They are a good team, probably a great team, but if Cam Johnson can’t do anything, it is going to hamper this team in the playoffs. In two back to back big games he was garbo. Braun was playing like a shell of himself against OKC and I could say the same about Bruce Brown.

If someone told me in October that SAS, DET, and Tatum-less BOS would have better records than the Nuggets I wouldn’t have believed it.

Thunder, Cavs, Knicks, Wolves & Rockets having better records may be a bit disappointing for Nugget fans but it isnt shocking.

I was extremely high up until AG (again) and Watson pulled their hamstrings within a week of each other. I just threw my hands up and said it’s not meant to be.

They have 45 days until the playoffs. They need to be healthy, they looked great when they were healthy.

Just get to the 3rd or 4th seed and they’re fine. If it’s not OKC, I think it’s them coming out the West.

They are missing important pieces in Watson and Gordon. The thing with this sub is injuries only matter to the teams the posters support, but they matter across the league.

That Wolves (Prince City Edition) hoodie is hotness.

If a certain player starts playing at an ok level maybe they’ll be alright, not saying any names, Cam Johnson. But if that player remembers how to hoop

They aren’t going far without Gordon, and those hammies might not ever be the same

It just feels like other teams are getting way better while they’re stagnating if not regressing

A center defines your teams defense. Gobert and Jokic being the 2 extremes on each side of the spectrum.

As great as Jokic and even Murray at times is, this team’s success hinges on AG and others for defense.

I dont see this team going to to finals in the forseeable future.

Nuggets are not a regular season team. It’s not glazing or anything because regular season games, in addition to seeding, are important for putting pieces together, finding chemistry and figuring things out (mentally).

That being said, they are a different team in the playoffs because AG would put more efforts on defense, Jokic stops trolling and Jamal stays awake during the first three quarters.

As long as everyone is relatively healthy, they are a true contender. Their biggest rival is still the Wolves/Naz Reid lol.

As long as the team is fully healthy they should have as real chance as anybody out there

Maybe we can stop Glazing Jokic as the greatest to ever do it 

Hypothetical Nuggets may soon rival Hypothetical Clippers as the best team of the decade

Maybe they need to get their 2 best defenders back and then render judgement?

Yeah, this is kind of where I’m at too. I still think this is the best team Jokic has ever had around him, and the way that the injuries gave Watson and Jones to show how good they are is very cool, but there’s only been 10.25 games this season where everyone was healthy, and they’ve been playing as less than the sum of their parts.

Since the Warriors game, they’ve been playing much better defense, which is definitely heartening, and I think that ultimately, their uncharacteristically inefficient shooting can be mitigated by just putting even more emphasis and effort on their defense. But part of this is also the simple fact that they’ve had so many players they were relying on in and out of the lineup this year, it’s been hard to figure out what role everyone has. I also think that playing with Jokic is weirdly hard because it’s objectively true that 90% of the time, him fighting through or shooting over a double team is a more efficient option than your wide open 3, so making the right play and taking the open 3 can be hard - especially when you miss it - and it leads players to over rely on him and doubt how they should play, and then they need to throw all that away and play totally differently when he sits down.

The Nuggets are weird since it feels like they sandbag a bit in the regular season honestly. I will say though the injuries(both to Watson and Gordon), and Jokic not looking as good post knee injury is concerning

Seems like nuggets are losing every clutch game this year. Not a good look going into the pkayoffs

I like Zach, he seems very knowledgeable about the sport of basketball but his basketball instincts are horrible.

Multiple starters missing many weeks can hamper a teams goals. Duh 

I don’t know if Jokic is playing “sensationally” right now. He’s still putting up some big numbers, but his turnovers are really high, oftentimes because he’s trying to milk a foul and just throws a soft pass, which almost always leads to fast break points.

CJ obviously needs to hit some fucking shots. But Watson should come back, and he’s having a career year. Gordon doesn’t usually take long to heat up.

I think they still have a championship squad but it hasn’t shown for more than a couple games at a time.

I think we should also keep in mind that the playoffs are basically a different season.

I see the hoodie Zach welcome to the resistance

Not having a healthy Aaron Gordon is really hurting them. Cam Johnson might as well be a traffic cone out there.

nuggets miss gordon, guy with high iq making the right plays. esp since murray isnt really a pg they go into stretches of taking bad shots instead of setting themselves up.

Play Spencer Jones over Cam Johnson if he isn’t going to actually score lol.

Sometimes his takes are wrong. There’s no one on Denver that plays defense other than maybe Gordon who is out with an injury. Can act like they have potential but when you’re a terrible defensive team and you don’t have the personnel then it’s not only practically impossible to become an a champion, but it’s predictable

Jokic is very clearly still hurt

They need Gordon and Watson needs to start instead of Cam. I can see them having a great playoffs if they finish the regular season on a great streak and have home court in the first round. They need momentum.

It hasn’t looked as good as most people thought it would, but it’s important to remember how this team looked last year.

Last year they basically had 4.5 functional NBA players (porter hurt) for the OKC series and that number dropped after the Gordon injury. Despite that, and the fact that they would look awful at times during the regular season, they still took the Thunder to 7.

As long as Jokic and Murray are fully healthy in April and May this team matches up well with basically any team in a 7 game series and would only be slight underdogs to OKC.

Professional yapper yapping again…here’s tom with the weather.

See you in April!

The injuries played a big part and also coaching 

When Jokic underachieves with a great team: “Sometimes it just doesn’t work out - no harm, no foul.”

When Luka fails to win the championship with an average team: “You can’t rely on this guy, he’s just anther Harden”

Jokic is still the best player in the world - I’m just tired of the narrative around him despite having proven himself time and time again.

Jokic and Luka need to team up. I don’t know how it happens, if it’s on Denver or in LA or somewhere else, but we just have to see it.

He needs better than Jamal Murray.

I’m loving the downfall of the nuggets. The amount of shit talking their fans were doing at the beginning of the season only to see their team end up as a 5th seed is glorious. If they don’t lose to the wolves, im expecting OKC to sweep them