Why Denver Nuggets Defense will be BETTER next season

Why Denver Nuggets Defense will be BETTER next season

On today’s show, we’ve talked a lot about the players, the personnel. We always talk about the offense. We very rarely get around to talking about defense, or at least I do. I love the shooty hoops. Uh Matt doesn’t. He he likes talking about the the defense. And so, we’re going to indulge him right here on Locked on Nuggets. You are Locked on Nuggets, your daily Denver Nuggets podcast, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome into Locked On Nuggets, your daily Denver Nuggets podcast, part of the Locked On Network, your team every day. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode and all the episodes that we’ve been doing over the course of these last couple of weeks. Obviously, you guys saw one a little bit earlier today with Matt and Swipa talking about Jamal Murray. That was a very interesting conversation. You guys kind of came to some interesting conclusions. I implore all of you go back and listen to that one and and listen to the why of it, not just the the overarching like like superfluous takes about it. There there’s actual good detailed conversation in there about why certain things are happening. On today’s episode, we’re going to talk about defense. We’re going to talk about elite teams in the Western Conference. We’re going to talk about Nicole Yokic’s summer. I’m very excited to get to it with my friend Matt Moore. He of the HP Basketball Substack as well as the Denver Dig of Mile High Sports and the Pickax and Roll podcast. Very excited to be here. I’m going on a trip after this particular show airs and I’m very excited to get away from the phone. Do not film me. Do not text me. Uh I’ll be back in four days. Where you going? Uh I’m going down to Colorado Springs to Green Mountain Falls. Uh it’s kind of near Pikes Peak. We’re gonna do a little bit of a cabin trip. Just a very short getaway. Maybe we’ll be doing something extra later in the summer, but just kind of the start of like uh getting getting away from the phone, if you will. I like the springs. I really do. Um I like Manitu a lot. I like I just think it’s really beautiful down there. We were we went down there for spring break this year and we had a really good time. Drove out to the Painted Minds. It was really good. I love There’s the best thing about Colorado is that if you drive two hours in any direction, you are in an entirely different biome. It’s amazing. And uh my son compares it to Minecraft because that’s where that’s that’s a great comparison as somebody who is very familiar with uh both of these platforms uh Colorado and Minecraft. Uh this episode, as as you guys know, is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins. Uh, all right, Matt, I teased this at the top of the show and wanted to get your take on this. Jonas Valenunis is not a defensive player. Cam Johnson is not a defensive player. I I don’t think Tim Hardaway is a defensive player. I I think Bruce Brown is a two-way player, but like he’s not I wouldn’t call him an elite defender by any stretch of the word. There are some areas that I think Denver could improve on in the defensive end, but I think that they’re going to get better by not just because of the personnel that they have, but because of the actual like mechanisms of the team and the way that they have put this together is going to make them a better defense than they were this past season. What say you? I’m really curious to see what Adam and company and the new coaching staff, Jared Dudley, etc., JJ Beret are going to come up with for a defensive identity for this team. So, I think playing, we’ve talked about this before, playing more drop for Nola to save his legs is probably a good idea. It just takes less energy. One thing that I broke down in the piece I did on the dig about Cam, Cam’s really good about being able to handle that dunker spot situation where he’s got to guard that on that weak side zone where he’s got to defend the dunker spot and then recover to the perimeter. He doesn’t get caught out of position where he gets screened. He’s able to recover quicker. Um MPJ had a really hard time with that mechanism of showing to the middle and then recovering. And I never was able to really figure out if the problem was Mike’s speed, if it was the fact that they wanted him to 2.9 and stay in the lane for 2.9 seconds to really show to pack the paint and then recover. I didn’t know if it was about how far over Mike would help if that’s where he was supposed to be helping and they were just asking an unrealistic distance spread. But I have a lot more confidence in Cam being able to do that. So like that’s a starting unit for me. It’s as simple as with last year’s starters, regardless of what they were in the years prior, last year it became evident that while Jamal had a season high in steals, Jamal was a defensive weak point, Mike was a defensive weak point, and as a result, Joker was a defensive weak point. Um, we tried to like talk about this and there’s still this idea that Joker was great defensively last year, which is really funny. It’s not It doesn’t like bother me. It’s just more of that’s not accurate. Yeah. Um I’ve seen him have great years. 2023 he was excellent. 2022 he was honestly really good. Um his problem last year was he did not have the extra burst speed and energy to be able to handle the kind of turns that you need to make when you are defending in drop. Especially because you can’t play deep drop. Yonas will. You’ll get eaten up in starting units by pull-up jumpers. Like you can do it a little bit more in bench units because if a if a guy’s coming off the bench, he’s not likely to be 45% plus from mid-range. He’s not likely to have an elite floater. Some of them do and you’ll have to guard that according to scouting report, but in the starters, if you play deep drop, you’re dead. Like you’re just going to get murdered. Um and so you have to play like this kind of high drop. And if you do that, then you have to be able to turn your hips in order to then rotate and stay lateral to guard the guy, get into the rim. And that’s where Joker really struggles is like if Joker is attacking forward, he’s very good. If is containing deep, totally fine. It’s when he has to do middle and he’s in that no man’s land, he’s not comfortable there. And never has been. And I think this season he’ll have to do it less because I do think you’ll have better containment coming from behind with guys that can get over screens better. Whether that’s Cam or Bruce or I don’t want to say Tim Hardaway Jr. but like you know maybe theoretically if Payton plays more I think Christian’s going to be a lot better at that. He was a way better at that by season’s end than he was to start. and not having to cover as much for other guys will help them be able to to attack these like limited isolation sequences. The Nuggets biggest problem last season was they were not able to ever contain the ball. So even when they would put two on the ball, it always found its way either to the the low roll man to the dunker or to the corner. and they have a much better opportunity I think this season with their instincts, athleticism, and just like defensive knowledge. It’s not about being an elite defender physically. It’s about just having a better mindset and understanding of these things to be able to compensate on top of what I think is going to be Christian’s biggest jump year-over-year. I think will be on the defensive end. It it will be fascinating to watch that. And like those nuances are something that you obviously pick up over years and years of time, but Christian got so many reps at it last year that I I do think that he will be better. The other thing is I I just don’t think anybody is going to be overindexed to the point that it felt like everybody was on last year’s roster. And we we’ve talked about this in a variety of ways from an energy standpoint, but defense is mostly want to. It’s effort. There there are obviously like like the want to is also about wanting to communicate. It’s wanting to do some of the detail work, work on some of those things. And I I gotta tell you, man, just the the feeling that I had about last year’s roster was that there was not a lot of belief until they got the the seat of their pants kicked by the firings at the end of the season. It felt like things like throughout much of that time were just we’re going to try to get through it. We’re going to try to get to the playoffs. And I just feel like the mentality is going to be different this year. Yeah, that might not be true. We’ll we’ll see what ultimately happens and whether the team can kind of like not fall into that trap this time. Uh but I do think that there are like you have to relearn how to be a champion. I think there’s more about this I want to talk about. Let’s keep this going in the second segment because I think there’s a lot to chew on here. 100%. When we come back, we will discuss a whole bunch of good defensive stuff. I’m very excited to hear about it here on Locked on Nuggets. All right, let’s talk about FanDuel, the sponsor of today’s show. Summer sports are in full swing. And whether you are all about baseball under the lights, golf on the green, or high stakes soccer action, FanDuel is the best way to make every game more exciting. You’re already following the action. Why not make it a little bit more thrilling? With Fandal, you can get it on the game while your friends are getting sunburned on the beach. Easy to use, fast to pay out, makes even regular season games feel like mustwatch events. Uh, I made the the recent mistake of getting involved trying to bet on Rocky’s games. Uh, horrible idea because they then just recently won their last one. Who would have thought? If you’re 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 fando.com to get started. We’ll be right back here on Locked on Nuggets. Back at it, Lockdown Nuggets. Thank you so much for tuning into the show. Hit that like button, folks. Hit that subscribe button. Would really, really appreciate it. Always nice to see the regulars in the chats uh hanging out despite Hey, did did a couple of episodes today. Make sure to go check out that Jamal Murray episode earlier as I mentioned before. Um okay, you wanted to talk more about defense. You want to talk about uh just the kind of mechanisms for why you want to do the extra why you want to go the extra mile. Where are the communications going to really help? What the championship mentality is going to be like. Can you expand upon that a little bit? Yeah. So, I think they’ll have a better a clearer mindset of what they want to do defensively. Um, I think Ryan Saunders was really great for this team in the championship season and contributed to that championship team and he was just as responsible for that defense as he was for this year’s. So, I’m not trying to like bury anybody. It is my understanding based off of talking to sources. The team was very frustrated at times with Ryan Saunders. I was trying to like hint at it after the firings that I was surprised certain people were retained and Ryan Saunders was like the one that I was really kind of surprised was retained. Um, so I’m not surprised that he’s gone. Again, I’m not trying to like the the problem was Malone and Booth having uh a hot dog comparing contest and that was a problem. Um that was the problem, but the the players from a tactical standpoint were frustrated with an inconsistency in coverage and that there were constantly changes being made to them. Now, I also want to know Joker is an active participant in how they defend teams. Like Joker gets to say, I’m going to play at the level. I’m going to play drop. I’m gonna do this. We’re gonna play this scheme. We’re gonna play this scheme. We’re gonna play this this like this is how we’re gonna play and based off what Joker wants than every other decision is kind of made. And I don’t I don’t expect that to change. What I do think though is they will have less changes in game, clearer direction, and a much more direct line of what they want to do. They had communication problems constantly last year. And a lot of this gets into, and this is something I really I really believe. The most important thing in NBA defense is trust. It’s I’m not going to try and anticipate what this guy’s going to want me to do because I know if I need to do it, he’ll tell me. So, I’m not going to freelance here. I’m going to wait for the instruction to come because I know he’s going to tell me what he needs. Um, it’s I don’t need to go help that guy. We’re in isolation defense. we’re in switching. He doesn’t need help. We’re good. Versus freelancing and going to help because you want to help your teammate. This is like the funny thing is most of the time when we talk about defense of like and I used to do this too where I would point out bad defense which was like not paying attention, falling asleep, being lazy because those things are very obvious and simple. And it’s also just like it’s we’re all going to make mistakes in the course of doing anything that we do by not paying enough attention. Like how many times in your life have you been like, I just should have been paying more attention. But the bigger systemic problems don’t happen from laziness. They happen from a lack of trust. It’s I want to help my teammate out so bad that I’m going to go and apply pressure here to try and get the ball out of that guy’s hands. And in doing so, I’m going to leave my guy wide open in the corner because I can get back. No, you can’t. No, he can’t. No, he cannot. Yeah. Right. And the idea is like, well, at least we stopped the layup, right? It’s like, no, as a matter of fact, like nowadays, a contested layup is definitely it’s still higher value than a three barely. But the margins are getting real tight, right? So, from that perspective, I just think that this season you’re going to have a lot better. The fundamentals of their defense will be much better. But my question for you, Ryan, you would I’m not just rubbing this in. I genuinely think it’s like you would thought that there was a team in there that could be 12th or better after the All-Star break defensively. Okay. I thought that they were going to lock in on the like kind of the energy stuff and and really focus again on the mentality and like they did in the playoffs like teams in there, right? But my question for you is this based off of that figure and and they’ve wind up 20th in defensive rating per dunks and threes, right? uh schedule adjusted. What is a reasonable number to set the bar at? And we don’t I don’t like this isn’t our hard number because we’ll have to do this again before the season for where we like we’ll have this exact same episode about the defense closer to the season. But right now after the offseason changes with the coaching changes with everything, what is your expectation for the standard of what you’re expecting from this defense this season? It’s got to be top half. Like it just got to get back into the top half. I I’m not even sure if I’m expecting a top 10. Like that’s I understand that this the bread is going to be buttered on the offensive end. The team is going to be an unstoppable offense in all likelihood, but there are going to have to be nights where to me they show that it’s not just about like we can outscore this team, we can get through it. It’s about let’s work on some things. Let’s really like lock in on this. Let’s let’s actually try to just suck the life out of this team on the other end and then like win that way. let’s let’s at least show that we can do that. A and I think that there’s merit to that because then it proves that when the offense dries up in the playoffs and and there will be times where it does, they at least have another thing that you can go to and feel reasonably confident about. So I think that the number that came to mind initially was 14th. Like I think that if they are above 14th like that should be the median line for improvement and showing that you care. Anything better than 14th is a great season defensively. Anything worse than 18th is a failure. Anything worse than 17th. 18th or worse is a failure. So like the re the reasonable outcome I think is 14 15 16 17. That’s like where they’re at is like slightly better than league average. League average, slightly worse than league average, two degrees worse than league average. That to me is like the range that we should be talking about because I do really think that there is like an actual ceiling to this team being in the top 10 defensively despite not having elite defensive personnel. I I think it’s more about like if you really want to put a stamp on the regular season, if you really want to show what you can do, then I think that there is a level of seriousness that you have to take from night to night. And that’s against pretty much everybody. It’s not it’s it’s showing against teams like OKC and Houston that you can compete with them, but it’s also showing against teams like uh Washington. No, you’re not going to score over a hundred tonight. we’re going to make sure that you are under n you’re under 100 because like we’re not going to get a lot of those opportunities. So, you might as well like prove it. Uh I don’t I don’t think that they proved a lot last year from a defensive perspective that they need to this season. Washington score 100 this season. They’re pretty good. But that’s just me. Oh, they they scored they didn’t just score 100. They they scored 130, 140, 150. Like it didn’t matter. You put a number and they reach it against Denver. Uh Tiffany Mendes says, “Please get Melton.” Tiffany, I’m sorry. like give up this dream. Uh Danthony Melton’s going to sign with the Warriors. That’s going to happen. Like that’s I’ I’d love it. Don’t get me wrong. Uh but there there’s a lot of stuff that’s being held up by the Jonathan Kaminga stuff right now. That’s um Hurricanes doesn’t need your guys’ takes on transition defense. Man, this is the one where it’s like, look, I could talk to you about the communication and the trust and everything else. This was the thing that drove me absolutely banana cakes last year. Yeah. Like they just didn’t get back, guys. Like they just did not get back. And that’s a team that is not connected. Because if you’re not connected, it’s like, yeah, I can’t really I can’t get there. I’m too Yeah. Like when you’re connected, you’re like, I got it. You’re locked in. You’re focused. I’m not going to let the ball get behind me. I’m not I’m going to stop the ball in transition. They were so bad in these areas. And again, I’m not going to be I I’ve tried to be as as positive as possible about Mike’s time here in Denver. I think he deserves all the credit in the world. Mike was a huge part of the transition defense problems. He just could not run back. He could not sprint back. Cam Johnson can sprint back. Let Let me ask you this then. How much of an expectation do you have for Nola actually getting back in transition? Not no nothing. It’s just it’s that’s that’s dead in the water. Yeah. And it’s not about Nola can’t stop him anyway. If they’re coming full speed at him, there’s nothing the Joker’s gonna be able to do anyway, right? So, um it’s not about that. It’s about the wings. The wings have to get back. It’s Aaron and Cam have got to get back and Christian and Christian I think puts the effort in 100%. And honestly I think Jamal puts in the effort too. He’s just like 6’4 and not super athletic and like that’s there’s only so much you can do when it’s a threeon-one or a threeon two. I would have to go back and watch every position. I will tell you that anecdotally I disagree a little bit with that assessment from memory, but I don’t want to say that the definitively because I haven’t gone back and watched. To me it’s it’s more about a floor balance thing because he’s often the point guard at the top of the game. Yeah, that’s fair, too. Um, we’ll say our last two subjects after the break. Absolutely. Here on Locked on Nuggets. All right, back at it. Locked on Nuggets. Thank you so much for tuning into the show, folks. Uh, we’ve got two things that I wanted to hit before we get out of here. Nicole has been very visibly in China o over the course of this trip. 361 and uh China have been putting on for Nola. How much of this have you been able to kind of catch? Just like the social media stuff. I saw him racing a train. That’s fun. That’s cool. I I I don’t really have much of a take on this. I don’t really think that this needs a take. It to me it is more about like he now has a he’s has a China trip. He usually spends a lot of time in Sombore. after this China trip, he’s effectively going to be going into Serbian national team duties for Euro Basket. Curious your thoughts on the fact that this will be the second year in a row that he’s doing Serbian team obligations. How do you think that affects him heading into next season? It’s a good question. Um, I’m always a little concerned about guys that put more miles on themselves in the summer, but look, they got wrapped in what miday was when that series finished. He didn’t do it like went back to Serbia immediately as he always does. Didn’t do anything in June. And then mid mid July he starts this this tour on 361 and through for for China to expand the brand. Um, imagine that, Nicole. And hey, they they love him. Like the some of the videos that they’re showing in these in these public areas, they they love him and they’ve been very excited to have him. So, kind of cool. And like like when you get somebody signing with a Chinese brand, like that that really does endear you to a lot of the fans. Yeah. Um, the Euro basket, I I always go back and forth on this where it’s like, look, he might look tired to start the season anyway. He could not do anything and then be out of shape and then look tired or but it’s if he looks sluggish to start the year which he hasn’t the last five seven years but if he were to look sluggish to start the year it would be like you know I think he’s tired from Euro basket those extra minutes you know and if he didn’t play it’ be like you know he just didn’t really do anything and you kind of wonder if he should have played Euro basket like that’s how we wind up getting into these situations like a good example of this is to me is Luca Donuch who would like play in Euro Basket or play in FIA and then get eliminated with a month to go and you be like, he’s gonna be in great shape for training camp and still come into into camp out of shape. Yeah. Like it was amazing. I’ve never seen anybody able to get out of shape as quickly as Luca except me. Like it’s absolutely incredible how quickly he like he’s and he’s the only guy the scouts are like, “Yeah, he plays himself out of shape,” which I’ve never seen. Um Joker’s not really like that. And so if Joker feels like he has the conditioning and the energy, then I think that’s absolutely one. I just think, how do I put this? I don’t know that Joker is ever going to turn it down out of being tired. His other his reasons for not playing in previous seasons were whatever reasons he had, but I don’t think he’s ever going to turn it down because he’s tired. I don’t know. I was talking to Swipe about this a little bit today. Um, I don’t know how beneficial it is to have Joker in this still psychotic I will never get tired. I am Serbian. We do not tire. We are strong. I do not know how good that is for his long term. But until it becomes it’s maybe one of those things much like getting older. It’s just you until you reach that point where it affects you, you can’t really anticipate it. Like if you feel good, go and then if you don’t don’t. And that may be just how it has to be handled. Yeah. I mean, gassing out in a couple game sevens is definitely like I’m not going to make any friends by saying that, but like against Minnesota, he clearly gassed out in that uh second round game seven. And then against OKC, he was constantly fighting against the defense of Alex Caruso and the mighty mice that were the OKC Thunder Guards. Um, and then having to turn into and defeat two sevenfooters at the same time. um and ultimately got tired doing that. So like I I think so much of that is more about roster construction than it is about anything. But like playing 37 minutes a game probably hurt him for sure. Um but it does like stand to reason maybe the tiredness doesn’t necessarily come at the beginning. It comes at the end of the season just from a long run of playing basketball. Uh but who knows? We we’ll see. Can instead of I we got time to talk about how many elite teams are in the west. we got time to talk about this because you’re gonna think there’s more than I do because that’s just how I always am. That’s that’s how it always works. Like I think that there’s a lot of great teams um in the West. You think there’s a lot of really good teams in the West and you think there’s absolute garbage in the East. And I didn’t I didn’t stutter, nor did you. And uh yeah. Um I think I I am always optimistic we’re going to see better teams than we think out of the East. Um but I think we should talk about this which is so MPJ hit the Nets practice facility and like had a quote about like, “I’m just amazed you guys had two courts.” I mean, he No, it wasn’t just a quote. Like, he literally filmed himself making that reaction for the vlog. Yeah. So, we’ve talked about it. I’ve talked about this on the show a lot. So, I don’t like rehashing stuff because I’m really averse to to dead horsing things. But it’s this is worth mentioning again and I’ll just It’s a joke the Nuggets don’t have a training facility. It’s a joke. It is a joke. It is. I I do not care. I have given the Cronis on Denver Dig and on this show as much credit as I can for their success in running organizations and winning sports championships. They deserve that recognition. They have done the thing. That does not mean that this very simple basic basic thing which is just about providing the best environment for your players. The fans deserve better than this because every Nuggets fan that under that that finds this out is like they it will it it’s embarrassing. It’s a little embarrassing that the Nuggets training facility and for those that don’t know the Nuggets training facility is in Ballerina. You take the elevator to a certain floor and there is a there is one full court. There are one, two, three, four, five, six baskets, I think. Six baskets, a small training, a small weight room on the side that runs the length of that court. And then there’s facilities behind that that I have never been in and will never be able to. And the key there is no windows. like uh it’s it’s one of those kinds of things that you you just want to be able to see the light of day in these situations. You want to be able to be in a in a facility where you feel like the team is taking care of you. You feel like you’re you’re being valued. You’re you’re getting the best possible treatment and care in order to become the best possible athlete you can be. Like I’ve been in a bunch of these and so I I can like talk a little bit more about this. A lot of them they’re offsite so you don’t have to deal with like eyes on you. You don’t have problems like there’s a parking issue because there’s a concert at Ballerina that night. You don’t have these kind of interruptions for whatever if you’re like we want to get in on the big court. No, we can’t do that. Why? Because the avalanche are playing and the ice is down. You don’t have any of those things. You have a massive facility. It’s got it has state-of-the-art recovery treatment. It’s got food and beverage for them to come in and get like the stuff that they need from that perspective, like f like whatever things the trainers are having them eat and drink. It’s got um film room for you to be able to do the in-depth stuff that you want to do from a film room perspective. All of these types of things. And from a from an owner standpoint, I would understand the idea of being like, we don’t practice anyway. like we the NBA schedule doesn’t allow us to practice except for all the shootarounds that they they definitely don’t report that they’re doing but they’re actually doing. Yeah. Um but even then it’s like a walkthrough, right? And like a shoot around. It’s always lighter. You’re not doing like a serious So what’s the the question as always is like what’s the ROI on it? And the implication has been given by Josh Kroni in press conferences that they have grander plans and like I will interpret that as they want to build a whole as always they have to be able to make money off the venture. So, if they can build a practice facility when they build a new um I forget with real estate develop development with condos and shopping and dining and whatever else there if they can make money off of it and add the practice facility, they’ll do it. And I’m just like, guys, like you have the land out by the rapids. Just build them a practice facility. Just just do this. Honestly, that’s what I’m waiting for is that you’re going to build the apartments. You’re going to like who who even knows if the arena is going to be in Denver anymore? Like they they might just put everything into like a sports park into a sports kind of conglomerate area where KSC can then monetize that in some way, shape, or form. But like look, it’s it’s far past time. There there are like not not just like the practice facility, but the actual building itself is kind of like it’s 2025 right now. The building was constructed in 1999, and I do not even think I don’t know if they’ve even had renovations done to this thing. So, it is ready for a new environment, a new area, and if the Nuggets actually want to be one of those organizations, one of those teams that is considered a great organization that then they their facilities are going to follow suit with what has been a good team. But it just kind of sucks to me that like Jokic for as much money as he has made the franchise will probably never ever experience a new practice facility or arena with the Nuggets ever. You know, the arena I think is fine. I think these arena I think that these conversations about the arenas are pretty annoying where there’s nothing about ball that seems to me it’s not falling down. Well, but it isn’t even optimized for basketball viewing. It’s optimized more for hockey viewing. Sure. Um, I don’t know how many acoustics and and a like there’s just a whole bunch of things like think about how loud the the venue is and like there’s so many ways that they it could actually be a better experience for everybody involved. But like that it good enough is good enough. You know, I actually have more sympathy for the abs because the abs have to public have to practice in a public facility. Oh, I mean, yeah, that’s that completely different. Like that’s that’s it’s ridiculous. And so I just I understand how much it would cost, right? And it’s like, do you want to pay 500 mill, you know, whatever it is? Do you want to pay $10 million? I’m like, no, I don’t. I don’t personally. Um, but it just seems I don’t It’s one of the things that’s kind of talked about is like it being an enticement to free agents. I don’t think that matters. You’re going to come to Denver or you’re not, man. Like Denver’s never going to be the market. Denver, like Milwaukee, and like all these other cities. If you have a generational superstar, you might get guys. Otherwise, if you do not have a generational superstar, no one’s going to sign there. Like, or like it was with Orlando before they got Paulo and Fron like it is with Charlotte. Like, if you’re in one of these markets, you’re just they’re not going to come, right? But I do think that there’s a certain standard of this in professional sports, this is what you do. You pay for the best facilities for your athletes. your athletes are given the best facilities possible so they can do their jobs. Um, and so I I when the Orlando Magic built one, that was like the breaking point for me where I was like, you cannot in good faith tell me that Denver in this market cannot reasonably afford this kind of development. And I understand all the plans and the complicated and the and the the real estate and the develop I get all the I get and the legal stuff. I I get it. The permits and everything. I get it. You are one of the most powerful sports organizations in the world. KSE is one of the most powerful sports organizations in the world. Oh, and you have huge real estate ties. Make it happen. Get it done. They’re also, I think, the last team to do it. So, this is why I don’t like having the conversation is I just wind up railing for like 10 minutes about how stupid this is because it’s such a simple thing for them to fix. On that note, everybody, I think that’s going to do it for this episode of Locked on Nuggets. Uh, let us know down in the comments what what are what are some topics that you want us to hit on over the course of this off seasonason. It’s a long long off season. We’ll be sure to give you guys those as many good things as we’re going to talk about as possible. But, uh, Ryan, yep. Uh, buddy, we are eight weeks from training camp. Eight weeks of content that we got to fill. Thank you. That’s not a long time. We’ll we’ll get it done. I’m I’m excited. It’s going to be a good one. Thank you so much, everybody. Have a great night here on Locked on Nuggets.

Matt and Ryan break down the Denver Nuggets defense and what might be different this season, despite adding more offensive minded personnel. Then, they discuss Nikola Jokic’s summer and practice facility problems.

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