Denver Nuggets sign Richard Jefferson
The Cleveland Cavaliers shocked fans around the league when they traded Richard Jefferson, who quickly found a new home with the Denver Nuggets.
The Denver Nuggets are primed for a playoff berth in the 2017-18 season. However, there is also plenty of cause for concern with the team.
They only have one true small forward on the roster in Wilson Chandler. The aforementioned Chandler, who turned 30 in May of this year, was the only player on the roster besides Paul Millsap who was not in his 20s — other than veteran point guard Jameer Nelson.
The Nuggets aided both their overall veteran savvy and their small forward rotation by signing Cleveland Cavaliers castoff Richard Jefferson. The deal is a one-year veteran minimum contract, per ESPN‘s Adrian Wojnarowski.
In order to make room for Jefferson, the Nuggets released Nelson.
This decision was an interesting decision, to say the least. The Nuggets are thin at small forward but are even thinner at point guard. Adding a veteran presence with playoff experience was a solid move in a vacuum.
However, it came at the expense of another veteran player who also played a position of need and started at point guard down the stretch of last season. Jefferson might not be as necessary as Nelson appeared to be. However, RJ can still be a valuable piece for a team in the playoff hunt.
Shooting and veteran savvy
While Richard Jefferson did decline somewhat last year after a solid 2015-16 campaign, his skill-set will be useful to an offense centered around Nikola Jokic. Jefferson is primarily a 3-point shooter at this point in his career. More than half of his field goal attempts came from long range during his two years in Cleveland.
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Jefferson knocked down 35.7 percent of his looks from beyond the arc in Cleveland. However, that number is somewhat misleading — he canned 38.2 percent of his triples in Year 1 but made just 35.7 percent of them last season. Still, he will get plenty of open chances in the 2017-18 season when spotting up around Jokic and newcomer Paul Millsap.
On the defensive end, Jefferson spent time at shooting guard, small forward and power forward last year in Cleveland. However, his best defensive position may be as a power forward, where he played just 14 percent of his minutes last year, per Basketball-Reference.
He is a bit slow for some of the league’s quicker wings. When he shifts up a position and plays at the 4, he has the strength to contest larger players. On the flip side, he still has enough burst to break out the occasional vintage dunk:
The biggest issues for Jefferson this year may come on the defensive end, as Denver is already dramatically overloaded at power forward. Thus, Jefferson’s minutes will once again mostly be as a small forward. He played far better at small forward in 2015-16 than he did last year. Only time will tell if last year’s decline was a one-year blip or a sign of something bigger.
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Richard Jefferson can still be an effective player on the floor. However, his most important role this year will be working as a veteran mentor to Denver’s young guns. While he might not be as useful in that role as Jameer Nelson was last year, Jefferson can be a stabilizing presence with playoff experience for a team in need of both.