’s top 100 scorers, Porter averaged the eighth-shortest time of possession and the 10th fewest dribbles per touch, but also scored the third-most catch-and-shoot points. He’s basically the hardwood vision of a place-kicker—he nets his team three points at a time by mastering one specific task.
Last year, though, Porter was somewhat timid—his 20.7 percent usage rate was the lowest since his rookie year; he jacked up nearly two fewer threes per 100 possessions than he did during Denver’s title season. To be sure, these numbers aren’t necessarily significant on their own, but Porter's involvement in the offense is a key bellwether for the team’s overall success. When Porter shot more than 10 threes, the Nuggets went 9-3; Denver had the equivalent of the second best offense in the league with Porter Jr. on the court and the equivalent of the sixth worst when he was off it.
This year, Porter is a load-bearing pillar of the Nuggets’ offense; even if he can’t create his own shot in a traditional sense, he needs to leverage his presence and his movement to create shots for the whole team.
On a roster mostly devoid of shooting, there’s no substitute for what he provides. He’s the underlying bridge that allows Denver’s finest moments to sing. The Jokic-Murray pick-and-roll works best when Porter clears out the space for them to run it; Jokic can connect on alley-oops with Gordon because Porter removes the low-man from the equation. When he’s active and aggressive, Porter functions as a giant-sized Klay Thompson, yanking help defenders out of position as he roams around the court. Conversely, when he’s passive, he just kinda stands there.
As such, Porter performance this season represents the Nuggets’ first major inflection point. If the Nuggets underperform and Porter underwhelms, the three years and $115 million left on his contract might seem like a luxury that Denver can no longer afford. Trading him would open some space between them and the second apron, creating the flexibility that they currently lack. While Denver lavished a max contract on Porter because of his special blend of size and shooting, he’s never manifested his theoretical talents.
Entering next season, the Nuggets are in a bind—Jokic is at the peak of his powers, but the rest of the roster has been hollowed out around him. Realizing that they’re closer to the end of the Jokic era than they are to the beginning, the coaching staff is losing patience with the front office. There’s no time to hope that Porter can make good on his potential or that Murray can regain his mojo. At a certain point, Jokic’s teammates have to help him as much as he helps them. Unless Porter shoots more, the Nuggets might be shot.
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