GET UP | Nuggets looking scary nex season – Brian Windhorst on Denver acquire Cam Johnson & Bruce

GET UP | Nuggets looking scary nex season – Brian Windhorst on Denver acquire Cam Johnson & Bruce

ress, but I also am not sure they have progressed. You know, they there was a lot of talk about them getting Cam Johnson. Obviously, he has been with the Brooklyn Nets the last couple years. He basically is the same player though as Michael Porter Jr., the player they traded him for. However, he makes a ton less money. So, the Kronis saved a lot of luxury tax payments, but that doesn’t really help on the court. Then the Then the Nuggets went out and got several bench players yesterday. Got Jonas Valenunis, Tim Hardaway Jr., Bruce Brown. Those guys are all okay. I just don’t know if they’re doing enough to close the gap with the Thunder. McMahon, you agree about the Nuggets? I’d never agree with Bon Timsons on hardly anything. Listen,
this is the best bench of the Joker era. Now, that’s faint praise. It’s kind of like saying I’m the most charming member of the hoop collective, but it’s a fact. The Nuggets needed depth. We all hammered on. You got to get deeper. You got to get deeper. You got to get deeper. Valenunis is by far the best backup they’ve had for Joker. They’re no hopefully will no longer just bleed points when Joker’s resting. Tim Hardaway Jr. has had a really good year in Detroit. He’s a he’s a, you know, a shooter off the bench. Bruce Brown was a huge piece of their championship puzzle. Now, Denver Bruce Brown is a different beast than Bruce Brown anywhere else. But again, a team that desperately needed depth, managed to go out and do that. And Cam Johnson is at least a lateral move for Michael Porter Jr., if not an upgrade. He’s more versatile on both ends of the floor. The Nuggets pushed the Thunder to seven games and definitely got better this off season. Wendy, what do you think about Denver’s off season?
Well, they took to their new front office, Ben Tender and John Wallace, who’ve been on the job just a few days, and they said, “Here’s what you need to do. You got to get Jokic backup. You got to get David Adelman, the new head coach, a couple more options than you gave Michael Malone.” And by the way, we don’t really want to pay the luxury tax. Can you cut a bunch of money? All right, we’ll see you in the fall. And they’ve done that. They have gotten some options. They have reduced their payroll. And they’ve gotten Yokic back up. Now, am I am I waking up as the Oklahoma City Thunder today going, “Oh my god, we’re we’re in trouble.” I am not. But they have addressed some needs while reducing payroll. That is not simple. And I think Joic will be happy to have any new new set of eyes, a new set of bodies to help him out this season.
All right, one more Western Conference team to hit here. Bobby, would you believe the Rockets are now the biggest threat to Oklahoma City in the West?
I would. And I believe that after they traded for Kevin Durant. And then what you look what they’ve also done here is they’ve added Dorian Finny Smith to try to replace Dylan Brooks. And they added a third center in in Clint Capella. They already have Steven Adams and Alpurn Sangon. So yes, Houston certainly is, I would say, the threat to Oklahoma City in the Western Conference. Durant trade is another thing that happened within the last 10 days in the NBA. It’s been a pretty significant week and a half. Thunder still clear favorites to win the West, but there are nine teams within 20 to1 odds of them. As you can see here, teams like Houston and Denver have completely revamped their rosters, while other teams like the Timberwolves, Clippers, Mavericks have all uh made changes as well. So, the West uh is jumbled. McMahon, I know you said you you like you think the Nuggets have improved a ton this off seasonason. Who else has impressed you out west with their moves uh since the season ended? I mean, I definitely agree with Bobby on the Rockets. They went from a hopefully to a Hall of Famer as far as their go-to guy, moving Jaylen Green, getting in Kevin Durant, who is still scoring at an elite level. And then they really did that while also leaning even further into their big, nasty, tough, physical bully ball type of play. With Capella, if they want to play two bigs, whether Steven Adams needs to rest or not, they can do that. That’s something that was very effective for them down the stretch. Durant bigger than Green. Dorian Finny Smith bigger than Dylan Brooks. This is going to be one of the toughest teams, one of the best defensive teams, one of the best rebounding teams. They had a glaring lack of a go-to guy in Kevin Durant. The Rockets absolutely to me are the biggest threats to the Thunder in the West. They’re obviously going for it. A lot of teams are chasing Oklahoma City. So bond tempmps, if I if I said looking at everything that’s changed so far next year in the west, are you taking Oklahoma City or the field to win it? I’m taking the Thunder. I I’d like I still like the Thunder to be the champions next year. They have the youngest team, second youngest team to win the title in the last 50 years. They’ve got SAS Alexander who they locked up to a massive contract extension yesterday. They’re going to get Jaylen Williams and Chad Homegrren locked up to contract extensions almost certainly in the coming weeks. They are a young, deep team that’s only going to get better coming through this championship experience this year. Jaylen Williams had a great run through the playoffs and he was dealing with a wrist injury he had surgery on while scoring 40 points in NBA Finals game. So, yes, these other teams are really good. Yes, there’s going to be a lot of challengers to Oklahoma City. But for the foreseeable future, I’m taking the thunder and feeling pretty good about it. Bobby, uh, two teams as we’ve discussed, West contenders that I have not heard anybody say, Lakers and Warriors. Both teams with huge Hall of Fame caliber stars nearing the ends of their careers. Is is either one of them anywhere near title contention right now?
I don’t. And how I look at both teams is if you were a marathon runner and you had Luca Donic and Jimmy Butler on your rostery, you got to the mile marker number six in the lead and then all of a sudden here comes Denver and here comes Oklahoma City and Dallas and the Clippers and Minnesota and they basically lapped the field and it’s no fault to themselves. They just didn’t have any big moves this off season because they already made those big moves here. So, I look at those other teams that we just mentioned here kind of lapping where the Lakers and the Warriors are right now.
Yeah, that’s rough. As somebody who ran marathons when he was younger, I know you got to get used to the concept of people running past you, but it still doesn’t always feel great. Uh Wendy, do you agree about the Lakers and the Warriors? Yeah, the Lakers don’t have a starting center yet. In fact, while we’re at it, they don’t have a backup center. Now, there’s a couple of free agents on the market like DeAndre Aton and Al Horford. They’re in on them. The Lakers are having conversations about trading for a backup center, but they don’t even have their starting lineup together yet. And I’m looking at Houston and I’m looking at Dallas and I’m looking at Oklahoma City and I’m seeing a 10-man rotations built out totally uh ready to go. So, I I would say this, the big X factor is Luca Donuch. If Luca Donuch reports to the Lakers and plays an MVP season, which frankly we’ve been expecting him to win the MVP for 2 or 3 years now, then that’s a game-changing situation because you still have LeBron James who at the moment is ready to go for the Lakers. I don’t know if he’s excited about it, but he’s ready to go. And you’re going to have two AllNBA players. So, the thing about it is is that the Lakers need that. They’re going to need Luca to be awesome and at the top of his game. And if he does that, we’re going to be talking about the Lakers a lot. Let’s be honest, we’re going to talk about the Lakers a lot either way. But they’re going to they are they are there’s some things going for them. They finished third in the West last year. This is not a team that is bar of talent. They have stuff going for them and they have options for the future. And that’s one of the things that uh Luca is going to want to think about one month from today, August 2nd, when he becomes eligible to extend his contract with the Lakers.
Yeah. Bond temps. I know we’ve talked a lot about uh the situation in LA being one where they’re maybe building for the future around Luca. If that’s the case and they’re not contenders this year, does that mean LeBron and Steph are are done winning championships in this league?
Well, we’ll see what they what it means for LeBron and Steph in terms of the Lakers and Warriors winning in the future. But the the biggest question about the Lakers this summer is not can they win a title because as it sits right now, they can’t. As Brian said, they don’t even have a center on the roster. The question for the Lakers this summer is what we’ve been talking about and talking around, which is, will Luca Donic commit his future to the Los Angeles Lakers? When they traded Anthony Davis for Luca Donuch, the franchise moved away from LeBron James and to Luca. And going forward, everything the Lakers do is going to be geared towards trying to have Luca Donuch be the center of this franchise’s universe for the next 5 years and beyond. And that begins with on August 2nd, will he agree to extend his contract by a couple years and stay in in Los Angeles uniform through the rest of the decade? If he doesn’t do that, if he goes into next season and says, I’m going to see how this goes and then test free agency next summer, an already tense situation in LA. I mean, right now we’re talking about, you know, can the Lakers get a center? Can they be a competitor in the West? If Luca Donic is going to be a free agent next summer, the questions in LA are going to be far different and far bigger than just will they get a center to play with him. And we’re still about a month away from finding out uh the answer to the question of what is going on with Luca. Much more on this as we move along we come back. Indeed, would you believe the Dallas Mavericks are title contenders once Kyrie is healthy? Yeah, if he gets back to the way he was playing last year, absolutely. I mean, look, Oklahoma City is the f is the favorite. Let’s be honest. But if you’re going to beat Oklahoma City, you have to have size and depth and star power, and the Mavericks will have that. And I can’t wait to watch Cooper Flag play in this with this team and how he might impact them. Absolutely. The Mavericks could could consider themselves that if Kyrie gets healthy.
Bobby, you agree?
I do. I mean, certainly Kyrie is the big X factor here, but I I look at their depth. I mean, when you go PJ Washington or Naji Marshall or Caleb Martin and either Daniel Gaffford or Derek Lively off the bench, that is a strong depth. And as we saw in in the playoffs in the finals, depth matters. Bon Temps, would you believe it if I said the Nuggets have regressed this off season? I don’t know if I can go as far as to say as they Do this.

GET UP | Nuggets looking scary this offseason – Brian Windhorst on Denver acquire Cam Johnson & Bruce