The Nuggets Offseason Checklist is ALMOST Complete

The Nuggets Offseason Checklist is ALMOST Complete

All right, Nuggets fans. Welcome into Pickax and Roll, brought to you by our good friends here at Mile High Sports. I am your host, Ryan Blackburn at NBA Blackburn on Twitter, part of the Mile High Sports Podcast Network. and I’m here. I am excited to talk about the Denver Nuggets on this Thursday morning. Uh recording on Wednesday night, going to upload on Thursday just like I have done in the past for previous episodes. Uh got a little bit of a revamp in terms of the setting. Uh upgraded the microphone. Hopefully this sounds better. Still trying to work out the the audio mixing and the details and uh making sure that the processing is good. Um, but I am also I I’ve got some some new stuff behind me as well. And so still trying to figure out what to put up on the wall. If you’ve got any ideas, let me know down in the comments in terms of how how I should be decorating the office space behind me. Uh, but on today’s episode, very excited to kind of be talking wrap up here for the Nuggets. I I did this a little bit in the previous episode, too, but I wanted to expand upon that and talk about the Nuggets offseason checklist and where they are at this current moment in time and what’s left, what is left for them to do. And then second segment, we will talk about is there anything that they could have done better? Is this good enough? Uh, and I I spoiler alert, yes, it it’s it’s good enough. They they did a great job. And I tend to think that uh they’re they’re in a good place. They’re in a good place now because of the good work that John Wallace and Ben Tenzer have done. So without further ado, let’s talk about what’s left. Um if you have been living under a rock for a little bit, you know that the Nug or you don’t know that the Nuggets traded Michael Porter Jr. in a first round pick for Cam Johnson. They traded Dario Sarich for Yonas Valenunis, by the way, on both of those deals. Now, now the the Brooklyn one, it sounds like they were working on that one kind of under the radar for a few weeks, which is great. That’s what you want to do. You want to continue to show Exactly to other front offices that you can keep things under wraps, that there isn’t anything that’s going to get out. you want to make sure that you’re showing things uh very public or like you’re good privately. You’re not going to let things get public and you can handle your stuff. And it turns out they both did that. Uh they also really showed that with the Yonas Falenunis trade that they can take advantage of another team’s situation by offering them something that’s mutually beneficial. And then they ran a pretty good deal. Uh, assuming that everything with Yonas continues to come back kosher, and I I think it is, like doesn’t doesn’t seem like there’s anything else that’s going on that should detract from that. They got two great trades. Two great trades backtoback on June 30th and July 1st that effectively put them into position to compete for a championship again. Uh, talked about this ad nauseium. I think that those were fantastic deals. both of them. Denver deserves an A for just those deals alone. But beyond that, like you get Bruce Brown and Tim Hardaway Jr. for minimum contracts. Denver still has some flexibility. They have a roster spot open. And that’s where we will start with this one. Last episode I talked about 15th man. Will they add one? Will they not add one? that I think is still on the kind of checklist, the things to do for Denver, whether they decide that it is worth it for them to add somebody. I’m on record saying that it would be nice to get another pick and roll ball handler, somebody that can kind of run a more traditional second unit. uh Bruce Brown for as much good work as he has done. If you remember back in 2022 23, he played about I’ll say 32 33% of his minutes in the regular season with like at that backup point guard position. Most of the time he was playing next to Jamal Murray or Bones Highland or Reggie Jackson or Ish Smith or gosh, I don’t I don’t remember if there was anybody else, but I think it was just those four. Obviously, Denver figured out that the best situation was him next to uh no point guard and with those second units and they figured some stuff out. But I do think that there is a world where a 15th man that is a point guard would help Denver, especially if like you don’t know from a ball handling standpoint like if Murray gets hurt, you would like to have somebody else that can handle. And so we’ll see if like we’ve talked about Russell Westbrook before. Not sure if he’s actually on the table for Denver. We’ll talk about him a little bit in the second segment, but I do think that Denver is at least open to the idea of filling that 15th man spot with whether it’s a point guard. The other position that they could really use is another versatile forward, somebody who uh I don’t know how many of these guys are actually on the market. like they could probably find somebody that makes sense, but maybe taking a flyer on I don’t know, Ben Simmons doesn’t really make sense. You want somebody that could hit some threes. You want somebody that can be big enough to guard fours and so that would be the ideal in that situation, but not a lot of those guys exist. So, we will see whether they ultimately fill it. But for now, that is still on their offseason checklist of things to do. Number two is to find a third two-way spot. I I was speaking about this to to the Broncos Country Tonight guys on uh 850, excuse me, and they were asking me, hey, to like Curtis Jones and guys like that, like Curtis Jones just had 20 points in Denver’s third summer league game. Could he be a candidate for them to jump into the roster and claim that third two-way spot? Maybe. Maybe Denver focuses on some of their guys on on some of the players that are already on their roster. I got to imagine that there is another guy out there, whether it’s a point guard, whether it’s a center. I I think a center actually makes a lot of sense. A third center, an actual sevenfooter or somebody that was pretty close. Tyrell Harrison, he’s he’s okay. He is somebody that like might be good for what Denver wants, might not be good for what Denver wants, and it wouldn’t necessarily be the worst thing in the world for Denver to at least consider the idea of somebody else because hypothetically Jokic goes down, Valenunis goes down. You don’t necessarily want to be at the behest of Zeke Nagi at backup five, Don Holmes at backup five because those are the only two other guys that are really big enough to handle that position right now. Daario gone, uh DeAndre Jordan’s not back. It does seem like Denver got a little bit smaller behind their two behemoths. So, we’ll we’ll see what happens with it, but I could see Denver trying to fill that third two-way spot with a big uh maybe that is also a point guard option and they use the 15th man on somebody who’s an actual traditional big man, but we will see what happens. Number three, trades are still on the table. I don’t want to completely write off the possibility that Denver executes another trade. You don’t want to like like look I I think Denver’s roster right now as it is their depth chart looks really good. It does. But there are a whole bunch of reasons why you make a trade. It’s not necessarily because you’re unhappy with a situation. It might be because the upcoming contract extension talks with Christian Brown, but more likely Pton Watson, don’t necessarily go the way that the Nuggets would hope. And so you you’re talking to those guys. Let’s say you come to an agreement, like this is number four on the list, the Christian Brown and Pton Watson extensions. Let’s say you come to an agreement with Christian Brown. Four years, 90 million, 5 years, 115 million, somewhere in that general range. That is a fair number, by the way. People would be wild to get too crazy about that because I do think that Christian is very clearly a starter going forward in this league and is going to be somebody that teams are going to want to have around. The Nuggets are going to want to have around. Uh but let’s say they can’t come to an agreement with Payton. Let’s say he wants more than the minimum or not the minimum, say he wants more than the mid-level exception. uh basically kind of in line with what Nquille Alexander Walker just got on the open market. Now that again little bit of a depressed free agency market because so many extensions, so many contracts were signed before the free agency period. People have this different opinion, this different view of these contract numbers now. And maybe I’m wrong in saying that Pton Watson is worth that kind of money. like I think that he is, but maybe the open market disagrees and maybe there’s enough guys out there on the open market that Pton Watson just isn’t as valuable to some of those teams. However, I still think that a guy that’s as young as he is, that’s as versatile as he is defensively, that has some skill set on the offensive end, like you can squint through the funhouse mirror and look at him and say, “Yeah, that’s the next Jade McDaniels.” And Jaden McDaniel’s got a 25 million a year contract. So to me, like I can understand if they weren’t able to come to an agreement, other teams would be interested in getting Payton Watson. They would. Uh the question is what Denver would be willing to kind of give him up for. They’d probably want somebody that’s another stable forward coming back. Uh or you get, I guess, draft capital. But it’s a little bit dangerous to make a move like that at this stage of the year. But maybe if they had another free agent that they were lined up and talking with, then they could execute a deal like that and it would make some sense. But I’m not advocating for that. I would like for Denver to re-up Christian and Peyton. I think that they are both very valuable for what Denver’s going to need going forward. Uh but we’ll see. We’ll see what happens. Number five, I never really discussed this. don’t think it blends together doing the shows that I do. But uh no Nicole Yokic extension. I don’t think that that was a like Oh, wait. I did talk about this. I I addressed this from a a money standpoint. Uh the reason why he’s doing what he’s doing. He’s talking the way that he’s talking. Uh his his agencies talking the way that they are talking. Um they have a justifiable reason to wait and to lock him in for more money. whether that’s actually what the reason was. Like we don’t have any reason to doubt, but like you you just never want to leave that up to chance if at all possible. So hopefully it’s not a problem. I do think that Denver with all the things that I’ve talked about, with all the things that Ben Tenzer, John Wallace, those guys have done lining up the team, I do think they have done enough to warrant Joic’s trust on this front. But if there is still something that is preventing him from signing that extension, then the Nuggets have to figure it out. They like, if there was an actual reason why he didn’t sign it other than the $80 million in 2030 or whatever it is, then the Nuggets have to come down to the bottom of that. They have to get down to whatever that is and rectify that situation. And I won’t speculate on what that is because I don’t know. But I do think that the most important thing that the Nuggets can do in any off season is make sure that Nicole Yokic is locked up for as long as possible. Uh that’s obviously you want the best player of the world on your team ready to go. Number six, Joic and Valenunis going to Euro Cup I believe it is. Uh obviously there’s a rotating amount of competitions that happen internationally. I believe that is Euro Cup this time around. Both Jokic and Valenunis I believe are participating. I think it was announced that Jookic is going to be going through Serbian training camp. He’s expected to accept the uh invitation from Pesich, the Serbian coach. Valenunis, I believe it was already announced that he’s going to be on the Lithuanian national team. So, there’s a lot riding for for those particular guys. The last time that Jokic was in Euro Cup, they were upset by Italy in the round of 16. That was a big deal back then because I think Serbia was the top team that year or at least pretty close to the top seed. and then they got upset by what affects what what amounts to a 16 seed. So not great. They can do better and I know that Serbians are are feeling that they are really ready for uh this to happen this time. And uh the other thing is that this is the first time in his career that Nicole Joic has participated in Serbian events backto back. Like usually he does one and then takes a year off and then does another then takes a year off. Basically he’s effectively done that for a while. It’s the first time in his career that he’s done it both off seasons. So, we’ll see how he looks from a physical standpoint, from an energy standpoint. But I got to say, like it’s really great that they’ve got Valenunis because the last times that Jokic has been going to do events overseas with Team Serbia, he hasn’t been like fully ready to go from an energy standpoint at the beginning of the year. the numbers don’t necessarily reflect that, but just anecdotally, uh, thinking about where his mind’s been at, how he approaches certain situations, a lot of those times he’ll ease into those seasons. He’ll probably ease into this season, especially kind of getting into his age 30 season. He’s he’s getting older. So, good to have another big in the wings waiting for his own opportunity, his own playing time. And then like it would be great if there there’s a world where Joic plays 30 minutes and Valenunis plays 20 minutes and they overlap for a couple minutes a game. How cool would that be? That would be so sick. Uh unfortunately Valenunis will probably take on a lesser role as the season goes on. But uh it does seem like there is at least a world where Denver explores stuff like that more consistently. And finally, number seven, get ready for training camp. It’s going to be right around the corner. It It always goes faster than people think. Now, from a content standpoint, this thing is going to slow down. We’re going to start talking about a couple of different things. I’m probably going to take a couple weeks off here or there, but it does move quickly and there will be stuff whether it is the Euro Cup, whether it’s the schedule release, whether it’s uh NBA rankings that come out, there’ll be plenty of things to discuss and pass the time. So, uh, when September rolls around, that’s when those guys start really coming back into Denver. And I’m sure that those runs, those private runs are going to be very interesting, very intense. A lot of Denver’s like a lot of Denver’s decision- making will happen in those runs. And whether that’s say the opportunities that certain guys get on the depth chart, whether that’s a start, it’s not going to be a starting spot. I think those are all penciled in, but it could be the difference between Julian Strawther and Payton Watson really like solidifying a rotation spot and not. So, it’s going to be interesting to see like Dron Holmes versus Zeke Naji. I’m very curious about. So, We’ll see what happens, but everybody’s going to get ready for training camp, and I’m very curious to see how they handle it. All right, let’s take a break. When we come back, we are going to talk about could Denver have possibly done anything better. Like, I’m I’m not sure what they could have done. And we’ll we’ll discuss that on the other side. We’ll be right back here on Pick a Roll. All right, we are back. 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. Okay, let’s get into what could the Nuggets have possibly done better than what they’ve done this this off seasonason because I struggled to think about things that I would have done differently kind of from and going from point A to B than what the Nuggets did. And I’ll start off with saying this. I did not think that a Cam Johnson for Michael Porter and one first round pick trade was going to be on the table. Obviously, Denver was working that for a while. They were thinking about how they could possibly put themselves into a better financial situation and Brooklyn was the perfect trade candidate. I did not fully appreciate this in the moment. Jordi Fernandez being the head coach in Brooklyn gave Denver such a big leg up in their negotiations because when you are trading one player for one player and a pick to kind of offset the balance. Jordi Fernandez definitely was approached by Shawn Marks and the Brooklyn front office and asked about his opinion of Porter and what they were going to be getting. What kind of player are you? What kind of person are you? Are you going to be working hard? Is this a situation where you leave a title contender and you just kind of relax? And that’s a good thing about Michael Porter. He’s not going to relax. He has goals. He has aspirations. I’m not sure how well his health is going to hold up in this kind of amped up situation. But I do think that one of the reasons why they were able to make that deal was because Jordy Fernandez vouched for Michael Porter. And so if he hadn’t, like think about if he had not done that, Denver trading what is a very expensive small forward starter in Porter for an inexpensive starter in Cam Johnson who makes far less money. Over the course of the next two years, he’s going to make about 35 million less I believe is the number. That’s crazy. That is a crazy disparity. And that was enough obviously for Denver to fit Jonas Valunis into a trade exception. And by the way, there’s still some ambiguousness in terms of like are they a first apron team? Are they not a First Apron team? Are they a tax team? Are they not a tax team? They are still figuring stuff out. I I mean they have better knowledge of this than I do. But I’ll be asking those guys over the course of these next couple weeks, just kind of when things all settle, the order of operations on this stuff, how did it work out, we we kind of discussed it. We thought about it. We tried to figure out the the way that they were going to do it. And so by getting that Cam Johnson trade done sooner rather than later, the Nuggets were able to clear up space for a trade for a backup center. And not only did they get like I think people are are going too far when they say Yonas is still a starting caliber center. I don’t think he is that. I think that I could name 30 setters that are better than him. But that doesn’t mean that he’s not a really good backup. Like he is a really good backup and you do have to pay money for those guys. Like there there’s a variety of names you could throw out there. Al Horford is still a free agent. We’ll we’ll see whether he signs, but like Luke Cornett just signed for 10 million a year. I think I would rather have Valenunis than Luke Cornett. Now they provide different skill sets. There are certain things that Cornet is obviously better at than Valenunis’, but for Denver and their purposes, there were very few players that they could get as a backup to Nicole Joic that would have served a better purpose for them if the goal if the goal was to just keep Joic fresh. so much of what Calvin Booth did for the backup center position while he was with Denver, while he was running things, he didn’t think it mattered as much from a roster building standpoint. And I don’t blame him for that. I don’t blame him because when you are when you’ve got Jokic, you’re obviously going to play him like you can play him 36 minutes a night in the regular season. You can play 40 minutes a night in the playoffs. You do not want to spend premium assets in order to get like eight minutes of backup center play in the playoffs. You don’t want to do that. Of course, Denver didn’t do that in this case. They got Dario Sarich or they they used Dario Sarge and like that’s not a premium asset. I was wondering if Denver was going to have to sell him off in order to make that happen. I mean, think about this from last year’s perspective. Reggie Jackson, a player that Denver didn’t want anymore, picked up his player option, about 5.1 5.2 million. And Denver, they go too quickly without making it m making themselves available to make a trade like the Darius for Yonas Falunista trade. They trade Reggie Jackson along with three second round picks to Charlotte just to take on that salary. for effectively no reason. Like there really was no reason other than to pay Daario Sarge and stay under the second apron. And that was ludicrous at the time and it’s even more ludicrous now based off of what you could show like how valuable an expiring contract can be in some of these cases. Now you need to kind of shift and negotiate and do some of those things. You need to be able to be more like capitalize and be able to take back money. But Denver was able to do that with the Cam Johnson trade. It was such a big deal that they did that. And it’s why like there’s a lot of people that criticize Denver for trading for a similar player in Cam Johnson and also giving up a first round pick in order to do it. That is the price of doing business to add the kind of players that Denver did. It just is the way that they had to make it done. And so they not only like they basically traded a starting small forward and a first round pick for a starting small forward and a backup center, a premium backup center at the position. So really good stuff and I think it’s a very valuable deal that Denver just did. And so was there anything else that they could have done in that situation that would have been better? Not really. Like not that I can see. I I’m not going to be like an allseeing eye over here. I did like I kind of wrote off Cam Johnson as a possibility because I didn’t think that it would be possible for them to pay so little in order to take on Michael Porter’s contract and give up Cam Johnson at the same time. But Denver was able to do it and only give up one first round pick. That is a great deal by pretty much any measurement to me. And then you get Tim Hardaway and Bruce Brown for minimum contracts. Were there any minimum contracts that were signed? I’ll even do this now. I’ll go on let’s go on spot track. Let’s look at the uh let’s look at the contracts that have been signed so far and let’s see the minimum contracts. All right, this is a funny list. So Tim Hardaway Jr. got the same deal as the following players. Spencer Denwitty, Kyle Lowry, Joe Engles, Garrett Temple, Mason Plumbley, Eric Gordon, Jeff Green, Larry Nance Jr. There are some guys that had fewer years in the NBA that also got minimum contracts like Tarian Prince, Jackson Hayes, Dante Exom, Aaron Holidayiday, Bruce Brown who we talked about obviously Marvin Bagley III, Jordan Mclofflin, Jan Tate, Sandro Memoi, Trendan Watford, the list goes on and the list gets worse. I gotta be honest, like there is a potential that and like Gary Trent Jr. is also one guy that like it would be nice if like because basically he got a a minimum contract or pretty close to it and then a secondyear option after that. So that would that would have been nice. But other than him, like other than him, is there any better player than Tim Hardway Jr. on that list that I just mentioned? I don’t think so. I really don’t. And so, you could then go to the list of available guys. And we’ve talked about this list before. Would Malcolm Brogden be a better player? Maybe. I don’t know if that’s the the kind of player that Denver needs, though. They need a spacer. Think about how much we were talking about the three-point shooting and how important it was for Denver to add a player of like really good spacing, somebody that could just get up shots, unafraid to take them, going to take them when he gets them. Like when he gets an opportunity, he’s not going to pass it up. And Denver needs to find ways to get those shots up efficiently and effectively. And so they got a guy in Tim Hardaway Jr. that I valued at a midlevel exception kind of contract or somewhere close to that. I did not value him as a a TPMLE guy. I did not value him as a minimum guy. And yet Denver got him for the minimum anyway. So the fact that they were able to do that, it’s really impressive. And I’m looking at the free agent list, it’s pretty barren. Pretty barren if you want uh if you want an actual shooter. Like shooters get paid. And the fact that they got one for the minimum I think is crazy. So really impressive stuff. Obviously they were gonna sign the Bruce Brown deal pretty much regardless. Like I don’t think that one needs to be questioned at all. Could they have done any better than that? Probably not. Like honestly you have a guy that knows the system that you trust that can impact both sides of the floor and is going to be okay filling a role. He already knows the deal. He knows the like he might play slightly less and he’ll have to be okay with that because 28 minutes per game is probably too much at this stage for what Bruce is going to provide. But could he play 22? Could he play 24? Could he play 20? Sure. Yeah, why not? I think it’s pretty clear. So again, really impressive stuff. Does Russell Westbrook make more sense in place of Bruce Brown? Hypothetically, you know, you’re getting Tim Hardaway Jr., you know, you’re getting that kind of skill set. Does Russell Westbrook make more sense in a vacuum than Bruce Brown? You can make an argument that he does because it’s a more traditional ball handler. Somebody that can play with the ball in his hands, can get downhill, has good chemistry with Joic, can set up the table for Murray, for Cam Johnson, for Aaron Gordon, for Christian Brown, guys like that. 100% you could make that argument. There are some chemistry things that like I won’t get into all the details, but Bruce Brown obviously fantastic chemistry with the team. That was never a question. Russell Westbrook. Good chemistry with the team. There were some rough points, but overall he was very good. He was very helpful. Uh I’m not going to sit here and say that like I don’t think Bruce is in a vacuum a better player than Russ, but I think Bruce is a better fit for what they needed even with the Tim Hardaway signing because Tim Hardaway is not a great defender. Bruce is a little bit more versatile. I think Russ is he’s he’s a fowler. He’s definitely going to be very physical and that’s something that you need for sure, but Bruce is going to be a little bit more disciplined on that on that front and I think that that’s valuable. Uh and so you think about some of the other things that Denver could have done. I don’t really think that there’s much. Like you you look at the the backup center market, the signings went away very quickly. There were not a lot of guys that were signed that made a lot of sense uh from an AAV standpoint, an average annual value standpoint. Like Bobby Portoris got a threeyear $43.5 million contract. That’s about 14.5 million. It’s a little too high. Also not really a backup center. Luke Cornet, as I mentioned, got 10.1. Brook Lopez, if you could have gotten Brook Lopez, that would have been great. Is Brook Lopez or Jonas Valenunis a better player? Probably Brooke, but like honestly Brooke was looking really slow in the playoffs this last year. And with Valenunis, you you just know you’re going to get somebody that can that can pass, that can score, that could do a variety of different things. Brooke is like he’s still a very good player. I don’t want to take anything away, but like I I think I think I’d probably rather have Brook Lopez, but Kevon Looney, no. Clink Capella, not really. Isaiah Jackson would have been interesting, but he’s a little bit smaller. He’s kind of in that that 6’8, 6’9 undersized center route. Not necessarily sure everybody wants that. Dron Sharp, that would have been pretty good. He got basically a two-year 12 million deal. Um Paul Reed two years 10 10 million 11 million would have been okay. I think I’d rather have Yonas. Uh lots of guys that you could say that about. So I do think that Denver did really well here and I don’t think that there’s anything that I would have done differently. If it were up to me, I would still be exploring the trade routes for a couple of my kind of favorite targets. Uh, AO Dumu and Kobe White on that list with Chicago. Probably not Kobe, but certainly AO as a like potentially six-man type, somebody who you’re willing to give some money to in the future. uh depending on like like he would look at the the free agent market and basically say, “Yeah, I would like to make Nikuel Alexander Walker money,” which is about 15 million 16 million in that general range. Um I think if you’re Denver, you’d be happy to to give that out. Um but then you’d have to trade probably somebody of value, whether it’s Julian Strawther or Peyton Watson or somebody of that nature. Is Denver willing to do that? Who knows? But outside of that, like Denver’s playoff rotation right now is is as follows. Jamal Murray, Christian Brown, Cam Johnson, Aaron Gordon, Nicole Joic. That’s your starting five. They’re each probably going to play about 34 35 minutes a night at minimum for some of those guys. And then off the bench, Bruce Brown, Tim Hardaway Jr. Maybe Julian Strawther, Payton Watson, maybe Don Holmes or Zeke Naji and Jonas Valunis, like that’s pretty good. That’s pretty good. It’s hard for me to see alterations to that. the the best guys will end up playing. But the fact that Denver has I think 11 guys, really 10, but 11 guys that you could say, “Oh, yeah, we could play them in a playoff round.” That’s awesome. That That’s awesome to think about. We thought that that would be the case last year in some ways. There was a little bit more copium, a little bit more kind of wishful thinking last year from that perspective. Like Dario Sarich I really thought was going to be like remember when Calvin Booth said nine real guys. The nine guys that he was talking about were Russell Westbrook, Julian Strawler, Peyton Watson, and Dario Sarich. That ended up not really being the case. It ended up being seven and a half with Russ Payton and then Julian playing half the time. So now Denver definitely gets another guy in Yonas that you can trust. I I really do like he’s his baseline has always been higher than Dariosar. So I don’t think that Denver has anything to really worry about from that. Knock on wood. Um but you’ve also got just another shooter and another kind of 3 and D type that you can trust. And I think that that will make things easier from a lineup mixing and matching standpoint. That’s the most important thing when you’ve got five starters that are going to play 35, 36, 40 minutes. You just need guys that can fill in around what you have. You don’t need game changers. You need players that can do a job. And that’s all it is. Like if you do your job well enough, you’ll be a gamecher, especially in a playoff environment where every little possession matters and if you do well on five straight possessions, that could be the difference between winning and losing in a bench stint. So Denver has that. I really do think that and I think that they are well set up as I’ve talked about before 55 to 60 wins somewhere in that general range. Even if Joic sits, you think back to 2023, they won 53 games. They coasted in those final like 15 or so. They could have won more if they wanted to. They didn’t. Um, and then the next year they won 57 because they couldn’t coast. They were trying to go get a one seed and then both Minnesota and OKC each had 57 wins or so. And so Denver had to fight and they were they were I think a slightly worse team despite the fact that they had a better record. This year is going to be a lot more like 2223 where it’s going to be a lot more natural in terms of the amount of wins that they can get. The question is how hard they want to fight, how hard they feel like they need to fight. If they feel like they really want homecourt advantage, they’re gonna have to go for 60 plus because OKC’s not going anywhere. U I don’t think the Houston’s going to be that kind of team to win 58 59. But maybe they do. Maybe there’s another team that steps up, too. But if it’s Denver and OKC trying to outwin each other by the end of it, you’re probably looking at 60. You’re probably looking at that general range. That’ll be very interesting to see if Denver has the discipline, the desire, the wherewithal to kind of get to that level because I think they have the talent. They may not quite have the horses to keep up with OKC in their youth. Um, but we’ll see. We’ll see it. The sense that you get is everybody feels kind of revitalized. There’s a little bit better energy. there’s a lot more desire to talk about, oh yeah, new group, new team, new locker room, things like that. And if that’s the case, then I think the change will be good in this regard. It’s not like they needed like a massive change. They got a good shift. They got a good culture reset over the course of the last year and now it’s going to be on the players to figure out how much they want to capitalize on that. We will see what they do. All right folks, that is going to do it for this episode of Pickax and Roller Brought to our good friends here at Mile High Sports. Thank you so much for tuning into the show. Hope you like the new setup. Hope you like the new sound. Hopefully it sounds okay. uh give me some tips if you are uh still trying to figure that out. If you still want something different out of me. Thank you so much for tuning into the show. 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 breaks down the Denver Nuggets offseason moves up to this point and the moves they still have to make. He also discusses whether the Nuggets could’ve done better with what they have and makes a firm determination.

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