FIRST TAKE | Nuggets have NOT done enough to support Jokic – Stephen A. on DEN add Cameron, Bruce,..

FIRST TAKE | Nuggets have NOT done enough to support Jokic – Stephen A. on DEN add Cameron, Bruce,..

moves, agreeing to a one-year deal with former Detroit guard Tim Hardaway Jr. and trading for Jonas Valenunis from the Sacramento Kings for Dario Saridge. Here are all the moves that Denver has made since free agency has started. They traded Michael Porter Jr. to the Nets for Cam Johnson. That freed up money for them to bring back Bruce Brown, a key member of their 2023 championship run. David, has Denver done enough to support the Joker?
Absolutely. I think Denver right now they last year of course took OKC to game seven and the reason they lost they ran out of players. They ran out of depth. They could not even get really four guys on the court. Now they’ve added Cam Johnson who I think is a better player than Michael Porter especially with that contract. And they’ve added depth which is something that they’ve missed. And the Tim Harderway Jr. aspect of this is so underrated. Dude shot 63% on open spot threes. How many more of those threes you think he’s going to get with Jokic on the court? This team has gotten pretty much the stuff that they need. And Joic, of course, is the wild card. They are as tough a competitor of OKC as there is in the West. This is the stuff that I think that would make Jokic want to come back.
Tim, I mean, Denver has added some okay veteran role players and this the sad state of affairs with the Nuggets the past couple years is that some okay role players might be enough to lift them over the finish line. That’s how poor their bench has been and that’s how inevitable Nicole Joic is. I mean, this is a team that lost in game seven in each of the last two Western Conference semi-finals after winning the title, blowing a 20-point lead to Minnesota two years ago and then losing obviously a blowout in game seven to the Thunder. But they were up in game four of that series in the fourth quarter. If they win that game, I think Denver goes on to win the title. I think if they win that game seven against Minnesota, they go on to win the title. Instead, they lose those two games. They’re sitting here having not made it out of the second round each of the past two years. And now they’ve gone out and gotten an okay backup center, a couple of okay wings. We’ll see if Bruce Brown could get back to how he was in Denver. Tim Hardway Jr. is an okay shooter, but there’s a reason he’s bounced around a bunch. And you know Valen Shununis at this point is again an okay backup center. But this is a team that did not have any depth at all and now they have some. Now I do think the upgra the upgrade or the alleged upgrade from Cam Johnson over Michael Porter Jr. as part of that trade is also a little muted. I would say those guys are very similar players. And the reason that Denver made that trade and gave up the one asset they have going forward, their 2032 first round pick is because it saved the Cronies a gazillion dollars in tax payments as a repeater tax team. It gets them out of the luxury tax this season. But if you look at Denver now, they are marginally better than they were last year. And marginally better might be good enough because they have the best player on the planet on their team. And him with a little bit of help could very well be enough to get the Nuggets their 2026 NBA title. Whitney, by going from Porter Jr. obviously to Cam Johnson, they save the 1617, they say the tax, but they’re also able to add a few players. Is that enough for Denver? This has been such a polarizing reaction as I’ve talked to people in the league because really on one some depth to this roster that they just were so badly in needed. And they’ve given new coach David Adelman something that Michael Malone didn’t feel he had. Whether he did or not was the basis of the argument between him and the former general manager Calvin Booth. but options, you know, he’s now can look down his bench and he can go with more veteran players or the younger players they’re developing. But the reason this is polarizing um is that a lot of people think that the that that this is not going to really help them. When I say people, I’m talking about like rival executives. So like they say it’s if you want to ever have a dream of prying Nicola Joic out of Denver, you’ve got to be happy that they used their prime last, you know, big trade chip, which Bon Temps referenced the 2032 pick in a in a money in a money dump move. Like I had somebody say to me, if you’re if you’re the Lakers, you’d love seeing that because that that means that you’re not helping Joic with like a bonafide star. Um, I got other people saying, “Uh, oh man, Valenunis is the best backup that Jookic has ever had. It’s like it’s like, you know, since Ysef Nerkach was there, like it’s terrific for him.” I got other people telling me, and again, these are the pros, so this is their job. This is not my opinion. Okay. Other people saying Don Shudis won’t even play in the playoffs, so they can rest in the season, won’t even play in the playoffs. So, um, the idea that they’re a winner or a loser, like I’ve seen a lot of people say that the Nuggets like, whoa, huge winner in the or in the in the in the people who are in the league are not sure about that. You know, some of them think this is, you know, long-term not going to be great. What I say is I have a sensitivity towards their new front office, Ben Tenzer and John Wallace, who just got these job. Both of them are inexperienced in these roles and they clearly had a mandate. They had a mandate from Jokic who said we need more depth and they had a mandate from ownership which was we ain’t paying that that repeater tax and they were able to deal with those two mandates in an inexperienced position and potentially satisfy both giving Jokic some some depth which as Bontemps mentions even a little bit is a major difference with a with a talent like Jokic and they’ve got their bosses happy that they got him off a bunch of money. I mean, the other thing to mention, too, when you talk about Denver and you talk about the the using the pick to get off of money, they’ve traded several picks during the Nicole Joic era over the past eight or 10 years. One time did they use a pick to truly make an upgrade to the roster. That’s when they traded for Aaron Gordon, which turned out to be the move that won them a title. Virtually every other time they’ve moved a first round pick, it’s been to save money. And it is does really make you think, what if Denver had been able to use those picks to go out and get further upgrades to the roster? You could be talking about a situation where maybe they’ve won multiple championships over the stretch. Instead, they have not. They’ve come close several times. They’ve made second, third round of the playoffs on a few different occasions, but they haven’t ever been able to quite get over the line in part because they haven’t had a lot of depth. And the one time they did win in 2023, they did have enough depth. They did have a Bruce Brown playing at a very high level. They had Jeff Green playing at a high level. And now, you know, you look at them, we’ll see if they can get back to that point next year. I I think on the macro level, the big question here to simplify this is this team took OKC to game seven. They probably should have won that series in game four. Are they better than they were then? I think they are. And if Joic has just a little bit better than they had when they were competing with OKC, he has as good a shot at anybody to carry a team to a championship.
So Wendy, are they better though than Houston as the biggest threat to OKC? Is it Denver or is it Houston?
In my view, it’s Denver because of number 15. because this guy I honestly it’s amazing anybody can beat him four out of seven and it’s obviously happened the last two years I I watched the guy and you know his I I voted for Shay Gildas Alexander this year and I was very you know I don’t regret it but I felt bad about it because watching what Joic does is so amazing and watching what it takes to beat him in these playoff series is so amazing and really as David referenced there we are really a narrow narrow pathway from having the Nuggets having gone to the finals three years in a because I believe if they don’t blow game seven last year against Minnesota, with all due respect to Luca, I think they’re winning that series and getting to the finals and I don’t know what happened against Boston as Boston was 0 and2 against them in the regular season. And this year, the Thunder won the title. Okay, they were far and away the better team and they were in deep trouble against against the Nuggets and had just one or two little things gone a different way in games four and five. I don’t know. So, I’m just I mean I it’s it’s not a commentary on Houston, who I think has been on an organizational hot streak. It’s a it’s a it’s an ode to the to the big man. Well, Paul Finebound had a comparison for Arch Manning that turned heads. Now, he’s here to stand on business. Finebound in rare form coming up. Plus, the East has more questions than answers right now. Which team are we highest on at the moment? [Applause] for [Music] Foreign speech. Foreign speech. Foreign speech. Get out there. Number two. [Music] I’m getting out of here. I’m not oil.

FIRST TAKE | Nuggets have NOT done enough to support Jokic – Stephen A. on DEN add Cameron, Bruce,..