Jusuf Nurkić continues to prove himself against Nikola Jokić

Jusuf Nurkić continues to prove himself against Nikola Jokić

And Mars Arizona Sports the local sports leader bigley Blast for one mostly glorious night in Denver the sun showed us what they can do when the ball moves when the turnovers are on mute when everyone is locked in from the jump time will tell whether it’s a legitimate

Turning point for our basketball team or whether it’s an unsustainable standard for this particular group to Main but for now it is safe to say this the Suns hit a grand slam in trading DeAndre Aon we have all seen what Grayson Allen has brought to this team including last

Night but Yousef nurkic has been unreal in the past two games and in my opinion last name was it last game last night’s game was his best game as a son in my opinion and it was the worst game I have ever seen Nicole joic play so what if

Those two are not coincidences what if the acquisition of nurkic was like 4D chess the antidote for our modern-day Tim Duncan remember in last year’s playoffs how joic by the end of last night’s game I couldn’t shake the most ridiculous feeling I have had in a while that I am

Not afraid of a postseason dance with the Denver Nuggets after all if you don’t fear the defending NBA champions and the best player in the sport what should that tell you about the ceiling of our basketball team all right today’s bigle blast brought to you by my great friends at

Chapman BMW make luxury attainable find them online at Chapman bmw.com here’s the inbounds pass yic gets it spins on Gordon fades for three and got it as the buzzer sounds are you kidding me Nico yic I know they call him the Joker but that ain’t funny a John Bloom on the

Buzzer beater yic hit which was kind of his highlight last night that was about it yeah and and I think joic in the moment in the urgency especially after nerk started to uh compiling file issues late in the game uh he got more effective and the stat line looks kind

Of really respect able but like you said there’s always been this feeling that if if you let and give Nico yic the ability to score but really limitate his ability to facilitate then then then you might get lesser of a player and you might find a much more beatable nuggets team

Last night kind of fit into that category but I don’t think it was necessarily any strategery that made that happen I just thought it was the physicality of of Yousef nurkic and again as I said in the blast uh being in Denver last year Watching those games you saw it happen

The ball went into Nicole yic in the post and he did that back down stuff but it wasn’t just backing down it was throwing the left shoulder repeatedly into da and da in his eminent softness I’ve had enough no moss and last night I’ve just Nico yic looked I thought I

Thought Yousef nurkic was the better player last night um there’s certainly an argument to be made for that and I just did and I may be wrong but that that’s what how I processed and he got outscored 25 to7 but you say this a lot and a lot this

Came up a lot during our you years of discussions on DeAndre Aton and how he impacted games don’t look at the numbers and a lot of people that’s how they view basketball it’s like wow look at the numbers and there’s people all over fantasy basketball players all over the

Country right now I was like yep yic got me 256 and five last night great game for the Joker he might have been out played um and make no mistake about it there was a lot of looking forward to the playoffs when the Suns made that deal late right

Before the beginning of training camp to send DeAndre to Portland for the deal that brought joic little and Grayson Allen uh man that seems like just such a steal right now by the way doesn’t it uh to to Phoenix a lot of that was previewing hey if we run into Denver

Again how are we going to be equipped to deal with joic who absolutely just bludgeon the Suns indeed and I I said it yesterday even with the the domination at the five last year yit’s just taking DeAndre Aton to school for that whole series until game six went when when Aton couldn’t

Go um the sun still you know Chris Paul stays healthy that might be a different Series so there was a lot of that because Yousef nurkic is comfortable playing against joic there’s respect there they were former teammates he doesn’t look at them in any sense of awe they’re friends

He he gets he gets pumped up for games against joic he’s had two really good games in different manners this year had 31 points the first time he went against joic in a son’s loss but last night you want to talk impacting the game seven points 12 rebounds had more assists than

Joic by the way fouled out of the game played 29 minutes but his fingerprints were way more on that game for the sun side than than jokic’s were on as you pointed out yic seven turnovers seven turnovers minus 13 which is his fifth lowest plus minus of the year so uh I

I’m not doing this to flex but I’m going to tell you a quick story from that incredible night over the summer that I spent hanging with the Vander Holyfield on that ship okay I I just got to do this because the subject of Mike Tyson came up and the subject and right

Exactly and the subject came up about why were you not intimidated why you of all people when you got in the ring against him why were you different why did you not you know cower in fear like everybody else on the planet did his

Answer was cuz I knew him as a kid I grew up with him there’s nothing to fear there’s no mistake I think that’s true with Yousef nurkic and Nicole yic I don’t I think Yousef nurkic just looks at him like yeah yeah that’s a former

Teammate I’m as big as he is I’m as strong as he is and and I think Nicole yic did not look comfortable last night and last year during the playoff series he looked 150% comfortable doing all that ball stuff and the tricks and this and that he was not comfortable isia he was

Comfortable yes and so I think in in this case here this is just to me I again I I hope this wasn’t just one night I I really hope this wasn’t the desperation and the fear and the oh my goodness we could get our doors blown

Off tonight if we’re not on it I really hope this is a new beginning cuz that locked in those are the two words to me that I that really jumped out at me from the very beginning well the other thing that’s standing out right now about nkit

Is his ability to play through stuff gets hurt against Houston comes back against Oklahoma City and absolutely dominated Chad holgren 31 rebounds in that game where a g it was a game where he might not have played he was on the injury report last night too for a completely different issue not only

Plays which is amazing because his reputation coming into this season was a guy who does not play well he had a serious leg injury which derailed his career at a certain point in Portland he’s been the most durable Phoenix Sun this year and a guy who’s played through the most this

Year he’s had a lot of injuries guy got punched in the face a couple times if you went MVP of the season for the Phoenix Suns right now I I don’t know what the list would look like but Yousef nerkish three stars for the season ah and to think the people there

Were people were like you gave up da for that dude and I will say this too piggybacking on a point that I made I’m not a fan of a team structuring its roster for a potential playoff matchup against one player the Suns you know they kind of everybody was talking about

That after the finals well how are you going to beat Giannis you’re really going to tailor your Western Conference team’s roster for a potential finals trip against Giannis you don’t do it it makes a little bit more sense when it’s within the conference but there’s no guarantee you’re going to play the

Nuggets it’s lining up right now no but but if you do play him you don’t want you better shape yeah you don’t want to sit there dealing with the same issue you had the year before and then you’re like why didn’t we do something about that yeah thanks for watching Bickley

And marada click to see the latest Bley blast and hit the button in the middle to subscribe to Arizona Sports

Dan Bickley was impressed by Jusuf Nurkić after his performance against 2x MVP Nikola Jokić. That was the topic of the Bickley Blast on Wednesday.

Video: Felisa Cárdenas and Jeremy Schnell/Arizona Sports

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