Game 1: Denver Nuggets @ L.A.Clippers, Oct-17 22:30 EST [The Opening Night]

[THE J0KER]

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According to everything we see last season, LA Clippers should not be so competitive team like last season, after the exit of two former all-star players Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan.

But that said, according to everything we see last season, Denver the biggest problem was to beat "weak opponents" on the road.

Also, the Clippers will be very motivated playing home at the season-opening night, and together with 2018 biggest addition Tobias Harris, they also sign Marcin Gortat this summer and promising point guard rookie Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and many good players which have big injury problems last season are healthy now (Galo, Beverley, Teodosic).

I'm surprised to see that bookmakers odds are almost equal for this game. Denver should be a clear favorite to win, at least with 55:45 chances. Our starting lineup is much better, our bench is improved, and we playing with almost the same team which started 2017-18, unlike Clippers which change several key players.


EDIT:

Read on Twitter

[TunaFish]

Clippers seem to have made out well in the trade of Blake Griffin. They are not as bad as many thought after that trade happened. Denver needs to come out strong and should win but this will not be a pushover. Odds look right to me.

[THE J0KER]

Clippers seem to have made out well in the trade of Blake Griffin. They are not as bad as many thought after that trade happened. Denver needs to come out strong and should win but this will not be a pushover. Odds look right to me.

They do a great job preparing the team for crucial 2019 summer FA market and the eventual addition of two big star players. But this season is just transitional for Clippers unless they add Jimmy Butler without losing Harris or Williams.

[skywalker33]

We don't seem to match up well with the Clips, especially with Jokic's countryman Boban in the game, he's probably seen all of the Joker's tricks over on the Serbian Nat'l team. He also has a big size advantage on us so we need to pull him out or go straight at him to get him in foul trouble.

[THE J0KER]

In the OP game preview, I put LAC last season starting lineup to show how this team is changed this season. But I forget to present their tonight starting lineup. I guess they will start with this roster:

PG Patrick Beverley
SG Avery Bradley
SF Tobias Harris
PF Danilo Gallinari
C Marcin Gortat

That means Clippers are the only NBA team which backup players are not worse than starters. Thanks to Lou Williams, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Milos Teodosic, Montrezl Harrell, and Boban Marjanovic, Clippers will never drop the level of the game during 48 minutes, so we must make difference when our starters are on the floor, and not collapse with 2nd unit like we did last season after +19 lead late in the 3rd quarter in one of the games vs Clippers, which was one of the most painful loses we have in entire 2017-18 season.

[DaFan334]

Jokic will need to take over on offense if Boban comes in to combat his unstoppable offense. That may end up being a big key tonight.

[nomansland]

I hope the Nugs don't take this game lightly. The Clippers actually have a pretty solid lineup and will beat them if they don't show up focused.

[ducler]

Read on Twitter

[skywalker33]

Man it seems like this night would NEVER get here !!! Go Nuggets. Had intended to go to the Denver Stiffs Watch Party but my wife's friend's husband has a birthday and she wants to go to Hacienda Colorado to surprise him. At least I can DVR the game !!

[TunaFish]

Good win! Shooting was off, particularly with Millsap. Yet, they played just well enough to pull off a road win against a team playing hard.

[youngthegiant]

A good defensive effort, the offense needs a lot of work.

[skywalker33]

Just as I called it, Boban really gave us fits (why didn't they keep him in the game ?), but we pulled out our first road victory of the season. Murray had a very poor game, Millsap somehow comes up with a D-D. Harris had a strong game, Jokic pulled this team together in the last few mins. Barton looked good yet a little tentative in the 2nd half, a bit uncharacteristic for him IMO.

The bench was strong with Plumlee, Lyles and Morris brought a strong presense, Juancho built a game on intangibles. Yet here it is.....Defense won this game IMO.

1 Down 51 to GO

[THE J0KER]

Everything seems that this is going to be our classic *dumb* lose on the road. We lead since the early start of the game and have the tiny lead at the end of the 3rd quarter, but in the 1st half of the final quarter opponent scored 20 and we only 10 points. But surprisingly, in the last 5 minutes (since 84:92 LAC lead) we won somehow 23:6. I agree defense was the better part of our game tonight. Credit to Millsap for defense, but unfortunately his offensive struggle continues (just 1/7 from the field). Murray was the biggest disappointment today, with just 7 pts in 32 minutes. Credit to Jokic on his new confidence, he was 4/5 in the 1st half but 0/6 in the 2nd before final 5 minutes when he put important 3pt and another 2pt. Barton was a great whole game, but at the end, we played on Harris, which is a better solution and our winning formula for tight finishes. Our bench has negative +/-, but that is expected against Clippers, the unique NBA team which bench is better than starters. Credit for this win also belongs to Doc Rivers for sitting Marjanovic in the critical moment of the 4th quarter, when Boban was the Clippers best player at that moment.

[psimanic1]

Wins like this are what counts the most, when none of the teams are on the highest level and you can't let those out if you want to go to the playoffs, from now on we can only play better and better, but if we want POs this year, we have to win those games to begin with..

But really now...it's only first week of nba and we already have back to back(PHO - GSW)... Lets hope Hernangomez shows up in GSW game like he did already...

[NuggetsWY]

1 Down 51 to GO

Malone said we need 22 road wins and I'm with you on the 52.
So let's say "1 down 51 to GO" & "1 down 21 to GO".

[NuggetsWY]

Just finished watching the game. Not an inspiring win but it was indeed a win. A road game against a team they should beat - the type of game the Nuggets lost too often last year.

One bad quarter and some sporadic bad sections on offense. Sure do wish Jokic would take more shots, especially when he's covered by a guard. He can clearly take those shots without being bothered by them even out at the 3pt line.

Defense wasn't great (didn't expect it to be). But I was encouraged by some of the defensive efforts. Definitely not a fan of Barton at SF - only because of matchup issues like in this game. But I'll give him credit, he made a much better effort/showing on defense than most of last year.

Barton - 19 pts on 6-12 w/3-5 3pt plus 5 boards & 2 assists - NICE
Millsap had a rough game on offense but had 16 boards - I'll take it
Jokic seemed "off" but had 21 pts with 8 boards & 5 assists (expectations too high?)
Harris had a nice 20 pts with some tough defensive assignments
Murray had an off night shooting but got some boards

Lyles had 10 pts & 7 boards - very nice
Overall the bench did well IMO

[Lala870]

whats the word with porter jr? Has he officially been ruled out for the season? I have seen nothing on this

[skywalker33]

whats the word with porter jr? Has he officially been ruled out for the season? I have seen nothing on this

Nope, no word on his return, Nuggets seem to be patient as they really don't have a "need" right now.

[THE J0KER]

Definitely not a fan of Barton at SF - only because of matchup issues like in this game.

I'm fine with Barton at SF, I don't like to see him a single minute at PG even when Murray have bad day and Thomas was out. Yesterday, this SF height issue was obvious, but Barton compensate it with good offense. And to be fair, there is just few teams in NBA which starting SF was so tall like Galo is.

[TunaFish]

Murray seems to have a pattern of starting slow at the beginning of a season. He will heat up but I hope its sooner than the last two seasons.