It might be time to bury this year’s Denver Nuggets
By Max Carlin
Following Monday night’s crushing loss to the Miami Heat, the Denver Nuggets’ playoff outlook is grim. It might just be time to bury them.
Miami Heat guard Goran Dragic inbounded the ball to James Johnson with 1:37 remaining in double-overtime. Johnson moseyed around the perimeter for a few seconds, then ran into a dribble hand-off with Dragic.
Dragic turned the corner, Wilson Chandler chasing him from behind, gassed in his 49th minute of play. Paul Millsap rotated over, preventing a wide open layup.
Dragic, sufficiently discouraged by Millsap’s presence, stopped, pivoted, and found James Johnson at the top of the key — dead center. With an ocean of space between him and Nikola Jokic (following a defensive breakdown), Johnson dipped, rose and tossed a lump of dirt on the Denver Nuggets’ season.
Johnson’s triple lifted Miami’s lead to eight; the Heat went on to win 149-141. Following Monday night’s loss, the Nuggets fell to 38-33, a full two games out of eighth in the West.
Two games might not sound like an unscalable mountain, but at this stage, in the West, that’s Mount Everest. On FiveThirtyEight, the Nuggets’ playoff odds have dipped to 15 percent.
Not only do the Nuggets have just 11 games to make up the disparity, but according to Tankathon, Denver has the NBA’s third-toughest remaining schedule. The other teams fighting for the West’s final four playoff spots — Los Angeles Clippers, Minnesota Timberwolves, New Orleans Pelicans, San Antonio Spurs and Utah Jazz — have the seventh, 29th, ninth, second and 11th-most difficult remaining schedules, respectively. Denver’s at a serious disadvantage compared to all but San Antonio.
For the Spurs, reinforcements could be coming any day now in the form of perennial MVP candidate, two-time Defensive Player of the Year and probable cyborg Kawhi Leonard. The same is true for Minnesota, whose superstar wing Jimmy Butler hopes to return before the curtain falls on the regular season. The Nuggets don’t even have the hope of a savior marching in off the inactive list.
Hope, ultimately, is what the Nuggets lack at this point.
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They have been a victim of chance, losing Millsap, the team’s prize of free agency, for over half the season. They’ve faced the penalty of playing in an historically dominant Western Conference — their only crime being geography.
Though the Nuggets deserve plenty of blame, too, with recent losses in must-win games to the lottery-bound Los Angeles Lakers, Eastern Conference also-ran Miami Heat and tanktastic Memphis Grizzlies.
Lamenting how we got here, how the Nuggets fell from entrenched within the playoffs to firmly on the outside, looking in enviously at the revenue from two home playoff games, is only so productive. Instead, let’s look to what’s next.
Some change is likely to come in Denver. I wouldn’t be surprised to see head coach Michael Malone out of a job. The Nuggets will have to navigate the free agency of Will Barton, and seeing him elsewhere in 2018-19 would be far from a shock.
Other than that, though, the 2018-19 Denver Nuggets should look a lot like the 2017-18 Denver Nuggets, and that’s not a bad thing. A healthy Millsap, a more developed Jamal Murray, a far richer Jokic: these are good things, major steps the franchise can take without doing anything drastic.
There’s also the draft, which could prove very interesting if the Nuggets are the benefactors of a lottery miracle, but will be an excellent opportunity for talent acquisition even if they remain in the latter portion of the lottery.
After all, the Nuggets are slated to pick 13th as of now, the very same slot they relinquished in a draft night trade to the Jazz last year, where Utah selected budding superstar Donovan Mitchell.
Expecting another superstar to fall to the early teens would be unwise, but Denver could add a real contributor with its late lottery pick. I’ve yet to begin my draft prep in earnest, but Kentucky guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander stands out as a potential fit in Denver as a worthy successor to Barton. Whether Alexander or someone else, considerable talent will be available to the Nuggets in the draft.
Next: NBA Rookie of the Year ladder - Week 23
Change, development and tough decisions lie ahead for the Denver Nuggets. Right now, though, take a moment. Say goodbye to the 2017-18 Denver Nuggets. It was fun while it lasted, but now, it’s time to grab your shovels.