Denver Nuggets FORCING Jonas Valanciunas to leave Greece?

Denver Nuggets FORCING Jonas Valanciunas to leave Greece?

When last we left you, Yonas Valenunis was a nugget. Funny story. Funny story. Or maybe not. Maybe not. Maybe maybe that is true. What is true? What What is What are What are rights to a player? We’ll talk about it on Locked on Nuggets. You are Locked on Nuggets, your daily Denver Nuggets podcast, part of the Locked On Network, your team every day. Welcome to Locked On Nuggets, your daily nuggets podcast. Part of the Locked On Network, your team every day. Thanks for joining us and making us part of your day, being with us all throughout the offseason. Appreciate you guys being every day. You’re hanging out with us Monday through Friday and being part of our community. We do appreciate you joining us whether you’re listening to us on podcast, checking us out on YouTube, joining our live shows. YouTube.com/locktonnuggets is where you can find us there. We do appreciate each and every one of you especially through the summer and into the offseason. On today’s show, we’ll talk about that the Jonas Valentino situation and how crazy it is and how wild it is and what exactly is going to be the outcome here. As word did come down on Sunday, the Nuggets are not planning on letting Yonas Valenunis out of his current deal. We’ll talk about the ramifications of that, the ethics of that, and all sorts of other things today on Locked on Nuggets. Today’s show is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins. My name is Matt Moore. I’m the senior NBA writer for the Action Network. I write a substack called the Denver Dig that covers all things Denver Nuggets. have a piece up about the Yonas Valentuna situation. This man’s got several pieces up about the Yonas Valentuna situation. He’s Ryan Blackburn from Mile High Sports and the Pickax and Roll podcast where he broke down a lot of this stuff over on that channel as well if you want to hear more about it. Ryan, let’s catch people up in case that they’ve been enjoying the holiday weekend as they should.
Yep.
So, Nuggets trade for Yas Valentunes. Hooray. They got the backup center. It’s all fixed. Everything’s great.
Huge. Then then the European reports start coming out. Um, and I’m going to Do you have the pronunciation? I never can pronounce this name right. I
I you know what? I got in trouble on the other show for butchering the pronunciation and they called me a racist white American. So like
Oh, I see. The Greek Greek fans have found you. That’s why
let’s go Panathanos. Panathnikos. Uh, I’m gonna call it PBC. Cool. I’m going to call it
uh basketball club. So we’re gonna just call it PBC. Cool.
PC wants Yonas and they wanted him last year and he uh has made it clear through his people that he was going to go and he was going to sign with them and that’s what he was going to do. But but you can’t do that if you’re under contract to an NBA team. If you ask why can’t you do that to an NBA team, it’s because you need something called a FIA letter clearance. Uh shout out to Keith Smith who had a really great breakdown about this on the Sasha Bazenko situation last year. Um, FIA’s got to work with the NBA and the NBA’s got to work with FIA and they all want to be basketball organizations that work together. And in order for that to happen, you have to have things like, hey, our guys can’t just leave their contracts dead and go play for your clubs. And so, you have to get that FE letter of clearance. Otherwise, you can’t legally participate in these games. So, you need the Nuggets in order to be able to buy you out, wave you, provide that letter of clearance so that you can go ahead and accept what sounds like a very lovely life in Athens. It sounds like a very lovely life. The beaches are south of there, I learned today. And they do look pristine. Um, so, so that’s all kind of hanging out there. Stein’s reporting like he’s going to go. No one really knows. Then it comes out the Nuggets going to go ahead and go through the trade. They’re going to complete the trade. That paperwork has still not been done because I think that they’re still trying to like I think they want to they don’t want to do the deal and then like I think they want to resolve the situation and then do the deal. also probably hard to do a physical on Yonis Valenunis when he’s in in Lithuania. So that that’s that’s kind of a problem because he’s over there for uh Eurob Basket. So that’s that’s an issue for them um for getting this deal done. Now on Sunday, Shamstra reported what had been indicated to Steiner previously, which is that the Nuggets are not planning on letting him out of his contract. If uh I do want to run down these scenarios. If the Nuggets were to just wave him, they would eat the $10 million on his deal. They can wave the non-G guaranteed uh on the next season, but they would just eat the 10 million for this year.
Non-starter. Like that’s not
that would just be dead cap space. They’re not going to do that. Yeah.
Yonas can agree to give up the 10 million this year and the Nuggets can agree to let him out and then all of that money comes off the cap. if they agreed to uh one year versus nine given up, then one million would go on the Nuggets cap, etc. Um, so those are kind of the options for Giannis to get out. If the Nuggets decide to not pursue any of these options, they can just be like, “Nope, we expect you to honor your contract.” And there’s not a lot that Yonas can do. This is about hard leverage, which the Nuggets have, versus soft leverage, which Yonas has. And that’s kind of catches everybody. Did I miss anything in that description of
No, I don’t think so. I think it it’s important for people, especially in a players league, to understand that that soft leverage that Yonas does have. It has translated in the past before a lot of times where guys say, “I don’t want to be here. I do not want to play here.” And depending on how hard they are willing to go in terms of pushing that envelope, uh the teams are not wanting to deal with that. But clearly the Nuggets made the trade for like Darius Arch for Yonas Valjunis because they expected Yonas to play because they expected him to be a very important piece of this rotation that we have talked about before. So it I will say not a fun position to play uh the backup center position behind Nicole Joic. So I can understand Yonas’s uh issue potentially with playing that particular role. Um so look it is what it is. Nuggets fans have to understand that this is more delicate than I think has kind of been reported on the the American side of things where everybody’s saying, “Oh, yeah, no, they’re not going to let him go.” Well, I I don’t necessarily think it’s that simple. I just I don’t think that like usually when guys want something, they get their way. They eventually get their way, even if it takes a little bit of time. So, the Nuggets are hoping it kind of goes the other way where he basically says, “Okay, cooler heads prevail. the Nuggets kind of give him the opportunity to say, “Look, if you want to go in a year, we will allow you to go in a year, but for this season, we really need you.” It’s a that’s a thing that I think that they are trying to work through. So, it’s a tough situation. I I don’t think that this is an easy one, by the way. Who are the agents for uh Jonas Valenunis? That is uh Jeff Schwarz of XL Sports and Michael Telum. So,
hey, just keep that in mind.
Hey, who does Jeff Schwarz represent, Ryan? uh only half of the Nuggets organization uh including Nicole Kach and Jamal Murray uh very very important and powerful person surrounding the Nuggets. Before we take a sec, I want to just go ahead and No, actually we’ll talk about this. I want to talk about I want to we’re going to get into the ethics. I love ethics conversations. So, we’re going to get into the ethics of this and we’re going to talk about it uh both from an ethical standpoint and from a pragmatic standpoint. We’ll talk about that from uh all angles coming up here on Lock on Nuggets. Summer sports are in full swing and whether you’re all about baseball under the lights, golf on the green, WNBA, or high stakes soccer action. FanDuel is the best way to make every game even more exciting. You’re already following the action, why not make it make it more thrilling? With FanDuel, you can get in on the game with with your friends while getting while your friends are getting sunburned at the beach. Uh, hey, do do you want to go bet on PBC to to win their league? You you can do that because they might have a really good player coming. That’s exciting for them. You can get in on the odds of that. Uh, the Nuggets have shot up the the odds boards. They are between 600 and 800 to win the NBA title in the market. Very interesting that there’s a lot of confidence this Nugget team is going to be as good as we’ve talked about them potentially being. 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 fandal.com to get started. We’ll be right back on Lock on Nuggets. Okay, so there’s a couple of things to look at this because Hurricanes are already already like ethics be damned. What’s the best move for the team at 2526? Okay, so first thing I want to say is that we do not know Yonas Valenunis’ motivation for going overseas. We don’t know that. And I want to make it clear that until we know those reasons, we should not talk about them the way that we were talking about them. This is a major life decision that he’s making.
Yeah.
Once he leaves, he’s gone. Like he’ll never be able to come back.
Probably. Probably. And so if that’s the case, that’s a pretty huge decision. And we don’t know if the decision was like there might be a personal situation that is causing him to need to go there to be closer to overseas whether and he’s not going back to Lithuania, right? He’s going back to um he’s going to Greece, but there might be a reason that he is in a position where he needs to. I don’t want to just obliviate over that. I don’t want to make it into like he doesn’t want to back up Jokic. We don’t know how he feels about that.
Sure.
He hasn’t given an interview. Like we don’t know if it’s about fit. We don’t know if it’s about coaching. We don’t know anything in that. Um, so well, so I think this is the the reason the ethical stuff the if you want to say like the ethical stuff doesn’t matter, Matt, it’s about business. You’re absolutely right. We as fans though get to talk about things in more than one way. Uh, Wade says Yonas is being less ethical by not honoring his contract. If there’s a personal situation, then sure, but if not, keep him. Okay. But him being unethical by not honoring his contract does not mean it’s the ethical thing for you to retain him. Just something to keep in mind. It’s not it does not justify your unethical behavior because he’s engaging in what you feel is an unethical behavior by not honoring his contract, which I think he should.
Is it an ethical decision to bring back Russell Westbrook? Like based off of the way that his situation went and how like strong of a a star he is in the NBA. I think I think it would be the ethical decision. Uh
that doesn’t always make the difference.
So, let’s do this. Now, a lot of people are doing this. Good for the Nuggets to play hard ball. Juggle Channel says he screwed Denver. Okay,
so here’s the thing. Here’s the question. Okay, the Nuggets the Nuggets can take this position. I do. I mean, look,
he’s he signed a contract to play
for the duration of the term of that contract. If he did not want to play those years, he should not have signed those that contract for that duration. However, when you start going into good for them for playing hard ball, this is where I will tell you that you are probably not thinking long term about what’s best for Denver. The reason that these teams always fall over, that they always break is not because they’re all soft, weak human beings. It’s because of the calculated risk and cost of those decisions. If you do this, you are saying you’re making a statement about how you treat players that you’ve acquired under contract. Your right to do it. You have the right to do it. Okay? You have the position. You have the high hand here, but you have to make a like a real long. Now, if I will be very clear on this, if Jonas Valentunis is like, “No, I want the money and I want out.” Come on now. Come on now. Right. But we don’t have any indication that that’s the case.
The indication was that he would be willing to give up all of it, right? Like that was that was what the reports are basically saying is that he just really wants to go. So if that’s the case and it’s not about money, it’s really about situation. It’s about something else that’s within his life. Then who are any of us to like like hold him back from that other than the fact that there is a legal document that is preventing him from doing so? Um, Smith says, “It’s dumb to force a player to be here when he doesn’t want to be here.” I kind of agree with this from the perspective of I, this is what I said today on the dig is just like, look, locker rooms are delicate. It’s 15 people in a room for six months traveling, all of it. These things get in the way. It gets in the way. The healthiest locker room I’ve ever seen in Denver was 2023 because everyone was paid and everyone knew what they were there for and everyone wanted to be there. Nobody was in a position they didn’t want to be in. Since then, a lot of people have been in positions they didn’t want to be in. Um, and Yonas would be in a position where he doesn’t want to be there. He would just be coming to work because he has to. And I don’t like saying like held there against his will because that’s not accurate. his will was to sign the contract. He’s he he understood the terms and conditions of that contract. Um there are benefits though to letting him out, which are not things that fans are ever going to see. We’ll hear about it. We’ll see it. We’ll feel it when we walk in the locker room. Like these are very real things that I think and I’d like your perspective on this Ryan because I am old and so it’s been so long since I can remember this but I just remember being really surprised by how different it was to cover teams daytoday and the human side of this and how much that impacts things more than I thought when I was just a fan or an analyst or a writer. Yeah, it definitely the world sort of opens up to you the more you allow it to and the more you kind of get ingratiated into into what is going on. uh just from the perspective of learning about uh Michael Porter’s back situation for example uh like there’s there’s just a lot of things like we we heard about Aaron Gordon’s off-c court potential issues like not not like issues but like like things that were happening off the court that were hurting Aaron Gordon at various points and so it becomes more human in that regard. It’s certainly like there are certainly situations and then because you want as a fan and you want as like a an objective analyst, somebody who has to cover it the way you’re supposed to. You want to look at what you’re seeing, make a call, and then use additional data that you get to kind of adjust your priors. And one of those adjustments that we often get is the behind the scenes where you start to realize, oh, that guy just got broke up with by his girlfriend or, oh, uh, there is a a dispute that is going on behind the scenes. And so, we may hear about that stuff, we may not hear about that stuff. Uh there’s a lot of times where we don’t hear anything and guys just keep it bottled up, but they might go through a slump, a shooting slump, and you’re like, “Hey, what’s going on?” And he they can’t really tell you or certainly don’t want to tell you about certain things within their private life. So, that’s a that’s a factor that I always try to remember or have had trouble remembering in the past and have now tried to put that a little bit more at the forefront, especially kind of learning what Aaron Gordon was going through specifically. Uh, comment from the comment section. Jonas should have told the Nuggets he didn’t want to play in the US and asked for a buyout. There’s no excuse for his going to Greece without telling the Nuggets and doing dirty underhanded wink wink deal. Well, again, he can’t really do the dirty underhand wink wink deal because he’s got to get the FIFA letter of clearance. And I will say this, the fact that he is going like he’s going for Euro Basket, like that’s like he’s going he’s on his way to Lithuania to start training for Euro Basket. Um, and I’m not saying that it’s like coincidental that he showed up in Greece to do his medical stuff and do all that kind of conversation. Um, but I think he wanted to have like a real probably discussion and like a for a whole full talk of what is this going to look like? How much will you will you pay me and to help me out with the buyout, etc. Those type of things in order to facilitate the deal because I do think it’s it was notable to me, Ryan, that this deal that’s offered is not a huge money maker for him. I assume that this was like, oh, they paid him something insane. And then at that point, you kind of have to be like, I really would like to take this deal because it’s so much money like that. I actually kind of understand.
Let me uh let me correct a little bit because the the 10.3 million is USD. It’s US dollars and you’re in US taxes uh that are kind of being forced upon you with that. So, how it’s been explained to me is that that’s about 5.56 million or so that you’re getting back after taxes. Whereas, uh, for the athletes in Greece and for these large Euro League teams, they get those after like they get 4 million after taxes is what’s been described to me. So, it’s not as drastic of a change in salary for somebody like Jonas who has made a fair sizable chunk of change in his entire NBA career. Uh, and he also gets the stability of playing a large role, playing on a contender, playing closer to home, things like that. So, I can understand it from that perspective of why he would do it. Uh, and the money while it is more in the United States, it may not be as more as has been kind of bandied about.
I’m cracking up because Jasonos Freddy is saying we we are just being petty, forcing a player to stay with us. He doesn’t want to be here. Let’s use logic. What we And what we really need here is we need to get the Russ stands and the Yonas stands to fight each other over this. Like that’s what we really need here.
I mean, I’ve got the Faku stands on speed dial. Like, we can we can make it happen. There’s there’s plenty of fan bases I think would uh would go to bat for their guys. No say it’s just bad for him to break your contract. He’s not because he can’t. Like there’s no there is no mechanism for him to do this. He can if he sits out like let’s say that he’s just like well I’m not coming. Okay. Well then the NBA is going to find him and that comes out of his paycheck. So he so he then is not earning PBC money and he’s not earning Nuggets NBA money. Like he’s losing the money he’s already owed and he’s not earning the money from PBC unless they’re doing it under the table. And I will totally cop to not knowing anything about any FIVA and like the restrictions on like finances and stuff. I don’t no idea. I have no idea about any of that stuff if it’s possible. But it’s unlikely that he would miss out on that. So like he can’t just break the contract. He can’t do it. And I honestly don’t think somebody mentioned this in the comments too that like he’s never done anything like this and he hasn’t. Like this is very unlike him. This is very like Jonas has always been a pro. Showed up in Memphis, played well. Showed up in New Orleans, played well. should have been sack played well. Like he’s done his job. That’s who he’s he’s been consistently. So, I’m not sure what is going on, but that to me was notable that this is like very out of character for him. Um,
uh, we’ve got a we’ve got a visitor in the comments who’s never been here before. Swiper says, “I have a question. Uh, what would you like to see Yonas play or use the MLE elsewhere? Uh, maybe we should answer that on Lockdown Nuggets. Good job back here on Lockdown Nuggets. Thanks for joining us and making this part of your day. Swive wants to know if we’d rather uh Yonas play or use the MLA for somebody else. You know, I know I understand how much everybody wants Al Horford. Um, I would kill for the chance to cover Al Horford for a year. I would just love the opportunity to cover Al. He’s been one of my absolute favorite guys in the league. He has been in the league as long as I have
in terms of like not in the league. He’s been actually playing professional basketball while I’ve been sitting on the sideline watching it and writing about it for the exact same amount of time.
That’s why. Um, and I’ve just I’m always I have I was a huge advocate of Al before he went to the Celtics. Like he was great in Atlanta. That dude has missed the playoffs twice in his career. It’s insane.
Oh my god.
Yeah,
that’s a great That’s a great trivia question. Which years were they like
the OKC and Philadelphia years is the answer.
Oh yeah,
it worked. And one and OKC was just they were letting him rest and get healed up from injuries.
Yeah.
One team couldn’t figure out how to win with them. one team, one one particular squad led by one particular player. Couldn’t figure out
to be fair, they had like 17 different power forwards in their starting lineup. So, I I there’s nobody left to give the MLE to other than now.
Other than now. There’s nobody left. If he goes to the Warriors or Lakers or retires because that’s apparently like his decision tree. If they get him, great. Awesome. Fantastic. I’d rather have Al than JV. No question. If if that happens, then you just Sure. No problem, JB. We’re good. Um, other than that though, there’s nobody left on the market that I would want to give this money to. No sir, you got to be out of your mind. He says be it’s not the worst to have another another ball handler and creator on the roster. Not the worst thing. I mean, what what is be Okay. Okay. Okay. I’m trying to I’m trying to think this through. I guess if you want to I would want a one-year deal, though, because like
Oh, yeah. I think would want a one-year deal. He would like, you know what? I’m gonna go one year MLE, maybe maybe two years with a player option and uh and get back out on the market and make back up the the 13 million that he’s giving up to get the hundred million dollar buyout. Yeah. I mean, so look, I think Bradley was underappreciated in Washington. I also think Beal just might be cooked.
Yeah. Like I just think it might be done in terms of him being an impact guy. I do not see him having like a late career renaissance moment. Um, defensively it’s a big it’s a big issue.
Small guard.
He fits a lot of the needs. I get that. I would be okay using some of the MLA, but if you’re not going to use all of it, I don’t know. Well, so they can’t use all of it. That’s the other factor here is that people are still like ignoring the the salary cap aspects of this thing. They have like 13 million that they can give up. So, it’s most of it, but they could give that to one person or they could give it to two people.
I do not care about his points per game, Daniel. I do not care. I do not care. I do not care. Yeah. The other thing is that for that particular Suns roster, he had to score. Like that was that was the requirement. They they didn’t have the financial capacities for anything else.
Now, I would if you told me that they would split the the MLA and get Beal and Tristan Vevitz. Okay. I like Tristan. He’s a name that I threw out there yesterday. Like I can’t believe that Washington’s just like not gonna bring him back. It looks like Yeah, I’m very surprised. He’s very good. Not very good. He’s good.
He had He’s like 21, 22.
Yeah, he’s so young for sure.
Doesn’t have to play every night for Denver. Like I I think that that would be a great kind of pivot if they had to. But what about uh Vu if he gets bought out?
Yeah.
Yeah, sure. I seems like a pretty obvious fit if he was willing to be the backup.
Yep.
Um but outside of that, like and outside of Al, it is pretty dry. I will I will say that for sure. It’s pretty tough. I’m not sure how I don’t know what not using it does for them.
You get under the tax. Get out of the repeater. Yeah. I mean, for the fans.
Oh, sure. They don’t give it. They They don’t care about that. That’s why. Or should they? That’s why. So R&M shorts says go get bataze. Here’s the problem. You I don’t know if there’s a mechanism to do that using the MLE.
They can they can they can So that’s that’s something that was added to the most recent CBA. You can use that MLE as like a trade exception, a traded player exception to acquire somebody that is within that number. So if they wanted to save Orlando $8 million and not have to pay him like that, that to me is a great option if they were able to do that. Another guy that could make sense for that, Kelly Olen on Washington, probably cooked, but like also free if that was the case. Uh there there are some other names that I think you could fit into that from a like Nick Richards, Andre Drummond, some names I brought up yesterday, but uh that that is a mechanism for which they could make a deal.
Would you rather have BL on part of the MLE or Cole Anthony on the minimum? I think I’d rather have Cole on the minimum. I I think I would too. I think I would too. He was put in a pretty tough situation having to start uh in the playoffs without Suggs there, but like he is a good kind of spark plug off the bench. That is something that you would want him to do. And also there there’s no there’s no issues with adding somebody of that caliber because he knows what he’s coming into for that situation. Whereas Beiel, I think, would have some preconceived notions on what his expectations would be.
Ken does mention that Vuj and AG were teammates for a long time. No, that would be great. They Look, man, if you could get if you could get the Bulls to make another dumb decision, which they’ve been want to do like they they’ve been doing it. Um, I would love Vir that would be great.
So, Max says, “You guys are crazy. Be’s better than Anthony.” Okay. I just
Do you guys realize how bad the Suns were? Like, do you guys understand how And you do understand that literally everyone was like, “What was the problem?” And they all were like at Beal. Like everybody was pointing was pointing at him like he’s the one that got got demoted to the bench. Okay. Now again I think you’re not wrong that Beal’s better than Anthony. My problem there is like Beal is going to come with expectations of his playing time, his minutes, his role. Like Bradley’s been a star in this league. Like he was the best player on that Wizards team. And if you’re like yeah the Wizards, okay, well he was the second best player on a team that made the playoffs like six years in a row in the mid210s. like
OKC fans have have showed up. Uh they they are here and they are letting us know that OKC would play Valenunis off the court after three possessions, but that would be three possessions that Denver did not have from the backup center position in the playoffs.
That’s true.
And also like he is just like people have to realize this is a regular season thing. So the Jokic gets to play 32 minutes as opposed to 37. I’m really fascinated because we’ve got like we’ve got Greek fans advocating for the right of of Yonas Valenunis as if he did not sign a contract. We’ve got Westbrook stands. We’ve got Beal fans. We’ve got Thunder fans. And we’ve got Russ fans. It’s absolutely amazing.
We got a popping chat tonight. This has been great.
Rainbow Coalition here on Lock on Nugget.
Say something controversial for 762 people. Um, I think I already did by being like, I’d rather have Cole Anthony than Bradley Beal.
I I don’t think that that’s that’s that controversial.
Beal was 22nd percentile in defensive EPM last year. He was 67th in offense. Not bad.
I can’t imagine 81st percentile at the rim. He shot 69%. Shot 50% from mid-range, 88th percentile, and he shot 39% from three. Like the shooting’s still there. He’s still he’s still a scorer, but like just in general like I I and honestly here’s here is one thing I will say on that. There was a report. How true it was over the course of the last year or so, I’m not sure, but that the only team or one of the only teams that he would wave his no trade clause for was for the Denver Nuggets. I don’t know why that is. Uh but like if that is something and he just wants to be here, then maybe there’s something to it. Yeah. I mean, you know, and he probably, again, if they were to grab Beal, I would be like, “Hey, it’s a good move. It’s, you know, I think it I think it works. If we’re just talking about options, like Beal is not a guy that I’m like, “No, right.” Like, do not want him here. Like Miles Bridges, I do not want Miles Bridges here.
Ain’t no way, dog. But Beal, I would think like would be helpful and would be good. Um, and I I do kind of go back and forth on this of uh, okay, so if we live in the reality that if we if we do not hold the cronies to what they should do, which is like I just do not care. I just you have Nicole Yokic, you’re going to be in the repeater. I’m sorry. Deal with it. Sometimes sometimes owning a good sports team is expensive. Them’s the brakes. But if we’re dealing with the reality, which is they’re not going to be in the repeater year after year after year after year, breaking the cycle is probably a pretty good pretty smart idea. And honestly, like they still have the flexibility to use some of it and not have to go over like they’re they’re they don’t have to fully cheap out on it. And it’s like you said, there’s not a lot of candidates for the MLE either. So if there’s nobody that they really consider, nobody that they really like, then I can understand being at least a little bit hesitant. Like if you take Yonas’s number out of their salary cap sheet right now, I see them having 10 million, just under 10 million in space under the luxury tax. So, you split that 10 million up between two different guys and you’re fine. Like, it’s it’s not that crazy as long as you get a decent backup center.
Bradley Beal or Chris Paul?
Chris Paul.
Yeah.
Like, I you you have fully converted me that there’s there’s one guy who gets buckets and there’s one guy that helps his team win. And uh I think I would rather have CP3 and so would the Suns by the way.
Um so, do I kind of give my thoughts on it. Do you want them to play a hard ball and just keep Val? I don’t know what I want. Like what I really wanted was to be able to cover a team that was like, “Oh yeah, they could win 60.” And Valentunis was supposed to be the like the catalyst for that in a lot of ways because of his ability to like have 48 minutes of really good center play, which is just something that Denver has not had in a long time. So that’s a that’s a new wrinkle that I think it would be pretty cool if they had. Uh, but it’s still the least important position in Denver’s rotation. It really is like the the backup center position is still the least important because you have the three-time MVP because he has the capability to play 32, 36, 40 minutes on any given night. Do you want to have to do that? No. Uh, is it worth like strongarming Yonas Valenunis to stay in Denver and potentially ruining what could be a really great opportunity in a down year around the NBA could that could be tough. So, like I I think they have to they have to approach this thing with maximizing value as much as they can. I’m not sure what that means. I’m going to make a a suggestion that I don’t want to and I will do whatever I have to knock on wood, jinx, cross my fingers, whatever you want. Joker’s got a lot of miles on him. Having a backup center that’s ready to go for a month in the starting spot that you can reasonably not duplicate his skill set but duplicate his body and play type with is immensely valuable. I think it is. But then when you think about the the healthy situation for the team and what it would ultimately return back to, especially kind of in a playoff context, that’s where the the balance has kind of been like Calvin Booth punted on the backup center position. That’s something that like he effectively said that he was doing. Um and now I think Denver’s really trying like especially over the course of the last year they realized that’s that’s tough. Need somebody back who can actually help there. So, I I would love to have Valenunis in because I think that he would really help the Nuggets. I I do I think that that would be great. You’re muted. Okay. We didn’t get to cover this because of the holiday and everything else uh that was going on. So, we caught you up on that. Honestly, part of me was like, “Well, let’s wait because it surely they’ll resolve itself in 24 hours.” And then it just didn’t. Um whenever this gets resolved, we’ll do an episode and we’ll catch up on what’s going on. We’ll talk about more stuff throughout the week. Uh, I want to get to some stuff about Bruce Brown and Cam Johnson and their fit together on the floor. I want to talk about kind of what we’re looking at. Uh, as well as, hey, guess what? Summer League starts this week. So, we’ll start talking about the Nuggets, summer league, Don Holmes, all the crew, all signs of stuff. Check out uh, Ryan’s coverage over at Mile High Sports. I’m over at the Denver Dig. Thanks for joining us. We’ll see you guys again next time on Live Time on Time Nuggets.

No Jinx begins the week with a discussion about the Jonas Valanciunas situation with the Denver Nuggets. Will they be successful preventing Valanciunas from leaving the NBA for EuroLeague in Greece? Matt Moore and Ryan Blackburn discuss.

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