Why Nikola Jokic is NOT signing an extension with Denver Nuggets

Why Nikola Jokic is NOT signing an extension with Denver Nuggets

All right, Nuggets fans. Welcome into Pickax and Roll brought to you by our good friends here at Mile High Sports. I’m your host, Ryan Blackburn at NBA Blackburn on Twitter, part of the Mile High Sports Podcast Network. And I’m here. I am ready to break down the Denver Nuggets and a couple of different bits of news and notes that have come out over the course of well from the weekend to now where there was something that actually came out this afternoon that I think is very prevalent for the Nuggets. Of course, it’s their best player Nicole Joic and him not electing to sign an extension. Uh we’ll talk about why. We’ll talk about what that could mean, what it could signify. Should Nuggets fans be worried? Things like that. There there’s plenty to get into on this particular show. Uh but gonna also be discussing Yonas Valenunis. Going to be talking about Don Holmes. Uh basically it’s it’s centers galore here for the Nuggets and for Pickax and Roll on this particular episode. So should be an interesting conversation for sure. Uh hope everybody is having a great night. As I mentioned on social media earlier today, uh this Tuesday night if you’re listening to this, I’m going to be going live on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday for this week. It’s going to probably be a pretty consistent three episodes a week offseason regimen for me. Uh but there’s like it’ll basically be about, okay, when are the Nuggets playing summer league? What’s going on? How can we kind of shift some things to when the news is actually happening? Eventually, I’ll probably knock it down to two a week or maybe even just take off entirely. Uh, but we will get into that in the coming days and weeks as we get into July here. And once you get through the first week of July, there’s a lot less news that ultimately comes out. But now the Nicole Jokic extension to me is news. It’s something that I think is a very important factor here for the Nuggets. And I do think that there’s a little bit of misinformation going out around and Lakers fans are like frothing at the mouth basically saying Jokic is gonna be a Laker. It’s gonna be crazy. No, that’s that’s not what this means. It might like we we don’t know. It’s there’s no guarantee until he actually puts pen to paper. And honestly, like even after he puts pen to paper and says, “I would like to be here.” We’ve seen this from Paul George and the Oklahoma City Thunder back in the day where he signed a 4-year max extension with OKC and then a year later Kawhi Leonard became available and he was like, “You know what? I would like to leave.” So players have all of the agency. It’s going to be up to them. It’s one of the reasons why I think this Jonas Valenunis thing is very interesting and why he does have some power in all of this. It’s not just up to the Nuggets. Uh but I do think that it’s important for everybody to understand what is actually happening here. Um he bought an entire street in Sombore. That definitely wasn’t cheap. He’s got to he’s got to go pay for that street in Sombore. says R&M shorts. Uh, Donic will be a nugget though, I mean, hey man, that would be cool. That would be a very cool thing for for that to happen. And if that is what ultimately happens from this and Jokic basically puts pressure on the organization and says, you know what, would love another like mega co-star and I wanted to be my buddy uh my buddy Luca. If that’s the case, okay, so not not a problem at all. Um, CT Fazio in the comments is here. What’s up, Ryan? Hope you’re enjoying your summer, man. I am enjoying my summer. Some some ups, some downs. Uh, last night I went to my first trivia night uh as a as an adult. Uh, but actually first really ever. So, it was fun. I actually really enjoyed it. We had some good food. We had some good beer. Uh, some good beer. It was great. I didn’t have beer. I don’t like beer. I don’t know why I said that. Uh, but it’s all good. I hope everybody is having a good day and especially you, CT. Hope you’re having a good night. Okay, let’s talk about this. Nicole Yokic in a reported thing. Uh, Tripping says, “What was your name?” It was Hawk Twivia. Hawk Twivia. Guess guess which creative writer came up with that one. It was uh it was your boy. Uh, so don’t think less of me. It was We’re We’re just having fun drinking. It was great. Okay. Bennett Durando of the Denver Post reported earlier today, a really good scoop for him, by the way. Glad that he got this. Uh said, quote, “Nicole Joic has informed the Nuggets he will not sign a contract extension this off season. Team sources told the Denver Post as the three-time MVP intends to wait until next summer to engage in contract talks.” That was the most important line. It was the first line of the article that Bennett wrote earlier today. You should go read it. Uh there there are some other good important pieces of context for Denver. I definitely think that it’s worth your time. Uh in there he included a quote from Josh Kroni when actually I asked the question at a Josh Kroni presser back in June about the Nicole Yokic exception or extension. He said, “Hey uh are are you gonna offer this?” And Josh says, quote, “We’re definitely going to offer it. I’m not sure if he’s going to accept it or not because we also we’re also going to explain every financial parameter around him signing now versus signing later.” To be completely transparent, that’s the way we always are. And then we he makes the best decision for himself and his family and we’ll support him in it. So that was what Josh said. that was what Nola has ultimately decided that he’s going to wait. There was no mention in there that like he’s definitely signing an extension next off season for what it’s worth. I think that’s what will eventually happen because I do think that Nicola would like to be a Denver Nugget for the rest of his career. He wants to be that guy. He wants to be Tim Duncan for the Denver Nuggets, Dirk Nitzky for the Denver Nuggets. And I think that that is something that he really values, of course. And the other thing is that he gets slightly more money per year by signing the contract um by signing the contract next year. Now, that’s a little bit of a mis a misnomer, too. And let me explain why. Um, one of the things that I I should have done, and I I didn’t fully prep it for this, but I want to show people the actual terms of the extensions that he could sign, projected. These are all projections because like people like, they need to understand, a max contract is a percentage of the salary cap, and that is not officially set until basically right up in that year. you get projections and we actually have a projection for next year that the salary cap’s only going up 7% as opposed to 10%. But basically what I have done here is I have shown people Joic’s three choices. He has a current contract that he could just let expire. He could sign an extension now which has a I don’t actually know if it has a due date if it has to be signed by a specific time. I think it’s just within this year of the cap or he could wait until next year of the cap and then officially have the opportunity to sign for four years instead of three. The reason why that is is at any given point you can only be signed for um five years. You cannot be signed for six. You cannot be signed for seven. You can only be signed for five. And now that kind of is a little bit shaky with the rookie extensions. Those are a little bit different. Uh but the the veteran extensions can only be fiveyear extensions or you can only be uh signed for up to five years at a time. So he has two more years right now at 55.2 and 59.0 million in 202526 and 2026 27. He has a player option of about 62.8 million for 2027-28. What would happen there is that would be declined if he was to sign an extension and they would sign a new contract that effectively says hey you are going to get this amount of money and ultimately what that’s going to be is a maximum 35% of the cap uh and for that year I have it projected at $182 million for the salary cap in 2027 728. So that is where these numbers have come from. As you can see on the bottom, 3 years 26.8 million versus four years 287.1 million. That is what fans and are and people are getting the 80 million number by the way. It’s because that would be his salary in 2031 2032 when he is at his age 35 season. And so when you’re 35 and he would turn 36 in February of that year, when you when you could lock in 80 million, not a bad idea. Not a bad idea to so I totally get it. Totally understand. Here’s what I will say about this. The thing that people aren’t really talking about from a nuggets perspective here, everybody’s saying, “Oh, he’s waiting just because he wants to wait, just because he wants to get that 80 million.” I want you to go through this exercise with me right now. Let’s say hypothetically speaking, let’s say another three years pass after. So he signs this extension now and then they play one year, then they play two years, then they play three years and it’s at the end of the 2027 28 season and the Nuggets have been as successful as we kind of expect. Maybe they win one more championship in these next three years, but really they’re they’re close. They’re hanging around. They’re very competitive. They’re one of the five to seven best teams in the NBA the other two years and then they break through in one of them. I want you to put yourself into Josh Kroni shoes, into Nicole Yokic’s shoes. You don’t think another max extension is going to be on the table for him then? You don’t think that he’s gonna be able to make up the 80 million that he’s not getting on this particular deal? You think there’s like under any circumstance, as long as he stays like basically within range of what he is, which is top 15 player in the NBA at that point. If you expect him to continue to be in that top 10 for sure, if you expect him there, and I don’t see any reason why he would slow down over the course of the next two or three, but if you expect him there, you don’t think the Nuggets would give him a max extension on top of what it is? And so, the reason why I ask that is because 2031 32 the salary cap will be larger than 182 million. So the the extension that he’ll be able to get then is certainly larger than the 63.7 million that he gets to sign for in 2027 28. You’re probably looking very close to 80. You’re probably looking maybe even higher than that depending on how successful the NBA is. And so I think that and this is what LeBron has done. This is what some other guys have done. That money will be there for him. And so I think he knows that. I think that he doesn’t have to worry about whether he’s going to make up the 80 million or not. It’s going to be there. Now, maybe there is a slight drop or or maybe you’re right. Maybe there is a worry for injury. If there is a worry for injury, my question would be, why not sign the extension now and lock in the money now? It’s a threeyear $26 million contract. basically 70 million per season. Like, why not lock that in now? Guarantee that you’re getting that now. Isn’t there plenty of time over this next season for him to get injured? So, I feel like there’s been some disingenuous stuff on both sides and and I think that there is reason for him to sign an extension now and there’s also reason for him to sign an extension later. And so my head gets to if the money is the same, if the money is the same both times, if you believe that if you sign a three-year extension now that you’re going to get paid on the back end of that again, which I think you would, then why not do it? Why not lock in that money immediately? Like I said, like I showed it is the exact same terms from 2027 28. Uh oh, I I screwed up numbers. I’m sorry, guys. I just realized that this this table is off. It’s 202728, 2028 29, and 2029 2030. Um, sorry about that. I just put this together right before uh the show. Um, but basically like you you know what I’m saying? for the next for the first three years of that extension, those terms would be the same because they are both built off of the max contract number for uh 202728. And so I think that there are certainly some reasons why he might be waiting. Maybe he doesn’t necessarily feel comfortable about locking things in too quick, too soon. Maybe he wants to see how this team functions together. Bringing back a whole bunch of different people. You’re you’re trading Michael Porter for Cam Johnson. I would assume that he would think that that’s a pretty good move. If he knows anything about Cam’s game, and I know that he does, uh Tim Hardaway Jr. getting back Bruce Brown, Jonas Falun, his team is clearly looking to build around him and clearly looking to go for it. I am on record saying that I think very clearly the Nuggets have done a good enough job during this off season to show him that they mean business, that they mean what they say when they want to win championships. This is like this was a championship winning offseason. This is what it’s all about. Whether Denver actually does win or not, that’s up to the players. It’s up to the coaches. That’s up to what happens during the season. But the front office and the ownership clearly has paid uh they’ve paid the piper in a lot of ways. They traded their future, their 2032 first round pick in order to get better now in order to build around Jokic now. They’ve done absolutely as much as they possibly can in order to do that. So I think that they’ve done enough to show him that they deserve an extension from him. Now I’m surprised that he didn’t sign it. This isn’t me saying that I think he’s going to leave. It could just be that he wants to lock in that 80 million in that final year and then maybe that’s that. Um Deon says maybe he wants to retire in 32 and that is absolutely possible and it would be 2031 because I screwed up the numbers. Um but like maybe he wants to retire at the end of that contract. Of course that’s a very strong possibility and I don’t want to discount that at all. Like to me, he doesn’t seem like a guy who is going to be playing until he’s 40. He seems like a guy who’s going to be playing until he feels like he’s starting to slip and then maybe one more year, two more years, and it’s going to depend on how much joy he feels playing the sport that he loves. And so, we’ll see what happens. Like, but he’s clearly a psychopath about basketball. he’s going to want to play and it’s if if the team keeps offering him like $80 million contracts, then yeah, he’s probably going to keep playing. But he’s clearly not like he’s mortal. That’s the thing. And I’m just kind of surprised that he didn’t lock in $200 million here. And we will see what happens and and whether this becomes a story or not. I don’t think it will be a story, but I just wanted to cover it and talk about it and and share honest thoughts about it because there’s a lot of people that are just going to say like, “Oh, yeah, it’s fine. It’s perfectly fine. This is the plan. This is obviously the plan.” It might be. It might be, but you don’t know that. Nobody does. That’s on Nola. And so, we’ll we’ll see what he says. We’ll see what he does. I’ll probably ask him on about it on media day. He’ll probably hate that I asked him about it. Like that’s that’s the other factor. So I’ll uh I I feel like the Nuggets media room does a pretty good job with Nola when it comes to asking him one question about a specific topic and then if he gives a definitive answer on it, then we leave him alone. I don’t think we’re going to be a group that’s going to be pestering him about an extension for the entire time. Once he gives a quote about the extension or lack thereof, we’ll probably leave him alone. So hopefully he doesn’t feel like that’s uh that he’s being punished because he’s not signing it because that’s not what this is. Nuggets fans just want to know that their guy is locked in forever. They they want him to be a Nugget for life and so hopefully he continues to feel the same. I don’t see any reason why it would be different. Like the team has done right by him and now it’s about just following through. All right, let’s take a break. When we come back, we are going to chat about the Yonas Valenuna situation as well as Don Holmes, who I am very excited to watch in this upcoming summer league. We’ll be right back here on Pick Axe and Roll. All right, back at it. Pick a roll. Ryan Blackburn here. Thank you so much for tuning into the show. Hit that like button. Hit that subscribe button. Would really, really appreciate it. Ariel Alter says maybe he wants to see what is done next off seasonason 2, not just this one. Uh, that’s completely fair, especially because like it’s when you have the pressure, that’s great. When you like hypothetically, let’s say Denver wins the title next year. I I would just assume that he would sign he would sign the extension at that point and just be happy because they’ve done exactly what they need to. But if they don’t win the title and they continue to kind of duck the tax and do some things that he doesn’t necessarily feel like he’s a fan of, I get that, too. So, we will see what it looks like. But I again I just you guys know I’m I’m never fronting for you. I I just wanted to share the honest thoughts. Okay. Earlier today in uh Lithuania, Yonas Valenunis spoke to a bunch of reporters about his future in basketball and whether he was going to be in Greece or whether it was going to be in Denver. Uh this comes from a couple of different articles. Basket News. Uh, Donatus Urbanos is the name, I believe, of the reporter who’s been covering this pretty consistently for Basket News. There’s a couple of other outlets that have covered it as well, but he’s the one that I’m going to focus on. He got a good quote from Valenunis, who was asked about the deal. He said, quote, “Once the trade is finalized, we’ll put together the plan for the trip to Denver. The team will outline how they see the situation, medicals, and all the details. That part is up to the team. And then on if he is playing in Denver next season, quote, “You can say whatever you want. People have already said plenty.” He apparently said with a laugh, “The whole thing blew up like a bubble.” He added with a smile, which is just kind of a cute translation. And I don’t know if that was translated or if that’s actually the what he actually said there, but that’s a that’s a pretty funny way to frame it. Um because he’s right. It is a big deal. It’s a big deal when kind of comes from out of nowhere. You’re thinking, okay, big trade, good opportunity. Very excited to finally have a great backup for Nola. Maybe they could they could even play together as as Shams made sure to outline in his uh his agent related tweets. um about the situation. Basically, it’s a whole lot of nothing. And that’s where I I should really focus on, but I I’ll actually restate the first part again because I think that that’s the most important part. Quote, “Once the trade is finalized, we’ll put together the plan for the trip to Denver. The team will outline how they see the situation, medicals, and all the details. That part is up to them.” So, he is going to come to Denver. He’s going to come to Denver. He kind of has to in order to complete the trade. The trade cannot be finalized until he takes a medical, until the Nuggets feel very comfortable about the situation. And I don’t think that there is a sorry I’m reading the I’m reading the comments on the the clearly definitely not Greek uh commenter who’s like I’ve been a lifelong fan of the Denver Nuggets. I’m actually going to I’m going to read this. Uh good morning. I am proud Denver USA and lifelong Nuggets fan. But after seeing the hatred the Marvel Valenunis has received from Denver, I am no longer supports of this franchise moving forward. Fantastic. I love it. I love it. That’s awesome. Uh look, Yonas isn’t getting hate or or not like certainly not from the reporters. Uh the fans are like, “What the hell? Why don’t you just want to be here? I’ve outlaid the I’ve outlined the reasons why he might want to go. I’ve outlined a variety of different things. Um I think that this situation is very interesting because there are things behind the scenes. um the Greek fan base and especially a lot of Eastern Europe very strong, very strong, very traditional. Uh this is a this is a delicate situation for a variety of reasons, but the most important reason is that in a lot of these cases, and I have to be careful with what I say here, uh in a lot of reasons, those guys find a way to get their way. they do and it’s not always we’ll call it above the table that they they find a way to get get it done. And so I wonder if there is a little bit there uh hearing some different reports. There was a report that Jonas Valenunis’s agent in Greece, uh, his international agent, maybe not Greece, maybe it’s just international, uh, made a lot of promises to Panathanos, got that one. uh Pana uh as as I have been told to call it if I can’t do the pronunciation correctly uh told Pana that they would not um that they would not have any problems from the Nuggets. Unfortunately, this agent forgot to tell the Nuggets about this and the Nuggets decided that they would like to keep Yonas Faljunis. Uh, I will say Sasha Vizenkov, this situation happened to him. He’s, I believe, Russian. He might have been Croatian. And so, my mistake if I if I screw that up. I think I You know what? I think he is actually Croatian. Um, he decided that he wanted to go back overseas and the Nets didn’t fight him on that. Part of the reason why they didn’t fight him was because he wasn’t that important for a Brooklyn Nets team. So, it was uh Toronto. Actually, was it Toronto? No, it was Toronto. Yeah. Sacramento then traded to Toronto and Toronto was like, “You know what? You’re good to go. We don’t need you.” And that wasn’t a problem for Toronto because they weren’t in a position where they needed Sasha Visenkov. They like the Nuggets need Yonas Valenunis for this upcoming season. They need to have a backup center that they feel very good about. And so that was always going to be at least a minor concern for Denver if if this fell through because let’s say you don’t get Al Horford. All right, I’ve already I this weekend I I laid out a whole bunch of different scenarios as to what’s happening as to some different options that they could get. And they’re not awesome. They’re not easy. You don’t want to have to spend an extra asset in order to do it either. So, that could be an issue. When you’ve already got Yonas or you think you already got Yonas, that’s definitely an issue. It’s definitely a problem. So, I do think that Denver’s going to try to hold on to him as they’ve clearly outlined, as the reporting has clearly outlined from a lot of different people. I do think that it’s going to be harder than people realize to hold on to him. And if Yonas wants to go, then he may just go. And that’s like that’s tough. It’s it’s a tough situation for everybody involved because he clearly has some reasons why. Uh but also kind of the way that he was discussing it and the way that he kind of addressed it with reporters. It wouldn’t surprise me if some of this kind of happened not entirely without his knowledge, but certainly like he would stay or it it’s not something that he feels as strongly about as maybe his agent does. So, we will see what happens, but I’m very curious as to how this works out. And if it does work out in favor of Denver, then no harm, no foul. I’m sure he like he’s been a professional in the NBA for over a decade. He’s a good dude. This is not a situation that like like he’s going to be okay in this situation if he has to play for the Denver Nuggets and finish out a contract where he gets paid more than he would be getting paid if he was in Greece. And that’s like even with the taxes in that situation. So, we’ll see what happens. The Pana deal will probably be there for next year as well. And we’ll just have to see what it looks like. But I think that they’re going to be they’re going to be fine. This is probably not going to go anywhere. But um I do think that it’s important that Denver tries to whine and dine him a little bit. Joe and Philly says that the Nuggets tried to take Valdiv Kaso Bonita. Uh they clearly wanted to get him in the building for that reason. Like uh if you’re if you are Pana and those team officials and you’re trying to whine in Donis and his team a little bit, pretty fun to just go out onto the onto a boat or off the coast of Greece and be pretty excited for something like that. If you’re Denver, got to take him to Shanahans, got to take him to Flemings. What whatever it is, whatever the the stake you’re going for, whatever Yonas wants, make it happen. I’m sure I’m sure he’ll be just fine. Okay, final thing for this episode. The summer league team. I’m not going to have time to do a full preview of the entire group. Also, don’t necessarily think that um it’s not it’s not fully warranted to do a full preview. Like tomorrow Bates will be interesting to watch. I’m actually very interested to watch Spencer Jones. He looked pretty slight. He looked pretty skinny if I’m being honest. He looks like he’s been working out and just getting cardio in. And so I think that he could be a player cuz he he looked like bulky when he was for Denver last time. I wonder if he slimmed down a lot and is going to be more of a traditional three because if that’s the case, that is a valuable position. So would love to see if he could do that, if he could make some threes, do some things. Um him says, “Ryan, have you seen CB?” I just saw the pictures. I did not see CB in person. I was not at practice today. Uh they’re also not doing a media availability tomorrow, but he was wearing the all red today in those pictures and jumper looked okay. Uh we’ll we’ll see what it looks like with him, but uh um we yeah, we’ll just have to see. Um but yeah, I’m I’m looking forward to some guys like Hunter Tyson. We will see where he is at. I hope that he proves that he is like perfectly above where the summer league level is. That would be the hope. Uh, but beyond everything, I I wrote an article yesterday about Don Holmes and it’s one of those articles that I love writing because like it is a little bit of lip service for the team, for the agent, for for everybody involved obviously, but like I’m just very excited and very happy for Don Holmes to be coming back. Like this is one of those things where you hate being around that kind of situation where somebody kind of gets their dream taken away immediately. And that year is a long year. It’s a it’s a long time for anybody that has suffered a seasonl long injury. I have. I tore the labreum in my right throwing shoulder before baseball season or actually during the previous baseball season but kind of played through it and then I missed my entire junior year. It actually screwed up my senior year as well in high school. So like that’s one of those situations where I feel like I can I can empathize a little bit. Um, but he now has this like a whole bunch of pressure, but he doesn’t he doesn’t operate that way. Like he is basically Denver’s only draft pick of the last two years, but he doesn’t operate that way. He operate like he’s just happy golucky. He is always very positive. I described him and andrew Mson described him in that article as the most positive person he thinks he’s ever seen. And that’s cool. Like that’s a cool situation saying basically that when everybody else was just distraught for him after that injury like they were yeah they were they were absolutely distraught and he was fine. He was fine like that was um like he was the most positive person in the room when when something tragic to him happened. So very excited to see what he looks like. He looks big. He looks like he is he’s been in the the weight room. He’s been making jumpers. He’s been blocking shots. He handles the basketball. I think one of the weaknesses that you’re going to see the game’s going to be fast for him. Um not because he can’t handle it eventually, but because he just hasn’t been up to game speed, like at this kind of speed, for a consistently long time. So, I wouldn’t be surprised if he has some turnovers, if he makes some late reads, if he uh just travels here or there, just like doesn’t necessarily look great. Um, where’s Embidat says, “How’s he moving on defense though?” He’s moving pretty good in the the scrimmage that I saw. I won’t pretend to say that I’ve seen everything, but like I saw about 10 minutes of scrimmages over the course of the first couple days that I went to, and it was cool. like he he’s moving great on the perimeter. He’s switching. He’s guarding. He’s uh moving his feet pretty decently. I I will say that he still looks like a guy that is like it’s not just about him filling out his body, but it’s about being comfortable with what his body is going to do and then being able to react and move quickly. I’m not sure where that’s ultimately going to be, but once he commits to something, I think he’s going to look really great. um just whatever that decision ends up being at that moment of time. Uh but the decision-making to me is going to be pretty slow and that would be my expectation, my my buffer for people immediately. But I do think that like he can guard, he can protect the rim, he understands where passing angles are going to be. He likes to get his hands on the ball. And I just think that like he’s going to be a great option for Denver both at the four and the five. I think people are underrating the possibility of him being able to play center. So like hypothetically, let’s say Yonas doesn’t play all 82 games. Let’s say Joic doesn’t play all 82 games. I think Denver’s second option behind one of those guys should absolutely be Don Holmes. It should not be Zeke Nazi. It should not be anybody else. It should be Don Holmes. He can handle that. And the most important thing is that he can make decisions with the ball in his hands and is not going to panic when he’s put into a position where he has to make a play. So, I’m looking forward to seeing what it looks like. Um, whereas Embid says looks too skinny to play center. That’s why. Not to the degree that I think you think he might be. Like 240 245 is not that far off. It’s really not. And what you’re talking about here is yeah, he might be a little bit und sized against Embiid or against Jokic or against Valenunis, but like how many of those guys are in the West? There’s there’s some of them, but like if he has to play center against Donovan Klingan of the Portland Trailblazers or I don’t know Isaiah Hartinstein or Cadet Homegrren like Chad Homegrren is a great example. If he has to play center against Chad, are you going to be panicking? Like I’m not going to be panicking. Like that’s that’s something he’s going to have to do. he’s going to have to switch out onto a lot of those guys. So, I I think he’s going to be fine. And like, look, yeah, you want to have lower expectations on guys because it’s the right thing to do. But, if he can pick and pop and hit threes, like guys are going to have to close out to him. And then some of the like he might be a little bit undersized, but if he can make it up on the offensive end in a way that like Zeke Nashi just isn’t able to, then I’m not worried about that. Like, that’s that’s not going to be it’s not going to be an issue. So really looking forward to it. More than anything, just excited to see him get back on the floor. Not sure how much he’s going to play. Denver has five games in summer league that they’re going to play. I would expect him to play four games. I got I don’t think he’s going to play all five. You probably want to give him an off day, whether it’s the final one or whether it’s one of the ones in the middle. But it’s all depending on how he feels, all depending on the situation. And I’m just looking forward to seeing him. So like, as much as he can handle, I’m I’m ready for it. I’m I’m looking forward to it. So, we’ll see what he does, but that’ll be the big story for Denver at summer league. Uh Tamar Bates, uh Kyle says, “Not on topic, but is tomorrow Bates going to play for Denver?” Yeah. No, he’s all I think he’s all ready to go. I think he’s like I don’t think there’s any concern about signing. I think they they signed him officially, so he will play. He’ll probably start. Let me let me do the the prediction on starters. Let’s go. Um, Tamar Bates, maybe Curtis Jones, but like certainly Tamar Bates out there. You want Spencer Jones out there. Hunter Tyson’s going to be out there. Don Holmes is going to be out there. Maybe play Dear at the F. Dron at the five. Dear God. Uh, you’re going to play Don at the five. You’re going to play Hunter and Spencer Jones out there at the forwards. You’re going to play Tamar Bates at the two. And then you’re probably going Yeah. him says it could be Reese Beakman. Um, certainly possible. And uh, yeah, it it wouldn’t surprise me. Curtis Jones is a a nice scorer for them, so he’ll probably get some opportunities, too. Uh, but yeah, it’s going to be fun. I I’m looking forward to seeing how it goes. And folks, it’s going to be like summer never sleeps once uh once this like summer league’s going to kick in over the course of these next couple weeks. Thursday is the first game. Uh looking forward to seeing what Denver looks like and then you’ll get uh some some other news beyond that, whether it’s schedule drops or Euro Basket. I I think it’s Euro Basket, not Euro Cup. I could be wrong about that, but you’re going to have some European competitions. Plenty to get into. So, make sure to keep it here. But everybody, that is going to do it for this episode of Pickaxe and Roll, brought to you by our good friends at Mile High Sports. Thank you so much for tuning into the show, folks. Really appreciate all the love and support on the podcast. As always, hit that like button, hit that subscribe button on the way out. I will talk to you guys very soon.

On the latest Pickaxe and Roll, Ryan Blackburn reacts to the news that Nikola Jokic will wait until next offseason to sign an extension with the Denver Nuggets. He also shares a Jonas Valanciunas update before pivoting to DaRon Holmes II and the Nuggets Summer League squad.

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