Did Josh Say the Nuggets Could….Trade Jokic? The Nuggets Had A Press Conference

Did Josh Say the Nuggets Could….Trade Jokic? The Nuggets Had A Press Conference

well that was a press conference the Denver Nuggets introduce John Wallace and Ben Tinser as the official vice leads of the Denver Nuggets while Josh Kroni says that he’s going to be more involved than he has been in previous iterations we actually got a lot out of today’s introductory press conference but right now the internet is ablaze by one particular comment from Josh Crocki y’all we have so much to talk about i had to grab Jeff Morton for this conversation go ahead buckle up get your popcorn get your lunch this is going to be quite the episode you know what time it is here on Locked on Nuggets you are Locked on Nuggets your daily Denver Nuggets podcast part of the Locked On Network your team every day what’s going on y’all welcome to Locked on Nuggets this is your daily Denver Nugget show some of the best content you’ll find on the interweb hope you’re having a spectacular Tuesday this is going to be quite the show with my friend Jeff Morton i cannot wait to get into it y’all but today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel right now new customers can get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins boom boom boom boom jeff Morton first off brother hope you’re having a spectacular Tuesday how are you doing today my friend it was great it was great having you on my podcast last week i appreciated you coming on and uh yeah it was a good day until I uh I I saw some comments that were probably ill advised but we’ll be getting to that yeah this is uh an interesting segment that we had of information today so you know the Denver Nuggets they recently just announced that John Wallace and Ben Tender will be taking over as the general managers in some sense uh for the role for the Denver Nuggets and both sharing different responsibilities while working together in the process as well so they were having their introductory press conference and there were a lot of really great questions live by Adam Mes by Matt Moore Ryan Blackburn Katie Wy uh I mean really everybody I mean there was a lot of great questions that were asked uh Bennett uh uh from Denver Post also asked some really great questions today so there was a contingent of Denver Nuggets media that were there all of them with a different kind of angle that they wanted to get a perspective view from from both the new hires and general manager but also uh from Josh Crocki who was there and one of the things that I heard most consistently Jeff is that they believe that there is not a significant gap and this is per John Wallace who I actually have a lot of really good things to say about he said that don’t forget that this team won a title just two years ago so the core is there the core that won the title is still here but we need to have assistance on the margins on the margins we need to make improvements when it comes to the shooting on the margins we need to make improvements when it comes to the defense they seem to be of the mindset Jeff that really they just need to have more internal development and they need to find players that are outside of the organization to help lift up the floor that Jokic is already lifting up so high and that the starters are already fitting so nicely into what was some of your takeaway from that part of the conversation there was an interesting quote from Josh uh Kroni where he talked about um having to improve on the margins outside on the outside of the roster so if you think of the roster as a a like rings on a tree he’s thinking about like the guys on the periphery so you know obviously that’s Hunter Tyson Jaylen Picket uh guys like that and um I think I think that was going to be and was always going to be the the way that this today was going to go you’re going to get a lot of we need to improve on the margins because people we need to understand this even though we may not agree the Nuggets are committed to three very highly paid players and if that they are going to ride down this this track then you’re going to be left with substantially large margin moves as they’re describing and that is one of the hardest things to do in the NBA is substantially improve on the margins and at the same time raise your ceiling and I think one of the things that you know I talked to Matt Moore and Ryan Blackburn about this quite a bit uh one of the things that I talked about was this idea that the Nuggets they have to find ways to truly uplift their roster uh around the margins but in a sense that I think is different philosophically than what they’ve done and what I mean by that is to say the Nuggets have I think proven that when they’re healthy they basically can compete with anyone they basically can beat anyone they basically have the play style the IQ but one of the things that John Wallace talked about in particular is that they have the IQ and the experience to just be able to operate at such a high level from an intellectual standpoint so when they’re facing an opponent even if they have more talent and more depth they can think through the game in such a specific way that every time they play in a series or in a game that’s why they can always find a way to get back into a series back into a game or even like the Thunder series and even dare I say the Clipper series when they’re at a talent disadvantage either due to the lack of options or due to injuries they can still make it work because they can just think their way between the gap of the talent and I think the Nuggets that is a part of their identity but one of the things that I’ve told Nuggets fans that they’ve heard this before if you’re going to build this team I think this team based on that IQ stuff I’m talking about you need to have as many athletes as possible and players who are older in their development that understand that and I think when they went to the route of having so many young people on the roster that were in their rookie contract which makes six total last year that puts them in such a bind because they might not be ready to play basketball at the level that Jokic and Murray and Gordon and Porter can because they’ve been doing this since 2018 and then Gordon came in 2021 and then on top of that Christian Brown I think he very much assimilated into that but Christian Brown was also like kind of a little bit of anomaly at 21 overall in 2022 he’s a very smart high IQ high intangible player and so I think they were looking for that and they said we need Jaylen Picket and Hunter Tyson and Julian Strawther but the other part of this that they missed though Jeff is that they missed the athlete part because you have to have players I think in particular that are really good athletes that are able to think through the game that’s how you make up for deficiencies because if you have negative athletes or meaning a lot of NBA athlete this is regular NBA athletes if you have athletes that fall underneath that in this scheme especially when you’re playing at the level you’re rotating weak side you need further you need rim protection from your wings you got to have players that understand that and know that if they don’t have the physical ability to do that that I think that actually hampers the team thus they’re not super playable early on or even at all so I just think there was there’s been a philosophical bridge that hasn’t been there in the last two years in a talent activation so for me Jeff I think they need to go into this off season knowing and Ryan Blackburn also with Mile High Sports put a great article out talking about uh some free agents that you can look towards for the Nuggets possibly signing i think they need to be really really specific on finding explosive athletes or athletes like Harris Levert or Bruce Brown even Marvin Baggley on the cheaper end finding athletes that know and have been around the league that can fit into this kind of system that’s what I think they should be doing well the problem that we’ve always faced with Jokic is that you have to be a very specific kind type of person in order to be able to acquies to the way he wants to play because he plays a certain way he has a view of basketball that is very specific and he is very like be in your spots i will pass you open all this stuff jokic runs this that sort of thing so if you’re going to work within and and from what I’m hearing today on on the press conference was they’re committed to going allin with having Jokic lift the team they’re less concerned about giving um the high ceiling guys they want the guys who complement what the Nuggets already do if you’re going to be doing that sort of thing you need three and D guys kcp was the perfect Jokic guy the perfect Jokic guy it’s hard to replicate a guy with a skill set like KCP because um 3 and D guys are like gold in the NBA i mean you if you get one of those guys you got to hang on to them um and obviously Bruce Brown was another off thebench be a dog and just do you know the dirty work which is what the Nuggets have been missing you know and that’s all well and good but it’s really hard to get those guys in via free agency because there’s just not a lot of them in the NBA and um that you then you also have to have the guys want to come to Denver which has been a challenge too look on the other side we’re going to talk about perhaps the most inflammatory comment that was made by Josh Kroni today is it something is it nothing and for me it seems to be a little bit of I think a miss in the philosophy of like how you actually approach the second apron swipe with Jeff Morton going to talk about that on the other side here on Lockdown Nuggets now ever wish managing your money felt easier hey with Monarch Money it can whether you’re growing your savings or planning a big purchase Monarch puts you in the driver’s seat it’s like having your own personal CFO giving you full visibility and control over your finances monarch Money is more than a budgeting app it’s a complete financial command center you can track 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subscribe we’re on the way to 15,000 subscribers blow it up on Locked on Nuggets so I’m here with Jeff Morton and we’ve been talking about the Josh Crocki John Wallace Ben Tender press conference and Jeff Morton the bomb that was dropped that might not end up meaning anything but the fact that it was uttered has gotten the entire world ablaze and just for context essentially while the question was being presupposed to Josh Kroni about the team and about the Second Apron and about getting into the Second Apron one of the things he talked about in not signing KCP back was what if they were to have sustained a major injury to one of their players that’s making a large amount of money meaning they would have no flexibility they would be paying a luxury tax penalty on top of a normal luxury tax penalty because of the second apron and now there is a nightmare scenario that if everything went bad that the possibility of trading Nicola Joic would be perhaps their last red button out of getting out of the second apron what was your takeaway from that segment Jeff Morton extremely clumsy wording from Josh i think he’s his intent wasn’t what he said um but he walked into it because that was the second time in that pre press conference where he overelaborated and and the other one was with the extension offer for you know a question by our own by your own uh uh Ryan Blackburn um and he overelaborated on that one josh was just overtalking and I think just based on what I was able to see he probably was like trying to warn people of the restrictions of the Second Apron and overtalked himself into saying something incredibly stupid and that’s what it that’s what it was Swiper that was incredibly stupid for him to say because now it’s gone everywhere and uh that was just I I couldn’t after thought I was like don’t even let that be a possibility let people think it if that’s what even was going to happen in the reality of it don’t don’t say something so stupid because that’s extremely what it was and I I like I don’t know why he walked himself into it because he he he no one asked him about Joic it was about the second apron and he walked right into that yeah i think some of this is you know to not be overreactionary i think for me is it’s not is not going to happen but again everything in life for me is sales and relationship and what I mean by that is that whenever you’re building something either with someone or for other people everything you do is about managing relationships and you have to know what your assets are you have to know what your bread and butter is you have to know that the reason why even our shows are successful is because of the people that watch them and listen to them so therefore I have to be very reticent about how I speak to and about the audience and I think for owners you have to know that the reason why your franchise is valuable the reason why you can win championship the reason why you can compete the reason why you even got to worry about a first or second apron is because you have a generational player on your team and in my estimation it was more so that that was something that should not have been said because what’s happening it is it is going around people did hear what you said and they did take away why would that be a possibility and on top of that for me Jeff they say they’re not afraid of the second apron but you’re saying that the way to escape the mistakes of contracts you’ve signed and a situation you’ve put yourself into is by pressing the full eject button on the best player on the planet in the middle of their prime or towards the end of their prime at some point three or four years from now and saying that’s the way that we would get out of this i just think that was very very misguided and I think that showed to me there might be a little bit of a we’re not actually as caught up on the times as we should be because I’m watching the Boston Celtics to name last night with Drew Holiday getting traded for Anthony Simons and two second round picks and what they did the Boston Celtics traded what was perceived as a separate and as a bad asset in Drew Holiday because he has four years on this deal Jeff Y and his deal he’s 35 with three more years on it and a player option I believe so they got rid of Drew and got a cheaper younger player Anthony Simons as a replacement and they’re now $18 million underneath the Second Apron because of that move and so for me I’m watching the Nuggets seemingly struggle with trying to find ways to walk the line of the Second Apron to not get across it to not add talent to the roster to do this this and that and saying “Well there are ways for you to actually be able to to do this properly but I don’t know if they’re fully equipped to be able to do that.” And one of the things Jeeoff last thing on this point one of the things that also kind of was throwing me a little bit today is that every time the media would go to ask a question about personnel they would open it up saying “Well either John or Ben whichever one of you wants to answer this question please take it.” And I think that’s also another part of this equation that’s interesting you have two people that are essentially in control of personnel so whose direction are we pulling in how do we I It’s just there’s all there there are a bunch of different things that we have to continue to figure out about how we manage this new situation you know saying you’re not afraid of the Second Apron is a lot like saying you’re not afraid of sharks the chances of you going into the ocean and being uh in a situation where you would be attacked by say great white are are very slim well that’s exactly what the Nuggets are saying there’s they’re not afraid of something they’ll never enter into stan Cronkey likes caps the second apron is a cap for him done no one should even ask about this question i don’t know why it always gets brought up in these press conferences i just don’t understand it he’s never going there ever and if people like internalize this no one would ask stupid questions about it but it it just keeps happening over and over and that’s why how uh Josh dogwalked himself into a stupid answer about the the uh the second apron with Jokic um I I to be honest with you if you’re committed to the three highest paid guys and and that is your direction then you’ve left yourself no other choice it it it really is the case if you are committed to Michael War Jr Aaron Gordon and Nicole Joic uh and I I mean not let’s exclude Joic but Jamal Murray man if you’re those three guys if you’re committed to them and this is what you’re telling people then what you’re telling people is that you have no choice and you’re you’re sticking with this and it’s not necessarily about finances or anything like that it’s just that you are committed to those four specific guys including Jokic so all other conversation is moot if you they have said over and over and over again and done by action and in and in in their what they’ve said verbally that they’re not doing they’re not moving off of that so what this does is creates this weird anxiety about how the Nuggets improve the team from what I was hearing in this press conference there was a lot of we’ll find something you know it’s like you know get searching through the sand and finding like uh like a a bunch of change that was uh in the in the sand so oh it’s a it’s found money that’s essentially what they’re saying that they’re going to try to do is find one of these guys because in order to improve they got to trade an asset and what they’re saying is they’re they they’re stuck so if they’re stuck we you me Swipa Jeff Morton are left wondering what exactly are you going to choose because they don’t have a draft pick so obviously you’re left with this so what is there available in free agency and everyone should read Ryan Blackburn’s uh free agency article on my high sports absolutely uh in the third segment we’re going to kind of wrap up this conversation give a press conference dra grade and I actually want to talk about some of the positives that are my takeaways in particular for John Wallace and why I think his his addition to the team is going to make a difference we’ll talk about all that and more here Lockdown Nuggets now summer sports are in full swing and whether you’re all about baseball under the lights golf on the green or high stakes soccer action FanDuel is the best way to make every game even more exciting now you’re already following the action why not make it a little more thrilling with FanDuel you can get on the game while your friends and are getting sunburned at the beach now I’ve been using FanDuel to track my favorite matchups and the app keeps it fresh with new daily promotions and fun ways to bet and again it’s easy to use fast payout and makes even regular season games feel like muchwatched events so new to FanDuel new customers can bet just $5 and get $150 in bonus bets if your first bet wins open the FanDuel app today or visit fanuel.com to get started we’ll be right back for the final segment of Locked On Nuggets we are back for the final segment of Locked on Nuggets with Jeff Morton in Swipa talking about the press conference today now this is what I will say Denver Nuggets fans one of my favorite takeaways from the press conference was John Wallace and if there is a moment or a point for people to get excited about I think John coupled with Ben Tinder that for me is going to be one of the pivotal pivotal additions to the team and here’s why adam Mades the great Adam Mades asked a great question about the Minnesota Timberwolves and whether or not when John was with the Wolves with Tim Connelly they found something in their Denver matchup that identified a chance and opportunity for them to find wins and solves versus the Nuggets in a matchup remember they’re 6 and0 versus the Denver Nuggets in the last six games now granted you know there are some injuries in the in the playoffs last year when Jamal Murray in his calf uh Jamal Murray had a concussion when the game they had a lead in when Julius Randle hit him in the shoulder russell Westbrook obviously fouled Nikquil Alexander Walker on the last possession of the game so it easily could have been you know the Nuggets win the series last year or 22 this year like there all kind of things but I think the stipulations are important here because I think John Wallace as an outsider there are things that he’s seen about this team from a lack of three-point efficiency a lack of athletes and a lack of ball handling and he mentioned two of those three three things today i actually think that him having an outside perspective and then watching how they built the Minnesota Timberwolves drafted Rob Dillingham have Mike Connley got Anthony Edwards got a wing in Jane McDaniels got another really good wing post to score playmaker Julius Randall you had Carl Anthony Towns you got a one of the best interior rim protectors of all time in Rudy Gobear you get Nikquil Alexander Walker from Utah Jazz on cheap good combo guard good shooter ball handler and then on top of that you get Dante Devenenzo you find a way to get another ball handler another shooter another defender onto the team nas Reed really really great player especially for his role you get him cheap another ball handler another shooter another dribbler another passer and then on top of that you got Jaylen Clark and then on top of that you get Terren Shannon Jr if you look all up and down the roster I actually think that there’s a concept in place for what John saw and what he was a part of building i think that really really really could benefit the Denver Nuggets if he’s given the opportunity to bring those kinds of players and archetypes into the Nuggets i I think that’s that’s definitely going to be his hope and I’m glad you’re focusing on Wallace here because I I I think Tenzer is just going to handle the business i think we’ve overthought his role he’s just going to handle the contracts and stuff like that primarily um I think you know Wallace has a good eye and everything I was told about him after he was hired announced he was hired yesterday was positive everything um uh people in Minnesota people around the league everyone liked him um they said that uh he has a great relationship with players uh and he has he can get people uh um indoors is I guess into into into the room essentially is what it is um I think that is what the Nuggets were saying and what Tim Connelly saw in him because he brought Wallace here at the tail end of his time in Denver so the Nuggets were obviously already familiar with him i liked him you know he’s a he’s a well spoken dude certainly a departure from Calvin um who stuck his foot in his mouth constantly um but this was this was a breath of fresh air and I think I I I’ll say I’ll say thing i was a little disappointed in the way Josh’s blunders kind of overtook the press conference because I think this really should have been more about Wallace and um maybe to a lesser extent Penser but what Wallace was saying and how how his he was expressing his vision because I think if we were able to go back and listen to him maybe we would and tune Josh out maybe we would all have a better feeling going in to what what we’re going into because look the Nuggets are obviously told us what they’re going to do so how has how is he going to be able to express his vision within the constraints that he has right now and I like the fact that he was just positive about what he wants to do and that I think should I mean people say this is copium here but I think honestly I think people should be encouraged about him specifically because literally everyone I talk to in the league is very positive about him yeah and I think I think John deserves the to have a fair shake ben Tinder also deserves I think Ben has obviously been here consistently uh you know John was with the team I believe for three years as Josh Grunky uh illuminated but I like what I heard from him i also like what he was a part of building with the Wolves i think that having an outside voice Jeff in this situation is really important and I think if Josh is going to hold true to what he says he’s going to allow for him to do his job and his job is going to be making sure he has the tools and the information that he needs to do his job and then Ben on the other end is making sure hey the money works here and here we can make that happen and I told Matt and Ryan I don’t think it’s a small thing they were in the Kevin Durant deal i don’t think it’s a small thing they were mentioned i think they know they do need to make adjustments now again making calls is one thing making something happen is another thing but I do think that if Jon is is objectively looking at his team he doesn’t have the same ties to players that I think his previous iterations of the team or the management would and I think if he knows they need more shooting then we need to get shooters he knows we know defense we need to get defense and if there are players that are not fitting in with that archetype that he’s talking about I would hope I would hope that Josh is going to allow him to do that and I hope that’s a second apron i hope that we’re kind of over that that that is no longer going to be something we’re completely worried about going forward you know on another episode I’ll talk about the the the Christian Brown extension what I what I do want to see don’t want to see with that michael Porter Jr along with Nicolic is extension uh worthy uh this this off seasonason i don’t know if he will get an extension or not but I just want to let people know that he will have the opportunity to um Josh did also talk about Nicola Joic uh opportunity for an extension and then in an area that you thought he kind of overtalked a little bit um just to give people a little bit of uh information um basically right now uh after July 8th Jokic will be eligible for a three-year extension um come July 8th that will give him an opportunity to have he has two years and a player option left um he could just extend on that last year and then basically give himself uh five years worth of a deal or next year if Jokic decides that he wants to wait this year and to get an extension the next season Joic will be eligible for a 4-year deal that will put him in even better situation financially for him and his family so this year it’ be a threeyear $212.2 million extension which is about 70.1 million in extension on average per year or next year be four year 293.4 four I believe which is about 73.35 um for over a four-year period so that’s all on the table and I think that’s what Josh was trying to say like hey whatever he decides three years or four he can choose what’s best for him yeah I think I he framed it so clumsily like we’re going to try but he said we’re we’re going to offer it to him but there’s no guarantee that he accepts it and then it’s like this is you don’t need to say that Josh just say that you’re going to offer it to him and then say it may benefit him later to uh wait you know to get it but you don’t have to introduce the thought that he’s going to not accept it and it’s just it Josh just overtalked and and that’s the shame of this whole thing is because I thought I was I was impressed by John Wallace and I wanted that to be the story today and I needed and it was fair to him to have that be the story today because I think if people and I know people are spiraling in the comments right now but if if people just s take back it’s just sit back and look and listen to what he said and I would encourage everyone to go back and look at those uh the video clips of Wallace he’s he’s got a great head on his shoulders and he’s really really smart and I think people need to kind of see this because uh everything I’ve been t I’ve heard from him and uh heard about him has been fantastic he needs to be the story right now not Josh Krony’s verbal blunders well y’all that’s going to do it here for Locked On Nuggets uh make sure again if you’re on the YouTube side like share and subscribe let us know in the comments what did you think about the press conference in total give us a grade josh Crocki Ben Tinser John Wallace what were you most encouraged by in the press conference what were some of the things that might have confused you are there any other takeaways we didn’t get a chance to talk about in this 30inut episode that you thought were important uh we’ll have more coming tomorrow with Matt Moore and Ryan Blackburn i’ll also be with you again on Thursday uh so y’all make sure you take care of your business take care of yourself it’s summer go outside go on a walk get some fresh air enjoy the world around you yo Jeff Martin Swiper y’all know what time it is see you on the other side

The Nuggets held their introductory press conference for Jon Wallace and Ben Tenzer and there are A LOT of takeaways to talk about. The Nuggets seem like they believe the core is good enough to win but they need more on the margins What exactly does that mean? Who are those players? Josh Kroenke made some comments that have the internet in a firestorm. How should we read them?
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