In the wake of Kevin Durant’s sudden and shocking departure from Oklahoma City, Bill Simmons’ great new website, The Ringer, has launched a series searching for “The Next Thunder.” So far this week, the series looked at the Utah Jazz and Philadelphia 76ers before turning to our Denver Nuggets on Wednesday.
In his piece, The Ringer’s Danny Chau provides perspective on our Denver Nuggets rarely possessed by national media members. Chau claims our Nuggets “are on the verge of relevance.”
Check out the article in the tweet below:
The Denver Nuggets are quietly positioning themselves as the next cult team, writes @dannychau https://t.co/2mdjZDo0Bk
— The Ringer (@ringer) July 13, 2016
The piece begins, appropriately, by noting how the Nuggets used their “failed” pursuit of Dwyane Wade as a sort of soapbox from which they would announce their arrival to NBA relevance. Wade gushed about the Nuggets’ organization on Twitter after signing with the Chicago Bulls — something he did not do for the Milwaukee Bucks, another team he met with.
@nuggets I wanna thank U guys for WOW-ing my team and I. The future is bright for your organization. Much respect and this decision was hard
— DWade (@DwyaneWade) July 9, 2016
The pursuit of Wade certainly appears to have paid immediate dividends as the Nuggets’ profile around the league seems to be elevated. Chau argues that Wade’s flirtation and thank you confirmed to most basketball fans “the momentum that Nuggets fans have spent all summer being giddy about.”
Watch Nuggets GM Tim Connelly discuss missing out on Wade below:
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Chau focused on Nikola Jokic and Emmanuel Mudiay as the Nuggets young players deserving of the most enthusiastic praise. The piece discusses Jokic’s meteoric rise from seemingly nowhere and Mudiay’s obvious star potential, but also claimed, “Jokic and Mudiay are a window into Denver’s future, but don’t necessarily have to serve as the team’s undisputed cornerstones,” before highlighting the interesting nature of the roster’s construction.
The Ringer’s associate editor notes that none of the contracts are untradable and that they have the assets to go after a superstar via trade. (Check out Nugg Love’s impossibly possible proposal for DeMarcus Cousins here.)
“Before the Gold Rush” offered a brilliant conclusion on the state of our Nuggets:
"“There is a reason it takes time for a buzzworthy team to rise to the top: creating a winner from scratch is a long and complicated process with no foolproof method. Nuggets GM Tim Connelly has done what he could up to this point: draft well, and maintain a flexible salary table amid this unprecedented cap boom. Cult teams teach the value and agony of patience, as fans have to wait to watch a core solidify and provide a verdict. The Nuggets’ sudden infusion of talent last season has given them a light at the end of the tunnel — and like the Earth itself, their core is fluid and brilliant. Denver has become the West’s undefined variable. The Nuggets could be next. But it wouldn’t take much for them to be now.”"
Let’s hope the time for the Nuggets is now!
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