What in the Hell Can the Nuggets Do?

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Basically, this suggests that Denver's starting 5 is fine, but that they have no depth and that their bench guys aren't even NBA players. Whenever their bench guys come in, their performance plummets.

not really, if you dig a bit deeper you'll notice an interesting trend.
basically everyone in the roster looks at least ok when playing with Jokic, absolutely awful without him.
and this has been the same, over and over, for too many years. even when they won the title.
I think the coach deserves to b held accountable for that, is he putting his guys in position to succeed or he's just riding the greatness of his best player?

[sashaturiaf]

Basically, this suggests that Denver's starting 5 is fine, but that they have no depth and that their bench guys aren't even NBA players. Whenever their bench guys come in, their performance plummets.

not really, if you dig a bit deeper you'll notice an interesting trend.
basically everyone in the roster looks at least ok when playing with Jokic, absolutely awful without him.
and this has been the same, over and over, for too many years. even when they won the title.
I think the coach deserves to b held accountable for that, is he putting his guys in position to succeed or he's just riding the greatness of his best player?

Joker is that rare calibur of player where he makes guys around him look so much better than they are and get them paid above their abilities to a degree that it hurts his own team down the road.

Only way he can overcome this is to become a team hopping mercenary like Lebron but he doesn't seem built like that. The NBA is lucky he isn't otherwise he'll probably win 7+ rings or something and ruin the league for everyone else.

[Edrees]

I've been saying Murray is overrated for the past 2 years and I got nothing but down votes. I said he never made an all star team and all I heard was well the west is stacked and he's better than some all stars. I guess it's just how the wind blows.

I think the Nuggest miss KCP. Good defender and perfect fit for their roster as a floor spacing 3p shooter.

you can't get down votes on Real GM buddy. We can't get held responsible here for what people say on another forum

[Ryoga Hibiki]

People keep dissing Porter Jr, but he's been their second best player and has not missed a single game (unlike Jokic, Gordon and Murray). Malone sat two starters against the Wizards, while also not building any confidence in his bench. When is the coach going to get blame for sucking? Every other coach gets smoke, but this guy somehow escapes it. Jay Huff is averaging nearly 10ppg off the bench for Memphis this season and the guy wouldn't play him last year.

Thank you, I’ve been saying this all year. Even if the Nuggets got a true backup big Malone wouldn’t know it if he was sitting 6 feet away from him… which is literally true in the case of guys like Huff and Hartenstein. Makes me wonder if Nnaji is actually bad or Malone just doesn’t know how to use him.

I do agree with this that Mike Malone don't know how good he had with the bigs he had before under Jokic. Zeke could be good under a different system like I.Hart and Jay Huff.

They still don't have good pieces on the bench even if Zeke is lowkey good. And they can't seem to score at all. It appears they don't run any actions. They run iso. If that's the case, they should get a player who is solid at isos and get more 3nd guys. They can barely score anyway. They have by far the worst bench in the league when it comes to net rating.

I don't think firing Mike Malone is going to do anything with the roster that they have.

as bad as they are, they are not that bad. I can't accept that any combination of starters+bench that doesn't include Jokic just appears to not know how to play basketball.
there must be an issue in the way the coach prepares them.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Giving MPJ the max was the nail in the coffin. You dont give a player like that the max. Letting go of Bruce Brown amd KCP was also when the dominoes started to fall and giving Murray the max (while understandable) wasnt great

This move has hampered the Nuggets depth ever since. MPJ wasn’t worth half what they paid him and it prevented them from keeping depth pieces.

MPJ easily worth 80% of that contract, probably even more.
you're not paying attention at what the market is

[Ryoga Hibiki]

great post. The championship year they had a supersub Bruce Brown. They are missing someone like him to fill this role.

2023 DEN
Bruce Brown's NetRtg without Jokic: -10.5

it's the same BS, over and over again. This team is poorly coached, if you looked at what they are without Jokic.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

I know it's hindsight because everyone else passed on the guy as well, but drafting Trayce Jackson-Davis instead of Pickett or Tyson sure would have been nice.

I think Tyson can play, if given a bit more of a leash.
And TJD would look awful, as he would play ZERO minutes with Jokic.

[Exp0sed]

the joker is averaging 31 14 10 48 against the hawks

there's literally nothing more he can do. this FO sucks.

The crazy part is his assists are down the last couple of games because he's playing with Westbrook and letting him set alot of the plays. WB had double digit assists in the last two games without Murray

He's also still over 50% from 3 on decent volume, it's been 25 games, not a tiny sample lol. That's with being one of the few players to consistently attempt full and halfcourt buzzer heaves

This week he even tried this volleyball heave lmfao:

https://youtube.com/shorts/bMe0opq8AtQ?si=TlHSaWaHfeiOYt4X

[jbk1234]

People keep dissing Porter Jr, but he's been their second best player and has not missed a single game (unlike Jokic, Gordon and Murray). Malone sat two starters against the Wizards, while also not building any confidence in his bench. When is the coach going to get blame for sucking? Every other coach gets smoke, but this guy somehow escapes it. Jay Huff is averaging nearly 10ppg off the bench for Memphis this season and the guy wouldn't play him last year.

This isn't even Malone's first screw-up with a backup big. He had Hartenstein back in the day and had him buried on the bench. He is absolutely horrendous in developing young players, but has gotten away with it because Jokic covers up so much. Dude deserves to be canned at the end of this season.

Most teams either contend or develop, but not both. It's hard to develop guys without them seeing meaningful minutes and it's hard for contenders to play third options meaningful minutes. In any event, Hartenstein priced himself out of L.A. three years ago and NYC last summer. I don't see a realistic scenario where he'd still be on Denver's roster.

The Nuggets shouldn't have offered Murray that extension and overreacted to KCP leaving. There were plenty of reasons to suspect Murray would never play up to that contract before it was offered and really no reason to rush the decision. If I've already paid a player tens of millions to rehab his knee and not play, I'm not worrying about hurt feelings. The stakes are too high to with Jokic on the roster.

[Celts17Pride]

This just shows how important it is for teams to spend big money on the right players. One bad decision by any team puts you in NBA hell with the aprons, tax penalties and trade restrictions. Thank you Adam Silver.

The new NBA CBA makes it almost impossible to trade a player like Murray even if you wanted to trade him because every team is worried about the future aprons, tax penalties and trade restrictions. So teams like Denver, Philly, Milwaukee, eventually Boston, New York etc. are basically stuck. Makes for a fun NBA.

Sad to see a generational player like Jokic stuck in mediocracy because there is no way to get out.

[GeorgeSears]

Answer: Not much. Perhaps trade Nnaji for a lesser role player. There's no cavalry on the way.

[wco81]

Thing is the team is shooting well, 49.2% overall and 38.3% from 3.

Jokic, Braun, Gordon and Strawther are over 40% and MPJ is 38.3. Even Westbrook is shooting better than he has previously.

What would be their record if they weren’t hitting? Joker is obviously getting them good looks.

If they firm up their defense, they can still be a threat in the playoffs. Jokic and other starters will play more minutes.

They have one of the richest owners in the league, if not all of sports. But it appears they don’t want to spend too much in a medium sized market.

Jokic is still going to be one of the most unstoppable players in the playoffs.

[nomansland]

They have one of the richest owners in the league, if not all of sports. But it appears they don’t want to spend too much in a medium sized market.

I don't understand why people keep saying the Kroenkes don't want to spend. I don't know where to find the history but I'm pretty sure they were top 10 in spending the past few years. They spent to bring Iverson over.

Besides, do you think it's a good idea to spend $22m on KCP and go into the 2nd apron? That 2nd apron stuff is not just about spending and it's crippling. The Nuggets would be in even a worse position than they are now. And Braun is playing as well as KCP, their games are just a little different.

[zero rings]

Thing is the team is shooting well, 49.2% overall and 38.3% from 3.

Jokic, Braun, Gordon and Strawther are over 40% and MPJ is 38.3. Even Westbrook is shooting better than he has previously.

What would be their record if they weren’t hitting? Joker is obviously getting them good looks.

If they firm up their defense, they can still be a threat in the playoffs. Jokic and other starters will play more minutes.

They have one of the richest owners in the league, if not all of sports. But it appears they don’t want to spend too much in a medium sized market.

Jokic is still going to be one of the most unstoppable players in the playoffs.

The Nuggets are dead last in 3 point attempts by a big margin. This has been an issue for years and it's the #1 reason the bench is so consistently bad.

Ultimately, it's on Malone to get these role players to shoot it with confidence. There's no reason anyone not named Jokic or Gordon should be shooting less than 50% of their field goals from 3. That's how you get value out of role players in today's game.

If Malone won't coach them into playing like a modern NBA team, they should fire him and get someone who will.

[_NoMas]

MPJ is actually playing pretty well, and he’s their only trade piece to get something half decent back (Murray can’t be traded this year).

They could trade MPJ for either Schroder/Cam Johnson or Bogdan B and DeAndre Hunter. Would either team accept that, and would it make Denver better?

[Chanel Bomber]

Basically, this suggests that Denver's starting 5 is fine, but that they have no depth and that their bench guys aren't even NBA players. Whenever their bench guys come in, their performance plummets.

not really, if you dig a bit deeper you'll notice an interesting trend.
basically everyone in the roster looks at least ok when playing with Jokic, absolutely awful without him.
and this has been the same, over and over, for too many years. even when they won the title.
I think the coach deserves to b held accountable for that, is he putting his guys in position to succeed or he's just riding the greatness of his best player?

Yes but EPM is supposed to extract the noise and it suggests they are still making a positive contribution overall.

But I agree the issue is they've become entirely Jokic-dependent and I think it's both a talent issue and a coaching issue. Their bench is a complete wasteland - to me it's the bigger problem. But staggered lineups without Jokic shouldn't be this bad, and this suggests there is a coaching problem.

I'd try to make some moves to bolster the bench before firing the coach. But the latter should be considered.

[Inspektor1312]

I think the first to blame is the coach. I get that Jokic makes players better, but when he's on the bench, they aren't even setting up plays. They're just passing around the perimeter and chucking threes.

It's laughably bad.

[dc]

Sad to see a generational player like Jokic stuck in mediocracy because there is no way to get out.

It was just about 18 months ago that we were talking about how the Nugz were setup with a solid core for a dynastic run and Booth made his not 1-not 2-not 3 statement. Main issue is Murray has fallen off in a big way and the team lost depth due to the lux tax.

Nugz still have time in the long run to contend. Jokic is still young and his game should age well. Warriors won a title when people thought they were done and Curry was in his 30s, so a lot of moves can still happen in the next 4-5 years.

[AussieBuck]

Thin team that plays bizarre hockey lineup changes. Got 4 borderline guys off the bench? Anyone else has the star hold them together in an alternative second unit, Malone leaves the bench guys out to dry 15 minutes a game. Just **** weird.

[Celts17Pride]

Sad to see a generational player like Jokic stuck in mediocracy because there is no way to get out.

It was just about 18 months ago that we were talking about how the Nugz were setup with a solid core for a dynastic run and Booth made his not 1-not 2-not 3 statement. Main issue is Murray has fallen off in a big way and the team lost depth due to the lux tax.

Nugz still have time in the long run to contend. Jokic is still young and his game should age well. Warriors won a title when people thought they were done and Curry was in his 30s, so a lot of moves can still happen in the next 4-5 years.

Not that easy. The new CBA purposely will limit player movement. NBA teams basically fall into these categories:

1. Teams over the 2nd apron
2. Teams in the 1st apron that don't want to be in the 2nd apron.
3. Teams trying to stay out of the 1st apron
4. Teams that have to pay young players real soon and don't want to take on salary.
5. Teams that are bad and willing to take a player for multiple 1st round draft picks.

Not a recipe for player movement. Denver is basically stuck.

Good teams just need to get lucky with 2nd round picks and vet min contracts.