Breaking Down The 2025 Denver Nuggets! Are They Real NBA Contenders?

Breaking Down The 2025 Denver Nuggets! Are They Real NBA Contenders?

Yo, what’s good with everybody? Welcome back to another episode of the Gifted Hoops podcast. It’s been a while, but I’m here today to talk about the Denver Nuggets. This is a very, very fun team. Shout out to the people that I have on here today to discuss it with. You guys know Grace. We have a ton of conversation, but we finally have the second half of the podcast. And Will, say hello to the people, Will. Hey everyone. It’s great to be on here with Gifted and Grace in another format. Um, excited to talk nuggets. They’ve been providing a lot of the uh interesting trades and moves and pickups. So, one of the exciting teams of the offseason. How are you feeling, Miss Grace? How you feeling? I’m feeling pretty good. Feeling pretty good. Uh especially about the Nuggets. You get to this point of the off season compared to last year where we’re like, well, there’s still all these questions like Russ hadn’t been signed to the team yet, but there was like, oh, he wants to come here and Yokic wants him. like we we didn’t have our roster complete yet. Um but now it and there were all these questions of like, okay, well, if you squint real hard, you could see like this is how they could be like a contender. Um but now it’s like, okay, they’re good. We can just kind of we can just kind of relax a little bit in um you know, late July. It’s also different because this year um there there’s no Olympics to cover so we’re just kind of like okay we can take actual like vacations now and um I don’t know what to do with myself. I definitely feel that. Um I have had a much different off season than last year where I was working a lot more. Um I had like a twoe vacation so I kind of just did blah things. cuz I watched a little bit of the hoops that they have going on currently in I would say the summer league, but not really as much. Um, I think for me, a lot of my overall intense focus has been going through and just rewatching the playoffs and all these teams. And I think to your point, Denver proved a lot of people wrong in a lot of different ways. Um, first off, there’s a lot of things that happen before we even get into the playoffs. I’m going to properly start this podcast off with my number one thing expectations coming in last year. Um, well, do you want to take this one first? Yeah. I mean, we signed So, we signed Russ, which I don’t know, you know, there was different expectations about him because of his reputation. Um, but everyone was pretty excited to get him as like a Bruce Brown replacement to get that like backup ball handler energy off the bench. Maybe could close some games. We knew he was going to maybe make mistakes, cause some losses with with miss layups or turnovers or whatever, but uh then we we signed Daario and I think a lot of us talked ourselves into him being like the Jokic faximile off the bench and playing that similar style. Everyone was way too high on that obviously, but um well well you don’t know this, but Gifted’s a he’s also a Warriors fan, right? And he was like he knew that Dario I didn’t think he was going to play chill on Daario. Yeah. Yeah. We should have we should have known that, but we’re trying to be hopeful just cuz like the backup big situation in Denver, everyone’s trying to be super optimistic whenever we sign anyone new. Yeah. But uh it was just like, well, it couldn’t get any worse, right? Right. But also like back then, we didn’t know that OKC was going to be as good as they were going to be coming into the season. So, I think some thought we still had a chance coming into the off season, but then once we started seeing actual basketball and like how the season was developing, I think that changed more quickly uh throughout the season. Um, Grace, if you I you can get your perspective. Yeah. No, I uh that was a good like lead in. and I was like, I could start anywhere with this. But, um, Will and I talked about this last off season, how when you’re trying to build a team around Jokic, there’s, you know, different there’s sort of different layers of responsibility, right, for getting to the finals, winning a title, etc. The players, the coaches, the the GM, etc. And last summer, we basically said like, look, what’s the expectation for a general manager in like building the roster? And I said, I think my bar is you should be able to build a team around Joic that has the expectation of making the conference finals. And last summer, I did not feel that we had that roster that had that expectation. It was like, well, they can get there. Like, I could see it happening. Obviously, they made it to game seven around two again. Um, but I put the fact that they didn’t make it more on that like base level to where I couldn’t blame like you know like obviously player performance matters too, right? Like cuz there is a there was a possibility if like more players had like overperformed instead of been injured slash underperformed that they could have made it. But unlike the previous year where they did lose to the Timberwolves, um where I felt like, you know, despite some like holes in that roster, I felt like it was good enough to have the expectation of going to the conference finals. I didn’t even though they didn’t make it. So, it was like that was really much more on player performance. Um, like in terms of blame pie, uh, last year going into the season, it wasn’t really an expectation of mine, even though I thought it they had the like there was a possibility out there. This is very interesting, right? So, as Grace said, I am a Golden State Warriors fan. So I cover all the teams of course but there is certain specifics and for me at least watching Darus on my team he had a historic 3 month start to the season with Chris Paul where Chris Paul just right just continually got into basketball but then as it aged on more and more it’s like oh the defense is just not there he’s not like a real five he’s really a four that if you try to play five you will pay because of how bad he defensively. So, as soon as I saw that De got him, I’m like, “Okay, if they’re trying to play him as the backup big, I don’t know how much he’s going to play. I like the fit of Daario as a spacer next to Russ as a backup, but just in, you know, terms of uh having another five out there.” Um, I honestly felt like, and I don’t know how he kept doing it for so long, but there were moments where DeAndre Jordan gave you good overall minutes as a backup. I’m like, okay, that’s, you know, surprising. But because of that, just to put this out there, right, because I think there’s a lot of um sort of uh rolling over previous like year’s analysis based on the backup big situation like the nonices were not good this year, right? But there’s been this whole thing of like is it the coaching? Is it that they need a real backup center? Is it like the rest of the players that play on the bench? Like do we need to play more starters there, etc., etc., right? And it’s usually like Jamal staggering kind of thing. When Jamal played with DeAndre Jordan unlike when uh you know obviously Joic is off the floor in that scenario and the average when Yokic is off the floor I think was like minus5 net or something. Those Jamal DeAndre lineups finished the season like a minus 2.2 net just like okay that’s like a normal NBA bench unit just kind of clo hovering around average. Um, and a lot of that was like DJ just providing basic center utility even if it wasn’t every night like ended up, you know, being able to to contribute in that way. Yeah. And like I feel like with all of those things being said, that’s why coming in for me, I’m like, okay, I’m not exactly sure where to put Denver. They lost KCP. Um, I feel like KCP’s impact was important, but I also feel like people were kind of dragging it to say that that this team wouldn’t be a playoff team without him. That so I was more like in the middle. I’m not sure how you felt about that. Well, but just losing is important, but you know, yeah, that was a big aspect of the offseason that I almost forgot about, but uh, yeah, we were pretty critical. Well, most people were critical of losing KCP. Like that archetype of defender, like he’s like a prototypical 3 and D guy who can navigate screens, guard quick ball handlers next to Jokic, which is so important. And losing him really put a hole there. But I think we’re all excited to see Christian Brown if he could fill that role to some degree. And I think he had mixed results throughout different points of the time last season doing that specific skill. But yeah, lo also added a different layer like a different he added some like uh you know transition uh like we were much faster with Bruce and or sorry with Russ and CB and uh his rim finishing was really good. KCP is notorious for getting clowned on for his rim finishing in transition, but uh that defense by his own teammates and that like mid-range transition, you can get that put back. Yeah. I mean CB just didn’t have that consistent like shot even though he did okay like defenders still don’t like necessarily respect his three ball. So you lose the spacing with KCP2 and I still think we’re trying to make up for losing KCP to some degree. But, uh, yeah, that was a big loss coming into the season. So, that probably put a lot of people, uh, lower on Denver. Even like Denver fans, uh, were skeptical of how that was going to work out. And they were critical of the front office, too, for like letting him get away even though he didn’t play that well in Orlando. And people were having victory laps being like, “Oh, he sucks in Orlando.” See, he Booth knew he was declining, but I still think he would have played pretty well if he stayed in Denver. Um, for the most part, even if he was like not as good cuz he’s declining for sure, but you know, your team definitely matters. The team context. I say this all the time too, Will. Like, like I understand it doesn’t look the same in Orlando. Yeah, Orlando’s the 30th ranked offensive unit in the entire NBA. KCP in the structure of what Denver was would still be a good player even if he wasn’t as potent as he was a year before. So, I’m 100% with you there. But coming in, I just have to say, okay, where is this team going to be? And I feel like a top five seed in the West wasn’t out of the question. And then we saw the season and it’s like, yeah, they’re still a good team, guys, you know? Yeah. I was like hoping just for like top three seed was like my high bar. I didn’t think we were going to get one or two and then it was looking like we could be four or five mid-season but yeah. No, like like with yog. That’s how close everything was. It was still very close to the end. Yeah, true. Yeah, but I think like halfway through the season I I definitely thought we didn’t have enough to win a championship and they and like Denver fans were split on that and you could get like in trouble with some fans saying that being like we don’t have enough to win it this year. You guys like OKC is looking dominant. Uh there was there was a lot of teams the Cavs the Cavs looked really scary. I I was skeptical we could have beat them even. Um but yeah, what about you Grace? What did you think about the about the KCP uh or just anything? Um just the the I I thought everything you said was uh basically what I was thinking just the one thing about uh about the KCP like letting him go. I was critical of it especially like leading up to because I was like you should try to keep this guy unless the price is like exorbitant and when the final number came out of what Orlando gave him and as I’m also an Orlando Magic fan I was very critical of that signing for Orlando not because of KCP but because I didn’t think that was what they I didn’t think they needed another defense first shooting guard on that roster when you look at the rest of what they’ve got going on there. Um, but from Denver’s perspective, I was like, “Look, okay, he goes, I don’t like that you let him walk at that number, but whatever. You I get it. You wanted Christian to be a starter, but they didn’t replace that function. It’s like they didn’t recognize the utility of having a forget like elite level, just like an above average level like defense first, screen navigating guard, like someone that can come off the bench. we just didn’t even have that archetype anymore and it was so valuable next to Jokic um defensively. So that was I think I I think it was more critical that they didn’t recognize like okay now we have this hole that we need to address. Um yeah but otherwise it was like yeah it would have been great if they um in my opinion if they could have kept uh but I understood with all the financial ramifications and all that why they didn’t do it. It was just like the next step that was like I didn’t really I didn’t get that. I think Grace said exactly what like you know these are my exact thoughts right like it’s one thing to lose him but the people who are trying to say well they have another young player in Brown who is going to step up and take that role. I said okay like there’s certain things he can do to fit that. Sure. But to me, Brown is not going to be able to fully replace what KCP brought. And now because his role has to go up, you’re losing Brown, who was in that role, which I always say this, right? Like that that I think Brown is the perfect player that should show you how the new CBA works. You have to have a player that’s on a contract that outperforms that contract as a young player in this new, you know, I would say league to really win titles. And I think Brown in route to that championship run had a lot of moments just like that. But asking him to fully replace that felt like a lot for me, which is why I didn’t really have Denver as like the favorite in the Western Commerce this year for me. Yeah, cuz in that starting five that was so good the year they won the title, it’s the same starting five uh that they depended on so much. Um and then you’re losing one of those guys. And as decent as to good decent to good as CB can be, that unit is just gone all of a sudden. The starters still perform well with Jokic and CB had different compliments with Jokic, but yeah, just never fully replaced that. And I Yeah, we’re still still trying to get there for sure. And that I think takes us directly to the middle slash end of the season NBA shenanigans. Um Denver was right where I thought they could be and then towards the end of the season they fired their head coach and Mike Malone which is a bomb. Not because they fired him. I kind of felt like okay the writing could maybe be on the wall because of the Calvin Booth stuff and this and that. Like that was public right? But to do it so quickly towards the end of the season and then the same day you also get rid of of Calvin Booth, it felt like they were waving the white flag for this postseason. But both are just such monstrous moves to make in season. What were your initial gut like wow like how did y’all feel about that? So gifted. Uh, actually I I think I remember having our podcast before the playoffs now because I think I remember telling you that the way I found I found out about Malone being fired was I woke up and I had a notification on my watch and it was just your text message saying, “Did you see?” Um, I forgot I did see. Are you surprised? Um, and I kind of knew instantly like what it was going to be even though there were some other ideas floating in my h head. Go check Twitter. Then it’s like, okay, that’s confirmed. Then a few minutes later, we get the news about Calvin Booth and I was like, oh, okay. Um, mixed feelings. I have very mixed, conflicted feelings about this. Um, but that was it. It was really just like, okay, so what does this mean for the rest of the season? That was my immediate um thought about like, are they waving the white flag? Like, what’s happening next? Oh my god, are we the Memphis Grizzlies? No. Um, yeah, that was a crazy time. I I think Malone the Malone news came out and there was like a very small window before they confirmed Booth or at least that’s how I got the news. So, as soon as I saw Booth was out too, I felt a little bit better. But I think I was obviously confused confused. So, that was the first feeling. But then through sifting through it all and like talking to other Nuggets media people and trying to get more of like the background of what was going on because there was like tons of stuff happening in the organization that you know everyone kind of knew in terms of the drama between Malone and Booth. Some like reports on how the players were feeling about it. Uh and then it seemed like you know you you hear about the feud. We heard that the players were like seemingly cool with this. So then I was like, “Okay, I’ll like be on board with it if you know the players feel like they need this change.” Um, I could see like Jokic and Murray who’d been with Malone for so long like outgrowing Malone and hearing the same messages all the time. And even Blackco Chanchchar like he went on a on the DMBR nuggets pod and like talked about the same exact thing and he said like, “Yeah, you hear the same messages from Alone. It kind of gets stale.” And the team felt really stale. We’d seen the same uh concepts from them. Everyone knows how to play them. They know how to play them on de on defense. They know how to attack their defense because they do the same like Jokic at the level lowman rotating thing. All teams know how to play it. And it’s just like it was getting so uh tiresome watching it. And even though Josh Kroni was trying to like kind of save face saying like this is going to give us a better chance to win even though it did look like waving the white flag. I think there was something kind of to that because they kind of like rallied in the playoffs and they played way better than I thought they were going to considering, you know, they fired him and like had this total front office reset. I think, you know, throwing David Adam into the Wolves like, yeah, you have three days to prepare for the playoffs. Good luck, man. That like I’m sorry. That’s why for me I was just so surprised by it because to do that when you have a couple days to prepare for the playoffs, it put that coach in a like very much hot seat like how you know and he rose to it though like they played very very well. Um I think he’s earned his position as their new head coach. So it’s going to be interesting how that shakes out. But Booth and Malone had a feud for a very long time. And I read a couple of I would say the articles around this and this and that. And I think I understand why. Um I definitely want to hear why you guys may think it is, but how I how I came to understand it is he wanted to have more veteran players to rely on. He really didn’t want to give any of I would say the young guys chances. But Booth was also giving some players extensions that quite frankly just shouldn’t have really happened as well. And they kind of kept clashing over that. Ironically, this current Denver Nuggets team is probably exactly what I think Malone wanted. So, it’s weird, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Nope. I mean, that was all the all the memes that came out. I was like, you know, Malone’s watching all this. Like, this is exactly what, you know, I was asking for. So, no notes on that. Yeah. No, it was totally like Booth wanted his guys to succeed. I think he was way too egotistical and confident in his plan. And it like Malone had been almost famous for not giving young guys a lot of playing time. Like the the development of just Michael Porter Jr. too was like quite a saga to follow with Malone and him and like him pulling him and like I think everyone’s surprised that Mike like handled himself pretty maturely through all the ups and downs of like that relationship and ended up where he was as a player with the Nuggets as a starter as like a solidified starter for us for a long time. And so like to do this plan with these young guys with Malone I think it was never really gonna work. And then we saw like pretty much the worst case scenario where they were like feuding over it and Malone was purposefully at least reportedly, you know, not playing certain guys in some in some context like in practices and in games which you also kind of understand like he’s trying to win. He’s trying to compete and win a championship with Jokic, right? Uh so they just didn’t like agree on the direction. And I I was glad that the front office just decided to clear out both of them and and start a new with like a unified front office that we’re seeing now, which I know we’re jump that’s jumping ahead a little bit. We’ll get there, but uh yeah, that’s the goal now is just try to get everyone on the same page. Yeah. And I can’t say this enough. It’s hard to win in the NBA. Like it’s difficult. I understand that like people are so used to saying, “Oh, wow. This team blow it all up. They’re not good.” That’s not how the NBA works, right? For them to effectively get rid of both. I liked it overall for the long term because they’re resetting the entire franchise basically because these two guys were in charge of the construction and then the actual dayto-day of the team. So, you can’t get rid of one. I felt I didn’t like I didn’t really love that. Right. So, both of them gives them a chance to like 100% reset the current build next to Jokic. And I think long-term that can definitely pay some clean stuff. I’m just so impressed by the off seasonason, but I would say before doing that, we have to actually talk about it. That Clipper series, man, um I watched every game of that and the player Aaron Gordon was for you in the playoffs. I just really feel like that deserves its own stuff. like he was doing amazing impactful things beyond like all of the biggest shots and game winners there. He was just such a riser for Denver this postseason. How did his performance impact you guys? AG is Mr. Nugget. Let’s go. I like that. Mr. Nugget Aaron Gordon. I love that. It was so crazy cuz he had such a rough season just like staying on the floor because of this lingering like uh recurring thing with his calf. Then the playoffs come along and he’s probably still dealing with it some and we saw with that like blown dunk in game two of the Clippers steer he’s like um but most of the time it’s just like this guy is incredible. his shooting leap was huge for us, especially uh even for the you know few games that he did play in the regular season and obviously in the playoffs when you look at game one versus OKC too it was like he just does it all right and you know I’m not sure if we’re going to if we’re going to touch on this uh gifted when you talk about the Clippers series in particular Mhm. there was a lot of talk about uh you know the Clippers are this deeper team uh and like that’s that that’s the reason that you would pick Clippers over over Denver in that series cuz obviously Denver has like um you know better like top end. Um unless you thought like Hawaii was going to go nuclear which he did for a game, right? Um, but I thought that the thing that AG and really Christian too in that series brought was a level of consistent impactful play from from uh, you know, third slash fourth and even fifth depending on the game if like I think MPJ had like one good game in that series um, from third or uh, third, fourth or fifth starters that the Clippers did not have in addition to like their top end guys performing. Like, yeah, it’s like, okay, yeah, you could argue their six through eight was like better, but like who cares if their their production is basically just making up for the holes with the inconsistency 100%. of the, you know, third through fifth guy and sometimes they were rotating guys in and out. Um, and AG, I think, is just like the penultimate example of that, like you need consistent difference makers in your starting lineup. Um, and I don’t know that that’s the first place my mind goes because I’ve been thinking about this question of like, you know, star power versus depth and it’s like, well, what do you mean by depth kind of thing. So, that that was the first thing that came to mind for me is just like AG is like exactly the archetype that you’re talking about. Um, if you wanted to make that argument. Love that insight from Grace. How about you, Will, man? Yeah, I love AG. He’s like my he’s tied right there with like my favorite nugget with Jokic. Like that’s how much I love him. Uh he just brings everything that Grace said, but like just this extra hard to quantify quality where like those game winners and like being in the right spot. Yeah. Yeah. The grit in the heart and like getting in Harden’s face like when you know Harden and CB were feuding and Aaron Gordon going after him. like he brings like a lot of the aggressiveness that sometimes with Murray and Jokic don’t exude that aggressive like they don’t wear their heart on the on their sleeves all the time. They’re more like chill players. I feel they kind of mirror each other in that way. But Aaron Gordon just like bringing it to the team for the team and he’s like the heart of the team as Jokic always said or he says he’s the soul of the team too. Um, and I know like that stuff’s kind of like it it’s not necessarily something you can quantify and like break down, but it’s definitely a true thing when it comes to Aaron Gordon. And uh, yeah, I I he even said during that series that he could barely jump. He was like, “Man, my cast so bad I can barely jump.” And then he had that like buzzer beater alley where he just jumped up there and jumped at the last second. Oh, that was just so good for the team to to if they didn’t count that or somehow it didn’t count, like that series might have gone another way. Uh but yeah, that was an amazing series. It was way it was close. Uh I think people, you know, that game seven wasn’t as compelling as you would hope for a game seven and so that was exactly as compelling as I personally thought. I can’t. Okay, Grace. But yeah, no, I’m really glad it wasn’t like a heart, you know, wrenching. We had so many games throughout the whole regular season even where we barely won it at the end or barely lost it. We didn’t know like what team was going to show up. And that playoff series was good to see just like the level of defense. Even though not a defensive team was much better than I thought, way more consistent, they got better each game I thought and AG was a big part of that and Christian was a big part of that and how they improved on the defensive end. And they’re like good defensive archetypes to match up against the Clippers, too. So, I like that as well. Um because like CB has a chance against Harden at least whereas like he’s he’s not going to guard someone quicker like a Steph or something like that in the playoffs but um or like Ant’s too big and fast for him. Although he he did pretty well in the in the previous playoff series against the Wolves but uh at times people were saying he was better than KCP. You remember that Grace? Um I do remember that too. And then Aunt decided he wanted to start running off of screens and then all over. It was like it would have been like flipped like okay would have been useful to have someone that could like stick to a guy. But also just real last thing on Aaron Gordon was you know people were questioning whether his three was real or not and then to see his shot in that series and even in the OKC series it was crazy be that consistent was very satisfying to see. Yeah. I so I like I remember being so drawn to everything Interrone was doing even off the ball like he just every time he was on the floor you felt instant impact but then on top of that to have the moments where he’s hitting a buzzier beating dunk he hits a game like the big shots were a big thing for him but he played through injury and like I think the most respectful thing that I think that stems him as like easily one of my favorite players in the league now for sure is the fact that in the game seven verse OKC he’s clearly hurt like there’s no doubt about it and he still played and also gave you good minutes in the first half of that game which which like you know a lot of people don’t say as much because of how the game ended but he still gave everything he had and then after that he’s hurt so like he has to be I would say sideline for these couple months of the offseason but just his thing to never give up on the team. I really appreciate that cuz and nowadays players don’t have to do that in any way, shape, or form. So, I thought that was huge. Um, the other player in this series that I think also deserves a ton of credit has to be Westbrook. And there were a lot of reactions to getting him. There were a bunch of fans who said that he’s trash. He shouldn’t really be in the NBA. The Laker fans were like obviously hate watching terribly because of what Russ had done for their franchise, but in this series when he came off the bench, his impact was crazy. Yeah. And you know, I said earlier like if you wanted to argue, you know, Clippers 6 through eight is like better than Denver’s. Like maybe like the seventh and eighth were, but like Russ was out playing their bench by himself pretty consistently throughout that series. And I’m talking about two-way impact. He outplayed Norman Pow in the series, which a lot of people probably wouldn’t have said. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And you know, Norm had he he had that injury and took a while to ramp up to get to the playoffs. He was he was better in like the second half of that series, but by then it was like too late cuz everyone else had their sort of inconsistent uh you know, things. Just speaking on on Norm Powell, but um yeah, Russ was big time. The Nuggets don’t win the Clippers series without him. um those like especially it’s funny because a lot of people complained over the years about um Malone’s sort of consistent use of these two point guard looks especially in the regular season like you’ll have Jamal out there and then the backup point guard and like all this stuff those were some of their better looks especially with Joic off the floor in the regular season but also come playoffs with Joic on the floor or off those Jamal and Russ lineups were absolutely crushing the Clippers they could not keep up and it was a combination of like Denver going a bit small so that they had collective more speed and more kind of offensive um talent, but also just Russ’s athleticism in particular, they had absolutely no answer for it. Um and in addition to obviously the athleticism, he had uh huge shots that he just made, including that three in game one that helped to send it to overtime and uh or was it overtime or did they win? I forget. But it like he was huge just across the board. Um he did miss that game four and I wonder if that that like that game shouldn’t have been closed. Denver was up 22 in the fourth quarter. So a lot like Clippers fans are like what if we’d won? I’m like what if you’d just been blown out like was you know foretold you know 8 minutes earlier. Um, uh, he missed it with, uh, I think that was a hamstring or something and then he came back and I was I I I didn’t know if he was going to come back, but he did. Um, and yeah, big time. And also we learned, you know, he was playing through the the hand fractures through in the playoffs. He played through a lot of injuries, too. Four players. That’s the other thing with these guys like MPJ, AG, and Russ all playing through um like non minor injuries. It is the playoffs, but of course, and you’re thinking to yourself, like, man, it’d be great if Denver had some guys behind them that could make it so that AG AG was not only, you know, uh, playing through injury, MPJ was not only playing through injury. These guys were playing 40 minutes a night. A lot of minutes, too. Yep. Yep. A lot of minutes, right? And here’s the thing is it would have been worse for Denver to have healthy guys that were behind them playing. That’s like a big, you know, issue that I think Denver really tried to address this this off season. So, that’s just uh it was big time for those guys to to do that and and you know, push through all of that for their team, but this team in particular because it actually would have been it was just better to trot out these guys injured, you know, go deeper in the in the rotation, which is, you know, sad. Yeah. Even though like the online discourse of Russ is always polarizing, I felt like the Nuggets fans at Ball Arena loved him. Like when he did anything, super impactful, especially that game one in the playoffs when he, you know, stole the ball and solidified the win, like the crowd was crazy. And I I love that he got that moment like a like praise from the fans and like people were questioning if he would even play in the playoffs. like we got him more to try to stabilize the bench and just get an extra ball handler off the bench and it worked out that he played super well with Jamal and Joic, the two main dudes. So, come playoffs, play them minutes together, you’re going to you’re going to be good. And that worked out really well in that series. I was super happy with that. Even to the point where like I I would have loved if he could come back to the Nuggets. I mean, Grace and I were saying bring him back. Why not? Uh, some people are ready to move on, but I people want CP3 right now. They’re like, Nuggets fans are praying. I’ve been seeing that on my timeline, too. Yeah, I’ve been bring Russ back. He already knows Jokic and them. But I don’t know what’s going on. Russ seems like he’s looking to other teams because there’s not been any like smoke about this of them reuniting, which I think sucks. But I will say that in light of the other offseason moves that Denver did end up making, my assessment of Russ’s fit on the team is different now than it was like a month ago. Mhm. Perhaps. Um, do you still want another backup point guard? Yeah. No, I definitely do. That’s That’s true. That’s interesting, man. I I would say um my favorite Russ moment on this team if he doesn’t come back is when he dunked the ball and like proudly accepted the tech and just the the way that he raised the energy as a stamp like we’re here. They didn’t believe in us. A lot of people didn’t have us and now we like we have this right. Like that felt like such a warming moment for the team honestly. Yeah. Mine was the And now I remember that game one did go to OT because he had the game sealing steal off the inbounds to James Harden in overtime. Um and that was like that was just elation, right? That was that was the feeling in that moment. Obviously the dunk in game seven was big too cuz it was just like yeah, we’re we’re here. We’re we’re ready to compete. Like this season is not over. Um, those moments felt like statement moments, right? Uh, kind of the same thing that when when we’re talking about AG’s biggest moments, like Russ was he didn’t do anything quiet. No. No. So, I think that both of those players had supremely high positives. MPJ didn’t. Um, he wasn’t really great this year overall in the playoffs. I want to give him some grace because obviously he was going through a ton of injury stuff, but it became hard to see him really play more so in the OKC series for me than the Clipper series. But I think going on to the next series, I think that’s where a lot of these player, you know, hurts really came back to bite you. Um, I do want to give Denver a ton of credit though because a lot of people and almost the overall consensus had this as a five or maybe six game series, but a lot of people said five. And I said five. I said five as well. I was also one of the people that said five. And Denver just completely outplayed expectations. I still to this day cuz I um sorry right now actually right I have been rewatching this whole series and the biggest thing is like the zone okay just did not know what to consistently do against the zone every play is you know trying to come from the top of the key and people aren’t really actively trying to move and OKC can’t hit shots but Denver’s defense to operate in that way and then do what they do offensively is huge huge. But game one was everything. I feel like this entire series starts in game one. The way that you guys um took advantage of their problems and and their mistakes was huge. And that’s a large part of why this was a full drawn out uh playoff series. What were your feelings game by game in that series? Game by game. Wow. That’s tough cuz you know game one happens and I agree with like I I actually thought that Denver in terms of playing OKC well did better in like the first half of the series than the second half even though there were individual players who did better in the second half like from Denver, right? So game by game it was interesting cuz game one happens and I’m like okay let’s see if they could get another one, right? cuz once once you get one on OKC’s floor, even I who said like this is going to be a five game series, I’m thinking, okay, they’re probably going to get at least another one at home. So, we’re probably going to have at least a six game series on our hands here. Um, it was mostly how OKC adjusted to Joic that kind of dictated how I felt about the series. And early in the series, I felt like OKC um was not particularly aggressive in how they were covering Jokic. Um and that is that that’s sort of allied by the numbers that he put up in the series. He’s the player I’m talking about where I’m like I think OKC played him better in the second half of the series even though his numbers were better in the second half of the series. Um, but his individual performances, like I said, got better as the series went along. Um, and so that was just like a okay, game one happens. I’m not taking like too much away from it besides maybe the series is longer than I think. And then uh game two happens. It’s like totally expected. I completely expected Denver to like lay down in this game. I was surprised that it was even it was like closed for like a couple minutes and then it was like okay you guys can have this one. Game three happens and that was like a really like that was maybe the worst yogic game of the entire series, but you had huge performances from MP. Huge man, from Jamal 2A like he took over especially in that overtime getting those multiple stops on J on JDub who had been having a nuclear night himself, right? Um AG obviously that was like the I don’t even want to call it the role player game. It was just like your your your co-star game. Um, bro, MBJ was good that game, too. Yeah, I think he had 25. Yeah. Um, yeah. And game four happens. That was the 36-hour turnaround game, uh, midday. And that was so ugly from both teams. And I ne a lot of people were feeling like uh in like when I’m like in the group chats like during the game, we’re like, “Okay, neither team looks good, but Denver’s up right now.” But I never felt good about that because it was like they’re up six. But it’s one of those games where it’s halftime and it’s like 30 to 36 or whatever. So affair. Mhm. Um but obviously that fourth quarter hits and it’s like Denver was never able to get separation enough to to overcome that that avalanche and OKC hit some shots against the zone and they end up coming out with the with the win. Another rough game from Yic by the way, especially in that fourth quarter. So I was just like, okay, like when are we going to start to get, you know, better Yokic game? We get the monster Jokic game in game five. First one since game one really. Um, and we have like a good third quarter from Jamal Murray and then like nothing else from like anyone or Jamal later. And that was the fourth quarter where I think Joic, there were two buckets made or there was one bucket made by a nonic person. It was like that basically garbage time layup from Jabal. Um, I didn’t really like the process at the end of that game either. Uh, but it was just like one of those series where I’m like, Denver lost this obviously in seven games, so in longer than I thought they would and not for the reasons that I thought they would. So, the series was more interesting to me because for sure the the way that it got to, you know, the thing I predicted, even though it wasn’t the number of games, but OKC winning wasn’t the way that I thought it was going to get there. Um, so it was just more interesting than anything to me. And it was one of those things where um I felt like the I came out of that series feeling like Denver has a matchup advantage here and that’s what carried them longer than the series probably should have gone. OKC was the better team like point blank period obviously right. Um, but I feel like Denver still has a matchup advantage here to a degree that I didn’t think was um was would like manifest itself given how uh poorly I was thinking about Denver’s overall state of team play. Um, yeah. So, that those were those were my feelings, my not not condensed feelings about the series throughout. Uh, I’ll just say I won’t go through the whole series, but I thought, yeah, a lot of the narratives shifted in certain ways that were really interesting. Like Joic looked dominant at first, then he kind of disappeared. We were asking how can we get Jokic playing like himself again against this swarming OKC defense which you knew were really good but then when you see it against one of the best offenses in the league in a huge moment that a lot of these players hadn’t experienced yet uh you start to worry a little bit like cuz I was really proud of the Nuggets but also disappointed at the same time because they could have had this series if it just went a couple ways because we missed so many open shots. David Adelman talked about that. He he in interview at some point in the offseason talking about how we needed more timely shooting. Like we just didn’t have players who could consistently hit when they had even a wideopen shot. And that was really disappointing because all we needed was a couple more to fall to pull out one more game cuz we had such a like we had a good lead early. we could have gone up 3-1 and just couldn’t ever like put our foot on the throat and really like take control of the series like and the Thunder responded every time in a way that I didn’t necessarily think a team with this little of experience uh would and you start to think like okay yeah Dor is more of a vet than I probably give him credit for. Alex Caruso obviously is been around a lot and won a championship. So, you started to realize that these players aren’t just young and, you know, lost out there as you might expect a young team to be. Although, like I think they’re consistently, conservatively speaking, third best player in that series was long time Alice Caruso. Let’s talk about it. He I love that. Yeah, it was great hitting threes. He was guarding Joic. He was doing everything for that team. Play the zone transition dunks, steals, annoying. Yeah. And then and that was like the thing you hoped when they added him in the offseason. It wasn’t going to be Yeah. as big of a difference maker, especially against your team. You’re like, “Okay, hopefully this addition because the Bulls completely I mean, maybe you didn’t. I thought I was gonna be on that for sure. I I like like I’m sorry them trading Josh Giddy who I think can be a decent impact player, right? But them like he was not that version of himself in OKC. They did not need that version of him cuz they already had multiple ball handlers and he was a liability on defense. to replace that with Alex freaking Caruso and to see what he did in the playoffs. Like that was the move to help them win honestly. Yeah, he was a huge difference maker in the in that series. As much as I hate to admit I mean they don’t win that series without him which I love him as that type of player. Like I love those types of players in the league. It just sucks when he’s doing it to your team. He’s like that classic player where you hate playing him but if he’s on your team you’re like you’re loving it. Yeah. Um but yeah, that was a rough series and then yeah, it quickly became it wasn’t like a experience versus experienced championship team. It was all about like depth and like the collective uh strength that OKC just had and the amount of options they had on both ends and Denver just could not as good as their offense was. I was like betting they might be able to score enough against their defense and we can muster our defense enough to stop them. But it really became I felt our defense was struggling to stop them much more than I thought. Even though their offense kind of sputtered at times and their defense just really limited us in ways that was uh too hard to overcome. Yeah. But that takes us directly to the offseason. And again, I think if you are a fan of the Denver Nuggets, you have to at least leave the playoffs somewhat happy. like they competed their ass off against a team that I thought was the best team in the league in preeason. I had them going all the way. Like this was a team I picked to actually win the title. And it came down to a couple moments to really decide the whole series again. Like this was very much a playoffs where they could have lost in six to Denver. Like that’s very very you know possible, right? But you immediately make some of the most monster quick moves I’ve seen from a franchise that just fired their head of basketball operations in a while. I got to say this, man. And I taste the grace about this too. The Michael Porter Jr. trade had my jaw on the floor cuz it’s like to turn that contract into Cameron Johnson who is a player that I’ve been saying like is is like you know he was the guy that I said hey I think OKC should trade for him and Denver got him and the most value I would say give up is the pick that I believe is in 2032 I get that but he’s such a good fit next to because of his IQ as a player his floor like I’m Sorry, there’s a lot of things there, but how did that trade make y’all feel? Cuz that was a phenomenal trade to me. Um, yeah, my jaw was also on the floor. There was footage of this because we were reacting to it live. Uh, we were reacting to the first day of of free agency and obviously a lot of um, you know, signings, but that was the fir I think that was the first big trade of the day, but it was like 2 hours into our stream, I think. Will, does that sound about right? Mhm. Um, my reaction was first like, “No way.” Because I didn’t see it. Will he’s like, “It happened.” I’m like, “What happened?” Great. I have been hearing so much MPJ for Cam Johnson trades for years. So, to me, I was like, “Oh, it finally happened.” But I still was shocked. I just am more of a mono tone type of guy. So, the excitement didn’t come across to Grace. No, it didn’t. Oh, it finally happened at all. Um, what was my like my emotional reaction was like I think first I was like, “Wow, MPJ is really gone.” Then I wanted to know the details of the deal, right? Um, I think that first announcement did say like 2032 and I was wondering if we were going to have to take back any players in the in the trade, right? And when we didn’t, uh, yeah, you got licked out in the chat saying I was confused for a solid minute. I was I was just like, what is happening? Because here’s the thing, gifted the our our new uh we’re just going to call them GMs. We got a new executive vice president of uh basketball ops and a new vice pres executive vice president of player personnel that are collectively the Nuggets general manager, right? Um who who we’ve been affectionately referring to as Ben Wallace. Um Ben Tenzer and John Wallace. And in the they were hired super late, by the way, for these positions. It was super late. Yeah. super late. We’re talking 2 days before the draft. And to be fair, and I was not being fair before this happened, but to be fair, Ben Tenzer had been acting in the interim general manager capacity ever since basically right after Calvin Booth was fired. And so groundwork was being laid, calls were being made around the league to try to canvas and figure all this stuff out, whatever. But in every interview and press conference that was held between the time that these guys got hired and when these trades actually happened, they were like, “We’re talking about internal development. We’re talking about we’re going to focus more on free agency than trades and uh we’re just going to work on kind of filling out the backend depth of the roster.” Then this deal happens and I’m like, “Okay, everything I know is a lie, right?” Um, so when that trade happened, my, you know, next thought was, okay, this off season is going to be completely different than I thought. Not just because they did a trade, but they made a trade that, you know, put Denver in terms of a salary cap situation in a position to make more moves. Mhm. Which they did make another big move the next day by trading for uh trading Dario for Yonas Valenunis and like huge dub. I got a rant about that by the way. We’ll get to that, but I can’t wait for that. We’ll we’ll get to the we’ll get to it. But like, you know, uh the the specifics on the Valentuna side right now, but even if he had left, like they got rid of Daario for nothing effectively. And that would have been that would have been a W even if it was just like we got a roster spot that we just was otherwise just kind of dead minutes on the bench there. Um, so yeah, no, like huge trade, but my my mind went less to the player because it was just kind of like, okay, this is good. Like they didn’t do anything to make the team worse in terms of having to take back bad money. There were lots of MPJ trades that were floating around uh both in the season and then after the season as Nuggets fans were trying to manifest something happening, and obviously it did, but a lot of them were just kind of taking back. We need more pieces. we need more depth. Just like give me rand like insert random player X here that is maybe worse than MPJ, but we’re getting like two or three of them, you know, back. Uh, and you know, regardless of like fit or like specific direction you want to take the roster or anything like that. Whereas this deal was like we’re basically getting in terms of like role fulfillment regardless of how you feel about like which is a better player in in a vacuum in terms of role fulfillment basically a faximile of MPJ with you know some more versatility in certain ways and on top of that making way less money so that they can make other moves. Um and so yeah that that deal was huge. that was like the, you know, the lynch pin of Denver’s entire um or not the entire offseason strategy, but a big uh chunk of it. Mhm. Well, it was also weird reacting to it live cuz Nuggets fans obviously have an attachment to MPJ. Yeah. There are there are factions who are like they hate not like hate, but they’re like they’re really mad at the fact that he sometimes disappears in the playoffs. They really want to trade him. Uh he does make a ton of money. people were skeptical that his contract was even tradable. So, the fact that we just got essentially I know we added the first round pick, but just like MPJ for Cam and no other players was amazing to me. And just as time goes on, like I wanted to be sensitive to MPJ and give him his credit, but I’m just getting more and more excited about Cam Johnson on the team. Like Grace, like just outlined the financial flexibility. But as a player, like I can’t believe people are saying this is like a salary dump move almost. Like there are some really things. Yeah. Like John Hollinger like salary dump MPJ. I’m like Cam Johnson is better than MPJ. I’m just going to like go out there and say like I I know he has uh durability like questions. He’s only played like 60 games. Um never and MPJ had done well playing 80 games. Um, but I I’m just like Cam his defense I think people have some good like they’re pumping the brakes on that a little bit. Uh, but he’s better than MPJ. I don’t think he’s going to get hunted as much. And I I think he’s smarter in better positions most of the time. Like I hate to say it, but MPJ kind of got hurt on that play when he hurt his shoulder cuz he was just he’s kind of a clumsy player and he’s like a little bit slow. Chris Dunn fell on his shoulder. Yeah, cuz of the play that he was making and then he’s like falling over himself and someone falls on him. I don’t know. Bodies get on the floor. I wouldn’t classify MPJ as a clumsy player. Oh man, I would I would He looks so slow and clumsy this last season. I I thought but um like his defense I thought was worse this last season than usual. Um but like the rotations just weren’t as crisp. But I’m not trying to hate on MPJ. I’m just I’m so excited about Cam and like the money. He’s a cheaper player. I think he’s a better playmaker, better dribbler. He drives more. He his He’s more effortless and when he drives worse. MPJ is a little uh jerky. He’s not as smooth. Uh MPJ can cut, but so can Cam. Um I think Cam is probably a better cutter than him, too. Yeah. And so it’s like the stats, like when you look at it are very similar. Uh, but it’s like David Adelman just said in this recent interview like during summer league where he just said it’s it’s the way that he’s gonna play that’s gonna be an amazing fit for us. And I think people are going to be surprised how well he plays in the system even like as opposed to MPJ. Like you don’t have to directly compare them if you don’t want to. But I think people will see he’s going to be amazing as long as he stays on the court which I’m hoping just good health luck for him. So here was my reaction cuz I was also live during free agency which was kind of bleak for the first you know like hour and then the gate started. Yeah. Yeah. So it took us a while to get there but once I saw this trade before I saw what it was for I’m like oh my god they did it. And I was saying this because no matter what the ceiling of he sorry no matter what his overall potential ceiling was MPJ is a player that the durability is always going to be in question his floor defensively is very much so in question. And it’s like do I want to rely on him in a playoff series if I’m trying to win a title? Probably not. And I feel like with Cam Johnson, even though I don’t think he’s a perfect player, I do think there’s a bit of people that kind of overrate him, I still think this is a phenomenal trade for Denver because regardless if he’s good or not, he has like one year left after this year. So, there’s still potential flexibility down the road. Plus, I just think in terms of fit, he fits better next to Jokic in my opinion based on what his skills are. So to me to do all that and not have to trade another value player to get him was pretty much a win for where Denver is right now. Their team that’s trying to contend and compete right now. So I thought that’s about as good as you could do in any mock MPJ trade, especially after he got hurt in these playoffs. Yeah, there was like the uh MPJ Zack Lavine trade that was rumored around the trade deadline and I I got the skepticism around that one just cuz Zack Lavine’s contract is bigger than MPJ’s at that point. We need He has one more year also. Yeah. So, I totally got from that perspective, but like really all you have to do to replace Mike around Jokic is get that three-point gravity. That’s like Mike’s biggest contribution. Yes, next to Yok. And I’m not like trying to simplify his role because he did some other things, but that was the main thing. And I think Grant, uh, Cam already fulfills that plus more, so I think it’s going to be great. Yeah. Um, but now we get to the move that I’m going to have a rant about. So, the Yonas Valentunis move was phenomenal to me. Um, I love that move. I felt like this was a team that needed a backup big. I always felt like signing Dario Sarish in 2025, I just did not see the fit on Denver specifically because he was a player that in my opinion cannot play next to Joic at all. Like it just doesn’t make any sense. And then even when he’s not playing with him, you now need to have another big who can also defend out there with him because Dario can’t play to five cuz he pretty much is a terrible defensive player in every way. And pretty quickly they caught on and he stopped playing for Denver. So, you moved a guy that wasn’t playing at all to get a very good value piece to me off of your bench. When he talked about potentially wanting to retire from the NBA and go to Greece, I have a lot to say about that. Okay. The number one thing for me, I want to give credit to Denver as a franchise. They could have folded. They fought. They said, “No, we’re not. We’re not buying you out. You’re on this contract. It is what it is.” And I feel like a lot of teams don’t do things like this cuz now it’s it’s like all of these players with the power and this and that, but you made a great trade. We’re going to make you play. And I think that’s fair. I know that might sound like super duper restricted to to the player. He can still retire if he wants to, but I think on paper that was a great move. And to what Gray said earlier, even if he decides to do that and doesn’t play and you just have a open spot on your roster, that’s still better than Darios, who effectively was not playing, was still being paid money, and still occupied a spot. So, that’s my short rant, but I like the move for Denver. I do. Yeah. Yeah. And to to your point on that uh on that gifted when the report first came out that Yokic or that Yonas not Yok uh let’s call him Valv avoid that that confusing uh when that Val was considering or was close to there were some like multiple translations things going on here uh signing or like coming to some deal with Penathanos in Greece. Um, I wasn’t sure that Denver didn’t know about this because obviously they’re not talking during, you know, this is free agency, but it’s the moratorium period. Like nothing’s actually official. None of these deals are official. Um, and I didn’t know that Sacramento didn’t know about this. Although, it wouldn’t have made sense for them to know about this and then trade foul because then they got to take Dario back. They would have just bought him out themselves. I was thinking like there’s actually a possibility in here that Denver knew that he wanted to do this and is fine with it and maybe they’re just like, “Okay, we got to get rid of Daario for nothing and open up a roster spot. We’re going to address backup big in some other way.” Um, but it seems like their plan is and they’re um at least publicly right now following through on enforcing Val’s contract and saying you got to play. So to me, at least early on in free agency, there was no downside to this. Obviously, as time goes on and there are fewer and fewer free agents left on the market, you be you get to a situation where it’s like, okay, Denver kind of needs this to work out now because they can’t address backup big in another way, at least easily. Um, like without a trade, for example. Um, but yeah, that was just like a home run move to me like in the moment. I still think so now even with the lingering like half questions although they’ve gone to great length Denver has to try to tell us like we have no concerns uh he’s going to play we’ve talked to him uh his representatives have also assured us he’s going to honor his contract etc etc um but yeah just like home run move cuz there was like no downside to to that trade I was I was in I was in literal shock Cuz when I first saw that there was it was just a swap of Daario Devel. I was just like, “Oh no, did we give up swap?” Was there any like I wanted to know what else we happened to give up because I just couldn’t fathom Denver making that kind of move and not like they they they unequivocally won that trade. Like it’s not even a debate. No. Yeah. Even if Val walked Yeah, we would have won it. I just I thought we were stuck with Daario for another season like for sure. Or maybe he could have been packaged in some other deal with like his salary, but that would I just didn’t seem so difficult to make a Dario deal. Um they they really gave that made a player option. My gosh, man. That was another thing like EPMLE and a player option. Yeah, they went they went crazy. Yeah. Okay. Brutal. Uh yeah, but then I thought we, you know, we started pivoting towards if Val walks, who could we get like who are we gonna shift to? And then a lot of people were pushing for Al. I know Warrior pushing for Al before the Val trade even happened to be fair. I’m sorry on Al. This this is where I need y’all to keep with you cuz my team has done nothing in this off season. Literally nothing. Literally nothing. Like literally, what’s going on with the Warriors? I I I have no answer for you right now. We’re still waiting on them to make a decision on Jonath Kuminga, which should have been done what feels like a long time ago, but like they’re going into this season with. So, I like a little aside about this restricted free agency situation. Sure. Just why not? I you just because like we Denver has a couple of players that are not in restricted free agency but are extension eligible this summer and could be pushed to restricted free agency next summer. and just seeing how it’s playing out with Kabinga, with um Giddy, and with Cam Thomas, with with Brooklyn, it’s like, wow, this is particularly messy right now because of the lack of cap space around the league, just because of how the new CBA is structured, favoring extensions, etc., and salary floor. Like, there aren’t a lot of teams with cap space. Um, there are no teams with cap space basically right now. It’s just Brooklyn. Um, which is part of the reason that I don’t really understand why they’re dragging out the Cam Thomas thing. But, you know, Sam Vini from the Game Theory podcast was talking about like a lot of people see restricted free agency as as a pretty big problem and even before this new CBA, like the whole process is like kind of sketch when you think about it, but especially when it plays out for this like drawn out period like it has this summer for these young guys. And I feel like he had a really good idea where he was like, “Look, you can give them the the qualifying offer to make the restricted free agent, but if you don’t negotiate a deal within like a shorter time window, then they become unrestricted.” I think that would make a lot more sense for both the player, their current team, and other teams that could be interested in these restricted free agents. Like, make it a make it a week, make it two weeks, whatever. But like m letting this drag on the entire summer potentially and then who knows what ends up happening. Does Kaminga end up just taking the qualifying offer and then trying to get to free agency next year? Whatever. I just think it’s a really like shitty process, but especially for the players cuz they have literally no certainty going into next season. Um and that’s where you have to start. But it’s also bad for the team because they are like it’s holding up everything because they have no idea like what amount of their cap space is going to be um you know taken up and that impacts what kinds of things they’re even allowed to offer other potential free agents. So yeah, I just wanted to put that out there. And you know, just in relation to Denver, it’s making me a lot more wary of the possibility of a player like Payton Watson going to restricted free agency next summer just because it’s so like this is so messy and it’s been messy for like particularly for Kaminga and Cam Thomas in terms of like how it’s playing out publicly. It’s probably still very messy for Josh Giddy as well, but we just haven’t seen as many of those like quotes or tweets kind of coming out from the different camps about what the, you know, holdups and sticking points are and all that. And then everybody weighs in online. It’s just like this is this is a mess. Um, figure out a price that like works for you guys. And if not, like if you can’t, like I don’t want Denver to be in a situation like Golden State is in where they’re like, “Okay, we’ll work out a signing trade for Kaminga, but we want a first round pick, but you’re not willing to pay Kaminga the amount of money that would suggest that you value him.” So, but you won a first round pick. Very sketchy. And the thing is like teams are incentivized to act in this way by virtue of the way that the system is set up. Not to give them a pass. Like I think that all these teams are acting like very sketchily, but they’re incentivized to act this way right now. Um so that’s why I think the whole like structure of it needs to be um needs to be addressed. But also like for my team in particular, I’m like can we let’s try to avoid that. like either you decide to pay this guy this summer or you trade him and then like we move on because this is just kind of ridiculous. I think a cap particular piece that adds on to this that is different from the last CBA is the fact that every team has to hit 100% of the cap floor before the season begins. 90%. Oh. Oh, sorry about that. I said 100%. 90%. Yeah. But but like that leads to teams specifically overpaying guys just to reach that floor compared to saying you can go into the season with it like the Jazz did with Lloyd Mark, right? But it also means that like if you if you uh follow through on those extensions, you have fewer and fewer teams that have cap space for other guys to to give out in free agency, too. So um that’s like the that that’s the part where it actually like I’ve been trying to make this argument for a couple years now that uh the the degree to which and different ways in which extensions are favored under this new um under this new CBA uh is it’s why like if you look at all the interesting things about free agency this year it’s been like trades and like some buyout guys for like small money but it hasn’t been a lot like big free agent movement and a lot of that is the caps base situation and the fact that stars and like um you know mid-level and upper role players are like taking extensions where they can get them with their current teams. So, and that’s why like I think it’s so poetic that the face of the NBA now is ironically Fred Van Fleet, who’s a player that specifically got up because of this new CBA where he got $40 million from the Houston Rockets. So, it was pretty funny. Yeah. Oh, the thing I hate about it is I feel like teams are just getting punished so much lately for drafting really well and just not being able to hold on to any of those dudes. And even the super max is functioning that way a little bit where it’s like, yeah, you drafted this amazing star, you can offer him this super max cuz you, you know, keep him on your team, but then it’s like, oh you don’t have room to give money to anyone else. uh you can’t have more than two max contracts on your team, which might be cool eventually once the that all like settles out and like the way the talent is distributed around the league might make the league a little more exciting, but it’s painful to watch the transition uh from what it was to where it’s going right now. And uh some some teams are uh like OKC are just they have quite a runway. Uh so we’ll see. We’ll see if OKC can be the first team to repeat in a while teams are struggling to like fix their together. Yeah, but I like what the Nuggets are doing. I can’t lie to you, Will. I I absolutely hate the function of a supermax in this current era because now it’s like a player like Jerry Jr., oh well technically I’m DPI and I, you know, like I’m I’m technically of that caliber. You don’t want to pay back. I guess I’ll go somewhere else. And now these teams are hamstrung to give the guy that they drafted the contract that he wants. Cuz now it’s like, all right, if you’re not giving me that that you’re not giving me the most amount of money I can make, why would I want to be here? Which which is like very not what they thought the supermax was going to do. Um, I think there might be a shift to make it a bit more restrictive and harder to get in the next CBA, but it’s just a lot of things with this current thing that u most players are starting to see like, yeah, this new CBA might not be the greatest for these types of things. Um it actually encourages more player movement from these teams that we are are talking about which from the at the not the very tippy top guys but like the guys right under that like you say a like it was a real question this summer whether Jiren was going to still be a Grizzly going into next season and obviously they clear up cap space and do that renegotiate and extend situation. But it’s interesting you mentioned that gifted about um uh you know the current functioning of but but not just the supermax but max contracts as well. Uh you know paying these guys and if they’re not worth it, do they not want to be there anymore? I don’t know, right? Because we haven’t seen teams really test that in that direction. the direction we’ve seen teams test that in were uh well okay the the maybe you could say like Brandon Ingram to the Pelicans but they end up trading him right what would have happened if they tried if he tries to go to unrestricted free agency with New Orleans this past summer can’t get that number and then just ends up extending at probably the number uh New Orleans would have extended him for which is probably more than anybody would have paid him and the only re because of the cap space situation Right. And the only reason that the Raptors were able to pay him what they did and a lot of teams have been calling this pre- agency now the Warriors do it with Jimmy Butler. You make a deal at the at the trade deadline for, you know, a big swing and that’s basically your big move of the off season and you’re able to extend that guy. Right. Right. Because now you’ve got his bird rights and all of that stuff. But we haven’t seen teams really test uh like letting a guy like that get to free agency outside of Paul George. But I don’t think the Clippers were really testing that. In retrospect, I think they just wanted him. I mean, they offered him $30 million. Like, they definitely weren’t trying to test that with Paul. They were kind of cool. They also didn’t want to give him the extra year. Yeah. Right. Um, so that was uh there there were like layers to that one, too. But if he wasn’t, you know, how old is he now? Is he 34? I think something like that now. Um, if he if it was Brandon Ingram, right, what does that actually look like? Like are you in a situation where effectively you get veteran guys that are in a situation that is almost like the in terms of the feeling of restricted free agency just because like okay your team doesn’t want to give you as much as you want but they’re the team that can give you the most money. Uh so what do you do? like do you go somewhere else just because of that disrespect factor and take less money or then again a lot of these situations end up in like a sign and trade scenario because like players tend to get to go where they want. So maybe the other team even though they don’t have cap space they could pay you some and then like trade something back whatever. Like that’s what ended up happening with Miles Turner. It was a signing trade uh that Indiana worked out with the Bucks that it’s not like Indiana got a ton back. it was just like basically allowing the Bucks to sign him, right? Um without cap space. Um but do teams start to put their foot down on that more? We haven’t seen that tested actually. So um especially with uh with the with like star level guys um because you don’t want an upset star like I mean that’s the thing, right? Like like a lot of these teams, right? And first off, I love your take about pre- agency cuz that’s 100% a thing where we right you trade a guy instantly pay him. There is no conversation. The only thing I’m saying it is that a lot of teams do this so they’re not in the position where okay we’re going to test this because if you’re a good team at the very least you don’t want to say okay well you know what try and try and it’s like oh oh wait he actually caught our bluff and now we have nothing. like this. This new CBA puts you in that spot where like the real GMs that make these quick I would say big moves early are 100% validated because of the opportunity. I just wish the pressure to say, “Hey, technically he’s eligible, but he’s not a real supermax player.” I wish that didn’t really exist as much. Yeah. And like it and like it’s tough because that pressure it’s mostly social at this point especially with the way that all these caps are structured where they’re it’s not like you have a ton of market pressure because there isn’t a lot of uh teams with cap space. The real like the only exception of the last few years was Paul George going to the Sixers. That was it. Right. Yeah. Um in terms of like a star level guy, you could argue like okay Miles Turner like left Indiana, go to the Bucks, that kind of thing. Um, but yeah, I uh it it’s interesting and I’m I’m curious to see if teams start um putting their foot down more because we’ve seen other like teams putting their foot down in other ways. Like for example, New Orleans was like, “We’re not giving you the max donation. We’re not paying you. We’re going to trade you.” Yeah. Um Miami, we’re not we’re not going to give you the max. We’re going to trade you. So these guys are getting their money, but they’re not getting it in like the easiest way. The easiest. Yeah. Yeah. That’s fair. That’s kind of Would you say, Grace, that you wanted the Nuggets to put their foot down a little bit more with Jamal when they gave him his max? Cuz you didn’t want him to get the full Max. I did. Well, I didn’t, but I was just like, he’s he’s going to get it cuz that’s that’s just what’s going to happen. That was the situation that Denver was in where you’re talking about uh the guy being in the last deal, last year of his deal. So he has more if they wanted to trade him, he has leverage in where he can go because the team that gives you assets for him has to know that he’ll want to extend there, right? Um so just like a from a pure like cold calculus thing, Denver was not in a high lever position. Um even if they’d been willing to go through with a trade and who knows like whether like the organization as a whole was we know there were there was at least one person in the organization that was you know looking into that kind of thing. Um, so that was like a slightly different situation than like Clippers with Paul George. They’re just like, “Yeah, we’re willing to let this guy walk.” Like we were like fully willing to just like cuz I don’t think that Jokic would have been happy if they just let his co-star walk for nothing. Denver’s in a different situation than the Los Angeles Clippers, for example. So, um, no. And actually, like I said, um, these guys are getting their money, but it’s not as easy as it used to be. A couple years ago, that max contract would have been like signed, steal, delivered like long time a Yeah. Or first first thing in July, right before he even went to the Olympics. We had to wait until all the way like I think mid August, I think, for late August cuz it was Olympics. Yeah, that’s true. Um for for that deal to get done. And clearly there were some, you know, behind the scenes like jockeying going on. He doesn’t get a player option, that kind of thing. Um, so yeah, I I don’t think that it’s it’s as smooth as it used to be. Um, but in the case of Jamal, like I just think like the if it would have been nice if they got a smaller number, but they were apparently, you know, there was some reporting that they were going for some weird like guarantees like in the contract about like I don’t know, who knows what kind of targets, games played, I don’t know what kind of thing. And in my head, I’m like that’s not actually useful to our cap situation. What you should have been going for is like fully guarantee the however many years and then try to get a lower annual number like that would have helped out more. That’s the main focus that would have helped. Yeah. Yeah. But it doesn’t we don’t have any reporting that they were going for something like that or even that Jamal would have been willing to but you know who knows I don’t know. Um, but that was just another thing that I heard that felt like this is very disjointed in terms of the strategy that the front office appears to be employing because it doesn’t actually help us. It just kind of creates strife for no reason, if that makes sense. And like I’m happy that the combo got us to this point because I wasn’t going to ask this too, right? Now that we’re officially our eyes are on this next upcoming season and obviously like with the changes in the front office, does Jamal Murray’s contract tank the Nuggets? Like is this a thing where if they’re not able to win this year, is that like, okay, he’s making too much money, we can’t really get the best pieces, I guess, moving forward. Is that a contract you think they would have to trade to still compete? cuz this league moves so so ahead where you kind of have to have these thoughts out there at least a couple years early and I think that’s where Jamal’s contract is at right now where it’s not the greatest. I didn’t want him to have that contract either. Um his injury stuff is kind of a thing and I don’t think he’s ever been like a allNBA caliber guard for the entire year even though he has moments of I would say looking that way. But to me, that question mark is really going to dictate where Denver is able to be at this year and also the next couple years. I will take this one. I’ve been talking a lot. Oh man. Uh it’s funny how the MPJ trade does take some pressure off of this question, I think, cuz it was either going to be like MBJ or Jamal on the trading block. And I think trading Jamal’s was much more extreme just for the fact that he fit so much better with the Oakic and could do more things and would completely change the identity identity of the team. Uh but like those are two huge contracts and the only way that we had to add to the team and add some more depth was either trying to trade and breaking these contracts up. Um it’s tough. Yeah, this timeline you’re talking about is hard to balance because you got to like if you want to move off Jamal, you got to do it before the contract just becomes way out of hand and and he’s not performing up to it and no one wants to trade for it. I still think right now you could maybe move off of it. You’re not gonna win that trade though. Like you’re you’re probably gonna take back someone worse, which which is which is some some people were advocating to do that and almost take like a step back year, a gap year just to move off Jamal to try to add some allstar point guard next to him possibly in another year. Uh which would be quite a process to go through. But I like this method that they’re going with with replacing MPJ with Cam and adding depth and then hoping that that kind of helps Jamal play better with like a more complete team. This offseason is the first off season since his ACL uh where it’s like wide open for him like cuz he was doing the rehab. last uh offseason he was hurt and then was playing the Olympics and I think was worried to like stress himself too much with the extension looming because if he got injured in that off seasonason then the extension might have been in jeopardy. So, it’s like you don’t want to keep giving him a pass necessarily in terms of him coming into the season slow, but I think he’s finally like room for him to do it. And uh hopefully he just plays amazing this whole season and like can he doesn’t have to play up to the level of that contract like in a vacuum just because of what the way that Jokic functions next to him because on another team I don’t think he’d necessarily be worth that amount. Um, but he is for the Nuggets in some senses. But it’s definitely scary to have like your two biggest like Jokic you pay whatever, but the second co-star Jamal being the next highest paid player and it’s Joic’s prime and his window. It it can it can be nerve-wracking, but I’m going to like trust in Jamal playing well this season and and like his mid-range is going to be good. Uh, his playmaking is still good. He’s just got to like be in shape and stay on the floor. And then I think you’ll see that like elite shot making in the playoffs again like he usually does. Uh he’s just got to like get there. Where do you stand Grace? Um so I wanted to first address a couple comments in the chat where someone said 57 million year four for Jamal’s Wild. That’s a lot of money. Like it is a lot of money. Uh and that is the amount of money that he stands to make currently with the current cap projections in year four of this deal. That’s just the way that it is with the salary cap going up the way that it is. That’s every veteran max contract is 30% of the cap. Uh and that’s what 30% of the cap is going to be in 4 years, right? And so I’ve been trying to especially this off season do my best to talk about these um numbers for everybody, not just Jamal. Uh in terms of percentages of the cap so that you can start from that baseline of the conversation cuz that’s just what everybody’s contracts are going to be based on. Um so then I agree with Will in a vacuum on another team like is Jamal putting out uh you know 30% of the cap worth of you know production? Probably not. on this team impactwise especially next to Joic like in terms of like the the collective impact there. I don’t really have an issue with the contract and that’s why I wasn’t like big on dragging out the process last summer because it was one it was clear like uh where the leverage stood because of where Jamal was in you know the last year of his previous deal and you know Denver probably not going to be able to get much from him without wanting to take a step back for example. Um, but also because in terms of overall impact on this team, it’s fine. My issue though and even going into last season, we talked about this a lot last summer, Will, especially in light of Jamal’s, you know, team Canada performances. I think it started with the friendlies like before the Olympics even started. We were like, look, Jamal is going to his extension hasn’t kicked in yet. It kicks in this upcoming season. he’s going to be making 30 30% of the cap down instead of 25%. And what this team needs from him is not just, you know, rising in the playoffs and we’ve seen over the last two years, you know, injuries, you know, there or not, he hasn’t been uh, you know, all NBA guy, but even if he had, that’s not enough for a guy making his percentage of the cap. He needs to show up in the regular season. he needs to show up early in the regular season because otherwise he’s putting a lot more on the rest of the um players on this team. And yes, the MPJ trade alleviates some of the pressure in terms of like where production and impact needs to come from because they have been able to build out their depth a little bit more. But ultimately, you need your guys to be your guys throughout the year. uh so that other guy other players on the team aren’t having to uh you know basically make up for that and move up a role in the in in the rotation in terms of like what’s being asked of them. Um and that’s the main thing, right? Like if if Jamal should like I’m not asking Jamal to be like all NBA is tough. That’s that’s the top 15 guys in the entire league and that there’s way more max contracts in that in the NBA. Um, even though you know, who knows with like the 65 game rule, maybe he could bake all NBA, which would be helpful for us now because he wouldn’t be super max eligible. That that would be extremely helpful for Denver. I don’t I don’t know. Yeah. No, I know. Uh, even Allstar, it’s like it’s hard to make Allstar as a guard in the West. It might be harder to make All-Star as a guard in the West than it is to make AllNBA, period, just because AllNBA is positionless. M um but if Jamal shows up to the season in the first half doing what he does in the second half of every regular season then we’re good because th that production like a that in terms of just the raw numbers equates to a lot more impact than people realize just because of how everybody is playing off of him and Joic. And so that’s my issue. Like especially last season, like that was a completely unacceptable floor that he came into the season with. Um, and he needs to be better than that. He needs to be better than he came into the season prior. Although that start wasn’t really as bad. Like I don’t know if people remember uh off that championship hangover, Denver started the next season like 9 and one. And their main issue was like Jamal got injured early in the season and that that’s when things started to falter a bit. They still finished with the two seed, but whatever. um that season. But like yeah, just show up like playing like your average and we’re good. You don’t have to be playing at, you know, 90 to 100% of your, you know, peak potential, but his floors are too low, but especially now that he’s making more of the cap like the the team doesn’t have the resources to keep, you know, supplementing that. And so I do and I do think that this off season with the additions of John Wallace at the, you know, executive vice president of player personnel, they brought in Jared Dudley. those uh those like signings and hirings definitely perked my ears up a bit because it seemed like they were almost specifically targeted towards like we need guys that are going to kind of be on Jamal’s ass and like keep him keep him honest like throughout the year and be like you know hold him accountable and that’s what a lot of people in the fan base have been looking for. Uh and you know we’ll see what happens. Um, but that’s my thing is I’m just like, “Look, Jamal, we need you to be Jamal because Denver is not in a position, they weren’t in a position last year when they gave him the max contract and they aren’t now that he, you know, is starting the deal to be able to move him and make a meaningful upgrade.” Because when you look at it, the guys that people want are either come with their own baggage, like guys that people want to replace them all come with their own baggage. they don’t have the, you know, years of of chemistry with Yogish. So, you’re looking at potentially taking a step back even if you make like an in a vacuum upgrade. Um, or they make way too much money like And it’s just not worth it to even do it. Exact. Exactly. So, I’m just I’m just at the point where I’m like there’s no negotiating it. It’s like Jamal, we know what you’re capable of. You need to show up and do it. Yeah. Um, I asked this question because to me I think Jamal is a very polarizing player. And I say this because he’ll have moments where he doesn’t look better than Chris Paul until 25, but they’ll have other moments where it’s like, oh, he’s actually the best point guard in the Western Conference in this specific game or this week, right? Like he is a very skilled player that’s extremely inconsistent. In my opinion, he is a great benefactor of what Jokic can do. And that’s why their combination and pairing works supremely well. My only thing is like this this sounds really good until Jokic signs that next contract which is why we all knew he was going to turn down this off season for next year. And I’m kind of with Grace like people have to stop looking at how much money like oh my god 56 million 57 million. Like the cap number is all I care about at this point. Like how much of the cap are you making? cuz that will inherently say exactly how good a player should be. Prime example, I think Jaylen Brown is not at all deserving of how much money he’s making in terms of just, you know, his performance, but the cap number, it’s actually not that bad low key. So, so like it might be something that’s a bit more sustainable for Boston, especially um I would say after all the trades they’ve done. Not a super. He’s got the same cap in terms of the percentage as Yogic. Oh, you know, it’s a super max. Like, he’s big as anyone could possibly make. I’m just I’m just I’m just saying like that in comparison to where the cap number is going to be for Jokic’s next contract, right, is what puts more pressure on I would say the Jamal contract. I mean, like Joic makes 35% of the salary cap. Now, on his next extension, his contract’s going to be tied to the salary cap 35% anyway. So there’s not really a difference there. The the main thing that um I think could revise this and it’d be like small margins and you know when when MPJ was still on the roster those like little revisions in the salary cap could have been you know massive in terms of like are we a second apron team or a first apron team? Are we going to even have access to any mid-level exceptions or not? Are we going to be you know in a situation where we have to put ourselves under a hard cap? That kind of thing. But now that he’s not and again pending Payton Watson and Christian Brown extensions or not, we don’t know what kind of situation Denver is going to be in exactly next year. Um, but now that there, you know, now that he’s not, there’s a little bit less pressure on like those small revisions in the in the salary cap because then you end up in a situation where I think like Anthony Davis, for example, because of the the cap not going up quite as much, but like his his contract tied to a number that was based on a percentage of the cap as projected, but then the cap didn’t go up by that much, but he’s still making the number that was projected, like that kind of thing. Um, that could hurt because then you’re like talking about like, okay, you’re supposed to be making 35% of the cap. The cap didn’t go up as much and now it’s just it’s now% and that could be like 2 $3 million. That’s like another player potentially, right? um depending on like those kinds of revisions. But other than that, I don’t think that Jokic’s next deal necessarily puts more or less pressure on um on the roster cuz like right now even he’s making he’s he’s actually above 35% because of the same cap thing I’m talking about. He’s 35.7% of the cap this year kind of thing. So he it might actually get revised down when it gets re uh tethered to the 35% of the cap on the next extension. So you know yeah it is what it is. extensions that we keep talking about is CB and even CAM broad that like those are ones that we’re really curious to see where that ends up cuz you can almost justify some of the higher numbers thinking about percent of the cap and and the fact that the salary cap’s going to go up and those numbers are going to seem less brutal just when you hear them outright right now but they can get to a point based on how are going to perform where it can get bad. I think like you could just say like, yeah, 30 million in a while is not going to seem so bad, but do you want Christian Brown making 19% of the cap depending on how he keeps developing? Right. Uh those are like big questions I’m curious to see how these new GMs navigate. Yeah. Um I think those are the next extensions that really intrigue me as far as what Denver’s done. Again, I like the job they’ve done so far in the offseason, but those real tests are certainly going to come probably after this o overall season. We just spent like 35 minutes really breaking down the financial aspect of the NBA, and I love that. But let’s get back to hoops, man. For 2025, how good is this Denver team? What are your expectations ahead of this upcoming season? Well, title or bust, right? Um, I think they’re good enough to win the title if they can get things to gel. I think like Cam Cam Johnson, he’s been such a gift to the media that follow the Denver Nuggets, right? He at his first um his first his introductory press conference, he was talking about like what his goals are for the season, that kind of thing. He’s like obviously winning a title, but just getting to a point where the team can gel uh and you get that, you know, chemistry and guys just kind of know where to be and everyone’s playing off of each other on both ends of the floor. I think that’s really important important goal to have because that’s a prerequisite to getting to the title, right? Um in terms of the regular season, I think Denver has to be a top three seed. If this were another year, I would say they have to be top two. But I think Houston has shown that they’re good enough to like I wouldn’t be it wouldn’t be like a massive disappointment if Denver was within a game or two of them in the standings and it just like broke uh broke their way because I do think that defense gets you further in the regular season. Um like def like being a defense first team gets you further in the season than necessarily in the playoffs. um uh or or then uh or even than than offense alone gets you in the regular season. And I think I do think that Denver will be better defensively this year than they were last year. Not because of any changes in personnel. So you’re looking at like okay, they added Alan Judas, they added Cam Johnson, who like I’m not that much higher on his defense, especially in terms of overall team impact than than MPJ, even though he’s a better like maybe one-on-one defender. Maybe a bit less spacey. Although I think this is like a consistent thing with shooters like they get back cut a lot. Um Bruce Brown, who knows like what level of defender he’s going to be and you know when in his last stint in Denver it was like hit or miss in the regular season, right? And then Tim Hardway Jr. So I don’t think it’s any any personnel thing that’s going to make them a better defense. I think it’s just the fact that they’re going to give a We spent a whole uh portion of this conversation talking about the impact that KCP had on this team. And I was critical of the move of letting him go. I was critical of them not replacing his screen navigation function even with like a bench signing. But I refuse to believe that KCP, even though I think he was robbed of all defense last year, I refuse to believe that he was the difference between Denver being the eighth best defense and being 22nd this past season. M um that like a much larger chunk of that was that the team just didn’t believe in anything. They had tuned out the coach. They had tuned out each other for large stretches of the season and that was that was evident. Um and it really manifested itself on the defensive end of the floor. I think there’s renewed energy in the building now. I think there’s renewed energy, you know, outside the building cuz a lot of these guys are not, you know, back in Denver right now. But we already heard that um Jokic and AG I think and Jamal have all like Cam John Cam has said that he’s talked to all of those guys already. Um and I think they’re excited. Um I think that another thing that’s been emphasized by both the general managers and uh coach David Adelman is that there’s going to be a lot more competition. And they’ve talked about training camp, but I think it’s gonna be throughout the year with uh where you have guy like real like vets who can play real minutes in Bruce and Tim Hardway Jr. competing for those minutes with uh Julian Strawther and Payton Watson. And those guys are going to have to really uh work hard to earn their place on the team. And I think that’s going to manifest itself in perhaps more defensive intensity. And obviously adding, you know, Jared Dudley to the team is another another play at that as well. So I just think that the the collective level of give a is going to be way higher on the team this year and that’s going to manifest itself in jumping probably I think at least 10 spots in the defensive rankings compared to last year. Okay, that’s all we need to get to really. I mean I like that we kind of leaned into our identity as an offensive team. I know like OKC just showed how important defense can be when you want to win a title. I think that’s getting more rare. Uh I mean the Celtics did it too, but uh I Yeah, we got shooting off the bench, Bruce back. You got that energy that I think a lot of those vets wanted. As Grace is saying, I think it’s going to go a long way. Be super underrated aspect just to get that freshness back. I think the team looks so stale. And while we did look close to beating OKC in seven, you’d think these additions could push us over the edge to potentially finally beat them in a series. But I think OKC is going to be better next year, too, cuz like they’re all just younger and getting better each year. So, it’s going to be really tough, but I think we’re putting ourselves in a position as best as we can to get another one with Jokic. uh just like health that I’m worried about at this point and hoping that the depth and just being more complete overall and hopefully playing diff some different lineups, being more creative with the offense like David Adelman I think’s a really creative mind can help like get us through the regular season to where maybe we could coast a little more in the regular season. Uh like I definitely want a top three seed, but we definitely do better when we start out hot and are able to like relax a bit before the playoffs. Um, but yeah, Houston’s going to be amazing. The Clippers look good still, so it’s just a matter of who’s healthy and how they look. But yeah, OKC and Denver, I have top two teams in the West for sure. Okay. Yeah. Um, for me, um, I’m currently evaluating all 30 teams again. Um, every offseason I do this where like I go through all 30 teams to see what’s new for these teams, what’s, you know, there. And so far through all of the teams I’ve done, this upcoming season’s very, very interesting. I think the Western Conference is very, very fresh. I think the Mavericks are going to be a very interesting team if Kyrie Irving is able to come back halfway. Also, like how good Flag can be in his first year. The Rockets are very fun because they were a very good team last year. A lot of people did not have them as a top two seed in the Western Conference. And the bigger thing for me is the pieces they had to give away to get KD weren’t pieces that were like completely instrumental to still having their identity. Those pieces are still on this roster. So to me, they doubled down on their identity and got a top 10 player in Kevin Durant. So their prowess in the regular season should still be more of the same. Um, objectively I think the Warriors are the biggest question mark just like it was last year where people aren’t sure of how good they are. But at the same time in the small stretch of basketball, Butler clearly impacted this roster tremendously and they look like a much more potent regular season team, but I have no idea what the roster is. So, I’m going to leave them out of these talks. Literally no idea. I think they only have like nine guys. I think they’re going to be pretty good. I think so. I think so. But like I do got to see it. Um, I think a very fun team probably has to be the Clippers where they were very good last year without Kawhi for a ton of the season. They’re going to have him to start this year hopefully. Um, and they signed Bradley Be, which I think can make sense for the Clippers. They also have Brook Lopez who is a pretty good backup big for Zubai. That’s actually not bad for them. So, I think they’re going to be a interesting team as well. I think Denver is firmly for me a top four team. I don’t think that’ll change. Um they have improved in many types of different ways. I also highly value player development. I think Brown was easily one of the best transition players last year. I think that will also improve. I think his halfcourt processing could also improve as well. So I think Denver’s in a pretty good spot. I do believe that for them. Um, in terms of like how far they can go, I think Denver versus OKC part two would be very interesting for me to watch, but I also think that there’s a ton of um I think overall roster lessons OKC learned from going through these playoffs and a lot of their players are super young. So, their fast track to being a even better team next year is scary. Uh, Chad is probably my biggest thing with that because I would say nine games before he got hurt. he looked like a completely different player and then he missed the majority of the season and they were still the one seed. So I think we could be, you know, in store for a historic year from Oklahoma. Um but yeah, I would say Denver is right now for me top four. I’m with that in the league or in the West? In the league. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely. I don’t know how high I am on the Eastern Con. I don’t think we we’ve spent too much time on the East. I know how high I am on the East Conference. Not very. Yeah, I’ve got a game like wide open for a lot of teams in the East that it hadn’t been previously. I mean, Knicks and Cavs, like without the Celtics and Pacers, they’re going to they could go to the finals. Even the Hawks, right? Like that’s why they made those moves. They saw the opening there and they’re like, why not? Uh, you know, sign Nquille, get Chris stops and nothing by the way. Yeah, the Hawks are really interesting. I can’t wait to see them. It’s the best roster I’ve seen around Trey Young in his career. I can confidently say that. Yeah, pretty easily. Now, they just need Jaylen Johnson to stay healthy. Like, that’s the big um that’s he’s been their big X factor over the last few years, but he hasn’t been able to stay on the floor. Um you know, just kind of random injuries here and there. Um doesn’t seem to be any particular pattern with them. So, hopefully he can stay on. He’s a really fun player to watch. Y and it’s easy to say that cuz he’s in the East. Um although I don’t like it when he goes off against the Magic. Um that’s another team that really, you know, made some big swings this off season going for for Desmond Bane. Um I think they’re going to be a lot better this year and they they already were pretty good the last two years just because they’re just like we’re just going to be a top two defense. We’re like one of the youngest teams in the league and we’re just going to be a top two defense and it’s fine. And this what the thing with these like really young teams being really really good defenses between OKC, the Rockets, and Orlando over the last few years. That’s been a really interesting, I think, um, trend because you see that, you know, at least regular season, like obviously all these teams have questions come playoffs and even OKC like they they won the title obviously and, you know, kudos to them for for all of that, but they weren’t like the same like regular season dominant. uh in the playoffs. Uh but come regular season, you can win a lot of games with defense and even Memphis in years past also. So when you have these really young teams that can also be really like top flight defensively because they can use their um you know their their youth and athleticism to their advantage over the course of an 82 game season. That’s always um you know just like interesting. Uh, obviously Memphis being perhaps the least um overall uh maturity and consistency with I’m sorry. Can we talk Memphis real quick? Like like like I I think they frustrate me the most of of almost any team cuz they had to pay Jiren Jackson Jr. and then an hour after paying him or something like that, he gets hurt and is going to miss 12 weeks. It’s like Jesus. And they lost Bane now. So now it’s like they need Wait, Bane, too. Oh, right. They traded. Oh, no. Yeah. So, he’s gone too. And then it’s like J has not really been healthy for a lot of these regular seasons. So, it’s like how how good is Memphis really going to be in the West? Like, I really I began asking myself these questions. Mhm. I think they’re going to take a little step back like without Bane for sure. They’re losing some some guys, but Yeah. And like the Jaw question, people thought they were going to move Jaw as soon as Bane was traded. They’re like, “Oh, they’re they’re tearing it down.” I think it’s less of that, but uh yeah, there’s there’s questions around this is going to be like a a like they’re going to learn a lot from this season in terms of how Jaw is going to play and uh could be like some of the last we see of this like group if if Jaw doesn’t really live up to expectations. Yeah. Yeah. But I’m very excited for what the NBA has to provide. Um, super excited to watch obviously all the teams in the Western Conference cuz, you know, I am a guy that appreciates this conference side of basketball. Also think the East is going to be interesting cuz there’s so many teams that are hurt. Um, I think the biggest question mark, the if healthy team has to be the Sixers, but Jesus Christ, I can’t rely on them to do anything. So, I’mma just really be all the way on mute for that conversation. But I really appreciate having you guys on and we talked about a lot of things. The cap, lot of money talks over all of my NBA junkies who love that type of stuff. We did that here. Um, I want to give you guys the floor to please openly promote your podcast. Very, very intriguing uh cast about Denver and the rest of the NBA. Happy I could finally have Will on as well. Yeah. Cavo. Yeah. No. Uh we host the what’s in a game podcast. You can find us on YouTube at what’s in a game NBA. You can find our socials at the same uh same like tag what’s in a game NBA based on Shakespeare. What’s in a name? What’s in a game? That kind of thing. Um and yeah, you can find us on on Twitter as well. I’m Aaron Burr27 E R I N. Uh B U R R. Uh that’s where you can find most of my rants and threads and things like that. It’s been a fun offseason. Yep. Just come come if you haven’t come hang out. We’re Nugget ccentric, but we sometimes talk other teams, too. So, we’d love other fans to come when we do cover other teams and talk about interesting things that they’re doing. Uh, and yeah, Gifted. It was great finally meeting you and being on your show. The chat was awesome. Great talking to you. So, that was really fun. Appreciate it. Yeah. Um, if there’s any time that Golden State makes a move and for whatever reason you guys want to talk about that or just any team in general, let me know cuz I watch a lot and it’s been painful knowing this team has done literally zero. Like like like it is crazy like not a transaction outside of losing Kevon Looney to the Pelicans, which wasn’t even a transaction. You just lost him. So, you know, hey, but you know, yeah. Uh, all of their links will be in the in the description box below. If you made this far as spam a hour and 52 minutes, cuz right now that is what this recording is at, I appreciate you guys for the conversation. Um, it’ll be fun to see exactly where Denver progresses to as a team in this offseason. But have a good one. I’ll see you guys in the next Gifted Hoops breakdown of another NBA team. But peace out, people. Have a good one. See you.

Breaking Down the 2025 Denver Nuggets! Are They Real NBA Contenders?

0:00 Intro
2:17 Reviewing The 2024 Off-Season Changes & Expectations
11:42 What Losing KCP Meant To Denver
14:53 Denver Fires Mike Malone & Calvin Boothe BEFORE THE PLAYOFFS
22:21 What Aaron Gordon Means To Denver + Clippers Series Recap
29:37 Detailing The Russell Westbrook Impact For Denver
36:27 Denver vs OKC Playoff Recap
47:57 Reviewing the MPJ Trade & Denver’s 2025 Off-Season
59:00 Jonas Valanciunas Rant + Why Denver Won The Trade
1:04:32 A Conversation On NBA Restricted Free Agency & The New CBA
1:10:13 Why The New CBA Matters
1:20:29 Does Jamal Murray’s Contract Trap The Nuggets + Priority Extensions For Denver?
1:36:04 Are The 2025 Denver Nuggets Real Contenders?
1:44:29 Denver’s Biggest Competition + Contender Power Rankings
1:50:11 Outro

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