OT: Daily Thoughts

[The Rebel]

It is pretty sad there are really only 4 good defenders on this roster and with Arthur out it is pretty obvious. It is almost sad the difference one good defender can make when your starting bigs are so terrible at it.

[pickaxe]

Ok. So we have a quality team that still makes it to the playoffs post-melo, that enters the playoffs without Gallinari. We get rid of Karl, who could make a team work even without tons of defenders on the team. We bring in Shaw to make the team better defensively. We also hope that when Shaw makes this team better defensively, they can progress beyond the first round.

Now, Shaw neither makes this team better defensively nor continues the same level of regular season progress, and we want to castigate the entire team for playing bad defense?

I need to say this now. I was not a fan of the George Karl firing simply for laughs, and was not a fan of doing it to blow the entire team up. The only reason GK should have been replaced is to improve the team. If this was supposed to mean making the first bad trade and then slowly getting rid of any shred of last season's success then the front office has bleeping lost it.

We can blow this team up, but I for one don't want to do that until we see who we're getting out of the draft.

Shaw doesn't get a free pass just because he's a new coach. IMHO George Karl needs to be rehired if this coaching staff cannot figure out how to IMPROVE the team as it was.

We had 57 wins! Best season yet!

To just give Shaw a pass this early is like throwing the franchise away. Stupid.

[The Rebel]

Ok. So we have a quality team that still makes it to the playoffs post-melo, that enters the playoffs without Gallinari. We get rid of Karl, who could make a team work even without tons of defenders on the team. We bring in Shaw to make the team better defensively. We also hope that when Shaw makes this team better defensively, they can progress beyond the first round.

Now, Shaw neither makes this team better defensively nor continues the same level of regular season progress, and we want to castigate the entire team for playing bad defense?

I need to say this now. I was not a fan of the George Karl firing simply for laughs, and was not a fan of doing it to blow the entire team up. The only reason GK should have been replaced is to improve the team. If this was supposed to mean making the first bad trade and then slowly getting rid of any shred of last season's success then the front office has bleeping lost it.

We can blow this team up, but I for one don't want to do that until we see who we're getting out of the draft.

Shaw doesn't get a free pass just because he's a new coach. IMHO George Karl needs to be rehired if this coaching staff cannot figure out how to IMPROVE the team as it was.

We had 57 wins! Best season yet!

To just give Shaw a pass this early is like throwing the franchise away. Stupid.

Last night I went to bed probably as mad as I have been at this franchise as I have been in years. I am sitting there watching a layup line on defense with the announcers talking about the team just needs to make 1 stop and that nobody wants to play defense, singing Hickson and Randolph's praises while Morris, Len, Dragic, and Barbosa are basically forming a layup line at the other end. Meanwhile they were swarming Lawson leaving plenty of room to drive into the paint for everybody else and you had Randolph and Hickson shooting 18 footers. Doesn't sound like a reasonable game plan to win if you ask me.

To me Shaw in no way gets a pass, neither does the front office, in fact that in a way is kind of my point. I thought that Shaw would have the sense to understand that this team does not have great man to man defenders, in fact the only really good to great man to man defenders on this team are Gallo and Arthur. However in the NBA you do not need great man to man defenders, with the rules currently in place man to man defense is extremely hard, but you need good to great team defenders. You know after those meetings and the 5 game winning streak I thought Shaw was finally getting it, but than these last few games I have noticed that Q went back to the bench, Faried is being asked to play man to man instead of help defense like he did in those games, Chandler and Lawson are being asked to carry the offense by themselves again, and there are 5 or 6 passes a game into the low post to have Hickson continue his inefficient scoring.

While last year having Gallo in addition to Iggy & Koufos in the starting lineup allowed the Nuggets to be good man to man defenders especially with Chandler off the bench, with Lawson and Brewer focused on the passing lanes and Faried rebounding, taking the occasional charge, and blocking the occasional shot. Karl found a way that all of them could be effective on defense. Hell even Miller was not terrible.

This year all you hear about is how the guys have to stay in front of their man, I am sorry but that is stupid, you cannot stay in front of the guards when you usually cannot touch them, very few can even stay in front of the good SFs. That was Gary Payton's point with his interview a few days ago, man to man defense does not happen in the back court anymore it is against the rules. Yet you have Faried (the only decent help defender in the starting lineup) worried about chasing PFs around at the 3 point line, and you have Hickson in the paint playing matador defense hoping to grab the rebound more than stop the guy coming down the lane with the ball. So when the opposition gets to the lane it is usually an easy layup unless Mozgov is in there. There is no help defense on 95% of the plays, just trying to play man up, which is incredibly stupid considering the rules and the personnel.

Which brings me to my next topic, why the hell did they sign Hickson? He is a poor man's Faried with a couple of more post moves, and slightly better at man to man post defense, but not the rebounder Faried is, no where near as efficient as Faried, and he is one of the worst big man help defenders I have seen in a very long time. I understand if the plan was to have him next to McGee and than trade Faried along with Miller or something for a stud young center or SG, but if that was the plan why are both Hickson and Faried here?

Hell for that matter why is Andre Miller still here? You brought in 2 combo guards, you have a starting PG, and a SG that can and has played decently as an emergency PG, so if the plan is too move Andre, why is he not gone? Why did he end up benched with no warning and being sent home because he was obviously replaced, yet when he had his most value last summer you decided to just sit on him?

One thing about Ujiri was that when the time came to make a move, he made the move, he did not mismanage team assets this horribly. Andre Miller and Faried have both lost considerable value due to Shaw not understanding how to properly utilize them, and the front office bringing in guys to replace them, and than not moving them.

You see I think the Nuggets had every intention on changing the style that the team played, I believe that they brought in Hickson thinking he was better with McGee than Faried is in the half court, they counted on McGee making dramatic improvements as well, and they brought in Foye & Robinson knowing they were both better in a half court game. They also hired a coach who obviously does not want to run. they also reportedly were shopping both Faried and Andre all summer up until now, both of whom are not the best fits on a half court team. The problem is that they did not actually follow through on it, they went half way bringing in a coach and free agents to fill roles in a half court offense, but not trading their redundant pieces for upgrades to make a half court team even come close to working.

[Powder Blue]

Ok. So we have a quality team that still makes it to the playoffs post-melo, that enters the playoffs without Gallinari. We get rid of Karl, who could make a team work even without tons of defenders on the team. We bring in Shaw to make the team better defensively. We also hope that when Shaw makes this team better defensively, they can progress beyond the first round.

Now, Shaw neither makes this team better defensively nor continues the same level of regular season progress, and we want to castigate the entire team for playing bad defense?

I need to say this now. I was not a fan of the George Karl firing simply for laughs, and was not a fan of doing it to blow the entire team up. The only reason GK should have been replaced is to improve the team. If this was supposed to mean making the first bad trade and then slowly getting rid of any shred of last season's success then the front office has bleeping lost it.

We can blow this team up, but I for one don't want to do that until we see who we're getting out of the draft.

Shaw doesn't get a free pass just because he's a new coach. IMHO George Karl needs to be rehired if this coaching staff cannot figure out how to IMPROVE the team as it was.

We had 57 wins! Best season yet!

To just give Shaw a pass this early is like throwing the franchise away. Stupid.

Rehire Karl? Are you F'ing kidding me. Karl got a pass for years after being out-coached year after year after year....after year in the playoffs. Now Shaw gets a less talented/injury-ridden team and after 40 games he should be shown the door. All of your complaints are about the roster construction...which Shaw isn't responsible for. Bench Hickson for more Q and Moz and we're still a .500 team plain and simple.

[Teens On Acid]

yeaaaa let's not bring Karl back.
Hickson frustrates the hell out of me. he's obviously putting in effort, or maybe it's a ghost effort..to make it look like he's trying his best so Shaw leaves him out there?

Definitely agree on more Moz and Q.

[pickaxe]

Ok. So we have a quality team that still makes it to the playoffs post-melo, that enters the playoffs without Gallinari. We get rid of Karl, who could make a team work even without tons of defenders on the team. We bring in Shaw to make the team better defensively. We also hope that when Shaw makes this team better defensively, they can progress beyond the first round.

Now, Shaw neither makes this team better defensively nor continues the same level of regular season progress, and we want to castigate the entire team for playing bad defense?

I need to say this now. I was not a fan of the George Karl firing simply for laughs, and was not a fan of doing it to blow the entire team up. The only reason GK should have been replaced is to improve the team. If this was supposed to mean making the first bad trade and then slowly getting rid of any shred of last season's success then the front office has bleeping lost it.

We can blow this team up, but I for one don't want to do that until we see who we're getting out of the draft.

Shaw doesn't get a free pass just because he's a new coach. IMHO George Karl needs to be rehired if this coaching staff cannot figure out how to IMPROVE the team as it was.

We had 57 wins! Best season yet!

To just give Shaw a pass this early is like throwing the franchise away. Stupid.

Rehire Karl? Are you F'ing kidding me. Karl got a pass for years after being out-coached year after year after year....after year in the playoffs. Now Shaw gets a less talented/injury-ridden team and after 40 games he should be shown the door. All of your complaints are about the roster construction...which Shaw isn't responsible for. Bench Hickson for more Q and Moz and we're still a .500 team plain and simple.

No, I am not kidding. I understand every complaint about Karl and joined in on every criticism after every lazy game he notched. My point is, regardless if Shaw has not had any time I do not want at any time to just get lax and end up with an even worse result than Karl would have produced.

This is simply a production issue. If Shaw produces something we can visibly see being a work progressing beyond what we were used to with Karl, losses are more acceptable up front. If we fired Karl and then start lapping up something even worse than Karl would have given us......look, I just don't get angry and cut my nose off to spite my face. Karl deserved one last year -if, and only if, what we've done to replace him isn't any better. You don't get second chances in life to build up a track record and momentum like the Nuggets had from 2005 onward.

It's a valid complaint to not want to get ousted in the 1st round of the playoffs, yet it is also a valid concern to ensure you can even get a ticket to the dance.

If Shaw can produce a ticket to the dance, and demonstrate a better fighting spirit than Karl in the playoffs, I will consider all of my whining null and void.

(and of course the front office messed up the roster, but we already talked about that....)

[pickaxe]

Ok. So we have a quality team that still makes it to the playoffs post-melo, that enters the playoffs without Gallinari. We get rid of Karl, who could make a team work even without tons of defenders on the team. We bring in Shaw to make the team better defensively. We also hope that when Shaw makes this team better defensively, they can progress beyond the first round.

Now, Shaw neither makes this team better defensively nor continues the same level of regular season progress, and we want to castigate the entire team for playing bad defense?

I need to say this now. I was not a fan of the George Karl firing simply for laughs, and was not a fan of doing it to blow the entire team up. The only reason GK should have been replaced is to improve the team. If this was supposed to mean making the first bad trade and then slowly getting rid of any shred of last season's success then the front office has bleeping lost it.

We can blow this team up, but I for one don't want to do that until we see who we're getting out of the draft.

Shaw doesn't get a free pass just because he's a new coach. IMHO George Karl needs to be rehired if this coaching staff cannot figure out how to IMPROVE the team as it was.

We had 57 wins! Best season yet!

To just give Shaw a pass this early is like throwing the franchise away. Stupid.

Last night I went to bed probably as mad as I have been at this franchise as I have been in years. I am sitting there watching a layup line on defense with the announcers talking about the team just needs to make 1 stop and that nobody wants to play defense, singing Hickson and Randolph's praises while Morris, Len, Dragic, and Barbosa are basically forming a layup line at the other end. Meanwhile they were swarming Lawson leaving plenty of room to drive into the paint for everybody else and you had Randolph and Hickson shooting 18 footers. Doesn't sound like a reasonable game plan to win if you ask me.

To me Shaw in no way gets a pass, neither does the front office, in fact that in a way is kind of my point. I thought that Shaw would have the sense to understand that this team does not have great man to man defenders, in fact the only really good to great man to man defenders on this team are Gallo and Arthur. However in the NBA you do not need great man to man defenders, with the rules currently in place man to man defense is extremely hard, but you need good to great team defenders. You know after those meetings and the 5 game winning streak I thought Shaw was finally getting it, but than these last few games I have noticed that Q went back to the bench, Faried is being asked to play man to man instead of help defense like he did in those games, Chandler and Lawson are being asked to carry the offense by themselves again, and there are 5 or 6 passes a game into the low post to have Hickson continue his inefficient scoring.

While last year having Gallo in addition to Iggy & Koufos in the starting lineup allowed the Nuggets to be good man to man defenders especially with Chandler off the bench, with Lawson and Brewer focused on the passing lanes and Faried rebounding, taking the occasional charge, and blocking the occasional shot. Karl found a way that all of them could be effective on defense. Hell even Miller was not terrible.

This year all you hear about is how the guys have to stay in front of their man, I am sorry but that is stupid, you cannot stay in front of the guards when you usually cannot touch them, very few can even stay in front of the good SFs. That was Gary Payton's point with his interview a few days ago, man to man defense does not happen in the back court anymore it is against the rules. Yet you have Faried (the only decent help defender in the starting lineup) worried about chasing PFs around at the 3 point line, and you have Hickson in the paint playing matador defense hoping to grab the rebound more than stop the guy coming down the lane with the ball. So when the opposition gets to the lane it is usually an easy layup unless Mozgov is in there. There is no help defense on 95% of the plays, just trying to play man up, which is incredibly stupid considering the rules and the personnel.

Which brings me to my next topic, why the hell did they sign Hickson? He is a poor man's Faried with a couple of more post moves, and slightly better at man to man post defense, but not the rebounder Faried is, no where near as efficient as Faried, and he is one of the worst big man help defenders I have seen in a very long time. I understand if the plan was to have him next to McGee and than trade Faried along with Miller or something for a stud young center or SG, but if that was the plan why are both Hickson and Faried here?

Hell for that matter why is Andre Miller still here? You brought in 2 combo guards, you have a starting PG, and a SG that can and has played decently as an emergency PG, so if the plan is too move Andre, why is he not gone? Why did he end up benched with no warning and being sent home because he was obviously replaced, yet when he had his most value last summer you decided to just sit on him?

One thing about Ujiri was that when the time came to make a move, he made the move, he did not mismanage team assets this horribly. Andre Miller and Faried have both lost considerable value due to Shaw not understanding how to properly utilize them, and the front office bringing in guys to replace them, and than not moving them.

You see I think the Nuggets had every intention on changing the style that the team played, I believe that they brought in Hickson thinking he was better with McGee than Faried is in the half court, they counted on McGee making dramatic improvements as well, and they brought in Foye & Robinson knowing they were both better in a half court game. They also hired a coach who obviously does not want to run. they also reportedly were shopping both Faried and Andre all summer up until now, both of whom are not the best fits on a half court team. The problem is that they did not actually follow through on it, they went half way bringing in a coach and free agents to fill roles in a half court offense, but not trading their redundant pieces for upgrades to make a half court team even come close to working.

Seeing how the Blazers are playing this year and the fact Hickson got a pass playing with LeBron...... the Hickson acquisition can definitely take a more concerning position than the Karl situation.

Hey, if we need to move Hickson to remain in a good position then we need to do it. If having Hickson in the lineup with Shaw is like having Boykins in the lineup with Karl, then.......yeah......

[Powder Blue]

Ok. So we have a quality team that still makes it to the playoffs post-melo, that enters the playoffs without Gallinari. We get rid of Karl, who could make a team work even without tons of defenders on the team. We bring in Shaw to make the team better defensively. We also hope that when Shaw makes this team better defensively, they can progress beyond the first round.

Now, Shaw neither makes this team better defensively nor continues the same level of regular season progress, and we want to castigate the entire team for playing bad defense?

I need to say this now. I was not a fan of the George Karl firing simply for laughs, and was not a fan of doing it to blow the entire team up. The only reason GK should have been replaced is to improve the team. If this was supposed to mean making the first bad trade and then slowly getting rid of any shred of last season's success then the front office has bleeping lost it.

We can blow this team up, but I for one don't want to do that until we see who we're getting out of the draft.

Shaw doesn't get a free pass just because he's a new coach. IMHO George Karl needs to be rehired if this coaching staff cannot figure out how to IMPROVE the team as it was.

We had 57 wins! Best season yet!

To just give Shaw a pass this early is like throwing the franchise away. Stupid.

Rehire Karl? Are you F'ing kidding me. Karl got a pass for years after being out-coached year after year after year....after year in the playoffs. Now Shaw gets a less talented/injury-ridden team and after 40 games he should be shown the door. All of your complaints are about the roster construction...which Shaw isn't responsible for. Bench Hickson for more Q and Moz and we're still a .500 team plain and simple.

No, I am not kidding. I understand every complaint about Karl and joined in on every criticism after every lazy game he notched. My point is, regardless if Shaw has not had any time I do not want at any time to just get lax and end up with an even worse result than Karl would have produced.

This is simply a production issue. If Shaw produces something we can visibly see being a work progressing beyond what we were used to with Karl, losses are more acceptable up front. If we fired Karl and then start lapping up something even worse than Karl would have given us......look, I just don't get angry and cut my nose off to spite my face. Karl deserved one last year -if, and only if, what we've done to replace him isn't any better. You don't get second chances in life to build up a track record and momentum like the Nuggets had from 2005 onward.

It's a valid complaint to not want to get ousted in the 1st round of the playoffs, yet it is also a valid concern to ensure you can even get a ticket to the dance.

If Shaw can produce a ticket to the dance, and demonstrate a better fighting spirit than Karl in the playoffs, I will consider all of my whining null and void.

(and of course the front office messed up the roster, but we already talked about that....)

The pieces available to play aren't good enough to get the Nuggets to the second round, no matter the coach. The same can not be said for most of the teams Karl had. It's unfair to expect more from Shaw in half a season when he's been given less than what Karl EVER had to work with.

Now that Gallo is out maybe the FO makes some moves to free up PT for the young guys. Shaw can't just bench all the vets, it kills their trade value.

[Powder Blue]

Tim Connelly interview...not much insight but a rare chance to hear from the front office.

http://stationcaster.com/player_skinned ... &f=2341243

[RRFB]

I'd really like to see us go after Greg Monroe and Larry Sanders. Not sure we have the assets to get them both but I'd be willing to trade anyone outside of Lawson/Gallo/Fournier (prefer to keep Mozzy and Q too). We would have to find a taker for McGee which would be tough but I don't mind trading the Knicks pick to do it, and/or any future picks.

[The Rebel]

I'd really like to see us go after Greg Monroe and Larry Sanders. Not sure we have the assets to get them both but I'd be willing to trade anyone outside of Lawson/Gallo/Fournier (prefer to keep Mozzy and Q too). We would have to find a taker for McGee which would be tough but I don't mind trading the Knicks pick to do it, and/or any future picks.

The problem with Sanders and Monroe is neither of them will step out to guard the stretch 4s, also neither of them have a jumpshot making spacing in the middle terrible on offense.

[josh_nuggets]

What do u think about going after markieef? (The better of the twins) Morris?

[josh_nuggets]

What do u think about going after markieef? (The better of the twins) Morris?

[Teens On Acid]

just expanding on what was posted in the vs Boston thread...

Wasn't sure where to put this, so feel free to move it, copy it, whatever.

This is from Sam Amico's chat at noon over at foxsportsohio.com. Take it for what it's worth:

FOX Sports Ohio: I'd watch out for the Rockets. Keep hearing the Nuggets, too, although not sure how real that is.

LINK.

Comment From Timmy
What teams are interested in Jeff Green?

FOX Sports Ohio: I'd watch out for the Rockets. Keep hearing the Nuggets, too, although not sure how real that is.

ok...so i don't think i'd go after Green. hasn't been shooting well, we already have the SF position locked up with Wilson and Quincy. what do you guys think?

[torotoe]

http://stats.nba.com/playerTrackingRebo ... **GP*GE*10

Contested vs. un-contested boards. It confirms the eye test... Mozgov has a good %, Faried's is decent, and Hickson is a bit of a stat padder. I would love to see McGee's numbers on this, but alas, player tracking stats are not available before 2013-14.

[Powder Blue]

So what are we gonna do without a PG now? Have the media write a couple puff pieces and bring Andre back? This whole situation is ridiculous, if you don't want the guy around the team fine, but then trade his ass, his stock isn't growing sitting and home not playing or practicing.

[Powder Blue]

Also I'm calling it right now, when Miller IS traded the return will be equal to what could have been acquired a month ago when he was first put on the block.

[RRFB]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/dempseypost/status/428994313960165376[/tweet]

It'll be interesting to see what happens if Nate's gonna be out for a while. Fournier and Foye are more than capable of taking over his ball-handling duties but it's not very practical with Lawson injured too. I really have a tough time seeing them bringing back Andre at this point.

[Teens On Acid]

nope. huge step back for the development of Fours IMO. get a d-leaguer for a backup. No more Miller.

[83SixersRocked]

Shaw is looking like D'Antoni II from where I sit. Gotta have a scapegoat. Miller's never been a problem, and in this day and age demanding blind adherence is a losing game; unless of course you have a few rings as a coach.