Michael Malone has been the coach of the Denver Nuggets during the entire Jokic-era. He’s benefitted the team and improved it, but some critiquing is necessary.
Michael Malone was born into basketball. His father, Brendan, was a coach as well at a high level, with stints as an assistant with the Raptors, Knicks, Pacers, and others. Almost by necessity and osmosis, Michael cultured a fondness and devotion to basketball which launched his own successful career as coach before he ever landed with the Denver Nuggets.
Starting his tenure in the NBA with the Knicks, Malone learned and perfected his own craft. He took some stops along the way, and then climbed the ranks to landing a head coaching position with the Sacramento Kings, which was brief, and ended abruptly.
His subsequent addition as the Head Coach of the Denver Nuggets proved to be an advantageous move by President of Basketball Operations, Tim Connelly. Since his hiring, the Denver Nuggets have improved in record every season.
Malone was at least partially responsible for the quick ascension of Nikola Jokic, though that came with the bitter departure of Jusuf Nurkic. Malone has directed the current era of Denver Nuggets basketball in conjunction with Tim Connelly, Arturas Karnisovas, Josh Kroenke, and Nikola Jokic. He has created a winning culture and moved the franchise in a successful direction.
But is this enough?
Through all of his benefits and already seen success, fans of the Denver Nuggets still criticize him for his decisions. These criticisms, for the most part, aren’t rash either and seem well within reason.
There’s even been a popular comparison among “Nuggets Twitter” of Michael Malone being equivalent to Mark Jackson with the Warriors, and needing Steve Kerr to push the team to championship level.
Could this be true? Maybe. To determine this, I’m going to look at three pillars of coaching in the NBA and evaluating Coach Malone through that lens.
1: The Culture of the Denver Nuggets
Culture is a multifaceted element. The Denver Nuggets have held steadfast to a model of development and team-building under Michael Malone. The team adopted a mantra of “We don’t skip steps“. They’ve preached continuity and have kept a strong core of players with Jamal Murray, Gary Harris, Will Barton, and Nikola Jokic. Paul Millsap was an addition to this group, and Michael Porter could be considered a part of this core now as well.
Even Monte Morris and Torrey Craig have been contributing members as locker room presences and team personalities.
This environment has been conducive to a team and organization thriving for growth. Not only has the talent grown, but the results have as well, with the Nuggets improving in win count every single season since Malone’s hire.
This aspect of patience and growth has been integral to the development of a slew of young players acquired by Tim Connelly. The merging of Connelly’s eye for talent with Malone’s coaching and culture has produced many diamonds in the rough. Monte Morris, Torrey Craig, Nikola Jokic, and even Will Barton have benefited from this remarkable duo.
Michael Malone is directly responsible for the culture of growth, continuity, and diligence. Likely his biggest strength as a coach has been his ability to get his roster to buy in, from top to bottom. Undoubtedly, this has been his greatest contribution at the helm of the staff of the Denver Nuggets. He is one of the best coaches in the NBA at developing and maintaining a culture of success, both in the short term and the long term.
2: Michael Malone’s system
Coach Malone has branded himself as a more defensive coach. The results show this, as Malone has brought the Denver Nuggets from the 25th ranked defense in the NBA in his first year, to now the 13th ranked defense, 11th last season, (per Cleaning the Glass).
Malone has been able to effectively create a capable defense around the vertically limited Nikola Jokic. He’s been able to utilize Paul Millsap as an excellent help-side defender, and he’s maximized the strength of Gary Harris on the perimeter. He’s even been able to turn Jamal Murray into an above-average defender. Even this season, he’s used newcomer Jerami Grant adequately in some matchups as a wing defender.
The results speak for themselves here.
The offense is a slightly different story. In his first year in Denver, the Nuggets posted a meager 109.5 Offensive rating, good for 25th in the association. This number spiked in his second season, up to 113.2. Since then, it hasn’t really improved. The offense over the past three seasons has consistently ranked between 6th and 9th.
It seems to be a case in which Malone hasn’t appropriately modernized his offense. A piece I read back in November went into the numbers on this more specifically. According to Pace & Space Hoops, and its metric D’Antoni Index, Michael Malone is among the very least “modern” coaches in terms of offense. The system that is deployed does not maximize the values of the shots being taken.
In an era of the NBA in which the three-point shot opens up most of the rest of the offense, the Denver Nuggets are 5th from the bottom in three-point shots attempted. This is especially important when the offensive centerpiece of the Nuggets operates with elite playmaking frequently from the low and high post. Spacing is even more important in this scenario.
It seems as if the status quo of limited threes is holding back the ceiling of the offense. Spreading the floor out both give Nikola Jokic additional room to operate, as well as maximizing the value of shots created when opposing teams double him in the paint. Malone has restricted this strategy both systematically and with lineup choices.
3: In-game adjustments & Lineups
Malone has received significant amounts of flak for seemingly refusing to play Michael Porter Jr. This has been probably the biggest gripe that fans of the Denver Nuggets have had about Malone so far this season.
This aspect may be his Achilles heel as a coach. Obviously he has found success with his Nuggets teams, but there seems to be room for improvement. He continues to value defense over spacing, which is problematic when the player through which the team operates through is reliant on either good spacing or other off-ball movements.
Operating the offense around Jokic has been less prominent this season. A large factor in this is certainly personnel.
Torrey Craig has been someone who Malone has insisted on playing throughout the season. He’s logged about 200 more minutes total than Michael Porter Jr, (who did miss time due to injury). While in theory, a good defender would be a positive, Torrey has negatively affected the Nuggets while on the floor, specifically with Jokic. When asked about his lineup choices, in post-game media scrums, Malone defaulted to say,
“They kicked our for 48 minutes tonight…I thought gave us the best chance to win.” (per Mike Singer via Twitter)
Even with the numbers suggesting that playing Craig over Porter doesn’t equate to wins, Malone resorts to players that match his ideal style of play the closest.
Of the nine Denver Nuggets who Jokic has logged at least 240 minutes with, by far the worst in net rating is the two-man combo of Torrey Craig and Jokic. They log a -5.9 net rating, one of two negatives in the group, the other being the Grant/Jokic lineup, posting a -1.6 net rating, (per Basketball-Reference).
Malone errs in the way of sacrificing offense over defense, which has frequently led to lineups that have struggled offensively, mostly due to spacing issues.
The oft-used Craig-Grant-Plumlee lineups have been pretty miserable in their large minute load as well, (-10.6 per Cleaning the Glass).
Coach Malone has been able to make good defensive adjustments over a series, such as in San Antonio, when he switched Gary Harris to primarily guard Derrick White. Though elsewhere in the playoffs, he was unable to make any meaningful offensive adjustments, as the bench was overwhelmed, and the starters leaned on the Jokic/Murray pick-and-roll very heavily.
Overall:
Coach Malone has undeniably been a good addition for Denver. He’s been able to get players to buy into his system and culture. This has brought the Nuggets to a great point. They’re on the verge of uncovered ground for this franchise.
There’s still more data points to gather to make any decision moving forward, but Malone has been an anchor for this era of Nuggets basketball. It just may be possible that the Nuggets might not be able to take the next step if the lineups remain suboptimal or the offense remains slightly archaic.