Game 80: Oklahoma City Thunder (45-34) @ Denver Nuggets (38-41) - 5:00 PM ET

[ducler]

[DusterBuster]

Why are there so many Thunder fans in Denver today? Watching the game on league pass and it practically sounds like a Thunder home game in Denver today...

[The Rebel]

Why are there so many Thunder fans in Denver today? Watching the game on league pass and it practically sounds like a Thunder home game in Denver today...

Russell Westbrook is going for the triple double record today, I heard tickets were going for big money today and most nuggets fans feel like we lost the playoffs a couple of games ago when Nelson came back to ensure no playoffs.

[skywalker33]

Why are there so many Thunder fans in Denver today? Watching the game on league pass and it practically sounds like a Thunder home game in Denver today...

Russell Westbrook is going for the triple double record today, I heard tickets were going for big money today and most nuggets fans feel like we lost the playoffs a couple of games ago when Nelson came back to ensure no playoffs.

History in the making for Thunder fans, want to see RW break the triple-double record.

[skywalker33]

Looks like Gallo is in full free agency audition mode

[DusterBuster]

Why are there so many Thunder fans in Denver today? Watching the game on league pass and it practically sounds like a Thunder home game in Denver today...

Russell Westbrook is going for the triple double record today, I heard tickets were going for big money today and most nuggets fans feel like we lost the playoffs a couple of games ago when Nelson came back to ensure no playoffs.

Wasn't aware he was going for the record, makes sense.

[Mickey8]

NBA refs are garbage

[MidMountain]

NBA refs are garbage

The flagrant foul call on Jokic was the most ridiculously bad call I've seen all year!

[Lala870]

NBA refs are garbage

Did not watch any of this game but in the NBA you either have a BIG name player (like durant, lebron) or you will have no success and can almost always look forward to the offseason. I think the nuggets have a decent team that could hang with a lot of teams in the playoffs but they lack big names.

[SoCalNuggsFan]

First Nuggets game at Pepsi. Everyone rooting for/against the triple double was fun. OKC was straight gifted an extra possession on the flagrant and 4 FTs between the tech and the pump fake jump into you. Awful officiating but they got what they wanted.

[Mickey8]

That decision was done to give an ugly Oklahoma team a life, all game long refs were awful, they let Oklahoma play physical defense not calling clear fouls on Adams and others, on the other end they whistle bs phantom calls, its laughable how some games outcomes are staged by refs, all three Houston games were highway robbery , can't believe Denver fans are giving standing ovation to a whining gremlin

[Mickey8]

First Nuggets game at Pepsi. Everyone rooting for/against the triple double was fun. OKC was straight gifted an extra possession on the flagrant and 4 FTs between the tech and the pump fake jump into you. Awful officiating but they got what they wanted.

And than you wonder why the most NBA teams are not competitive , not just that the top talent is concentrated in a few teams, but you have to deal with crappy referring every night . Its all spectacle to promote few top players

[DusterBuster]

First Nuggets game at Pepsi. Everyone rooting for/against the triple double was fun. OKC was straight gifted an extra possession on the flagrant and 4 FTs between the tech and the pump fake jump into you. Awful officiating but they got what they wanted.

That flagrant call on Jokic was pretty weak. I can't remember the last time I saw a flagrant called when the player barely touched the guy he fouled.

[skywalker33]

First Nuggets game at Pepsi. Everyone rooting for/against the triple double was fun. OKC was straight gifted an extra possession on the flagrant and 4 FTs between the tech and the pump fake jump into you. Awful officiating but they got what they wanted.

That flagrant call on Jokic was pretty weak. I can't remember the last time I saw a flagrant called when the player barely touched the guy he fouled.

For weak fouls, watch more Nuggets games...but I'd bet the Blazers get their share as well.

[Mickey8]

Also I can't believe how weak is Denver home court, It feels like every Nuggets home game is away game or a game on neutral court and on some night they even get booed at home , to applaud and cheer for the opposing player when you are fighting to keep play off hopes alive , is just mind boggling , definitely one of the weaker fan cultures in the league .

[DusterBuster]

“I asked him, ‘Why?’ and he told me, ‘I don’t want to talk to you,’ ” Jokic said. “I said, ‘OK,’ and walked away as Westbrook was shooting, and I get a technical. If I get a technical for saying OK, I’m good with that.”

“Kenny Mauer said, ‘We told him to walk away and he didn’t,’ ” Nuggets coach Michael Malone added. “That was the explanation I got. My thing to Kenny was, with two minutes left to go in the game, that’s a tough call to make, in my opinion, when the game is hanging in the balance. It wasn’t anything demonstrative. It wasn’t anything cursing. It wasn’t anything over the top. He called it. He must have felt it was the right call.”

If this is actually how this went down, that's some Grade A bull-s right there.

It wasn't even a chippy game, so there was no reason to be that sensitive with throwing out T's like that. This is the reason people like Cuban are so vocal about calling out refs.

[NuggetsWY]

I thought the Nuggets played their usual game; one good period, a couple of average period and one terrible period. They haven't learned how to win a game but that's also a thing for the coach. The coach can't play the game, but he needs to motivate and manage the rotation so that hot players play and nobody is too tired. Lots of minutes, especially for Gallinari & Chandler, probably didn't leave any energy for that 4th quarter.

[DusterBuster]

I thought the Nuggets played their usual game; one good period, a couple of average period and one terrible period. They haven't learned how to win a game but that's also a thing for the coach. The coach can't play the game, but he needs to motivate and manage the rotation so that hot players play and nobody is too tired. Lots of minutes, especially for Gallinari & Chandler, probably didn't leave any energy for that 4th quarter.

I came away from that game with the same response as I have with every Blazers vs Denver game I've seen this year.... you guys need a go-to scorer. Jokic is a great building block and 1st pillar, but he's not a guy you can just give the ball to and gets points from when you need it and I don't believe he ever will be. Please continue reading before getting upset at that last sentence... Understand that's not a slam on Jokic but a general comment on the current state of NBA basketball that I don't believe you can build a winning team around a bigman right now. Look at the last few teams that tried to construct a franchise around a bigman; New Orleans and Davis, Sacramento and Boogie, and Minnesota and Love/KAT. All of those teams used a bigman to be their main building block and all of them either have failed or are struggling to get a consistent above .500 team. The league has just changed to where if a 7ft C is your best player, you're going to struggle, no matter how good that player is.

You guys have a great C and a great complementary cast, but without that high scoring goto scoring guard, I think the Nuggets will be stuck at that 40ish win area.

[skywalker33]

I thought the Nuggets played their usual game; one good period, a couple of average period and one terrible period. They haven't learned how to win a game but that's also a thing for the coach. The coach can't play the game, but he needs to motivate and manage the rotation so that hot players play and nobody is too tired. Lots of minutes, especially for Gallinari & Chandler, probably didn't leave any energy for that 4th quarter.

I came away from that game with the same response as I have with every Blazers vs Denver game I've seen this year.... you guys need a go-to scorer. Jokic is a great building block and 1st pillar, but he's not a guy you can just give the ball to and gets points from when you need it and I don't believe he ever will be. Please continue reading before getting upset at that last sentence... Understand that's not a slam on Jokic but a general comment on the current state of NBA basketball that I don't believe you can build a winning team around a bigman right now. Look at the last few teams that tried to construct a franchise around a bigman; New Orleans and Davis, Sacramento and Boogie, and Minnesota and Love/KAT. All of those teams used a bigman to be their main building block and all of them either have failed or are struggling to get a consistent above .500 team. The league has just changed to where if a 7ft C is your best player, you're going to struggle, no matter how good that player is.

You guys have a great C and a great complementary cast, but without that high scoring goto scoring guard, I think the Nuggets will be stuck at that 40ish win area.

Well, that's an interesting opinion/theory, but unsupported. It's not hard to say ANY team couldn't use a go-to scorer (aka superstar) but we may already have that scorer in Jamal Murray. He's just 19, so got plenty of room to grow, we see him developing into a starter very soon.

[DusterBuster]

I thought the Nuggets played their usual game; one good period, a couple of average period and one terrible period. They haven't learned how to win a game but that's also a thing for the coach. The coach can't play the game, but he needs to motivate and manage the rotation so that hot players play and nobody is too tired. Lots of minutes, especially for Gallinari & Chandler, probably didn't leave any energy for that 4th quarter.

I came away from that game with the same response as I have with every Blazers vs Denver game I've seen this year.... you guys need a go-to scorer. Jokic is a great building block and 1st pillar, but he's not a guy you can just give the ball to and gets points from when you need it and I don't believe he ever will be. Please continue reading before getting upset at that last sentence... Understand that's not a slam on Jokic but a general comment on the current state of NBA basketball that I don't believe you can build a winning team around a bigman right now. Look at the last few teams that tried to construct a franchise around a bigman; New Orleans and Davis, Sacramento and Boogie, and Minnesota and Love/KAT. All of those teams used a bigman to be their main building block and all of them either have failed or are struggling to get a consistent above .500 team. The league has just changed to where if a 7ft C is your best player, you're going to struggle, no matter how good that player is.

You guys have a great C and a great complementary cast, but without that high scoring goto scoring guard, I think the Nuggets will be stuck at that 40ish win area.

Well, that's an interesting opinion/theory, but unsupported. It's not hard to say ANY team couldn't use a go-to scorer (aka superstar) but we may already have that scorer in Jamal Murray. He's just 19, so got plenty of room to grow, we see him developing into a starter very soon.

It's not unsupported. You guys unequivocally don't have that player right now and as I listed, all of the teams that have tried building around an ultra skilled 7ft big man have struggled or flat out failed to accomplish that goal. They all also had the same problem of not having that high level go-to scoring guard. The NBA just isn't a bigman league anymore.

As for Murray, certainly there's a chance he can develop into that guy, but that's something you have to hope for, not something you can bank on definitively happening.