Ranking the Denver Nuggets potential playoff matchups

Denver Nuggets ideal playoff matchup #5: Grizzlies/Suns

A matchup with either of these outfits would mean that Denver fell into the Play-In, and clearly, that is the furthest thing from ideal.

We saw what the Phoenix Suns did to the Nuggets last year, and this season’s rosters really aren’t that different. Deandre Ayton can’t stop Jokic, but he’s probably the best defender of Nikola that we have in the NBA today, so without any support for Joker again, we reckon it would be another ugly sweep.

The Suns are by far the best team in basketball right now, putting more distance between them and the second-place Memphis Grizzlies than there is between the Grizzlies and seventh-placed Minnesota. They’re a well-oiled machine that does all of the important little things right, and they’ll be getting Chris Paul back very soon.

Phoenix is also as clutch as they come, winning 83 percent of their clutch games (as defined by NBA.com) while the next best team (Memphis) only has a 66 percent success rate. They also shoot the ball at a 56 percent clip in the clutch, which is a whopping seven percentage points higher than the next best team.

The Grizzlies aren’t quite as sure a thing as the Suns, but they’re pretty close. We cannot expect Gordon or anyone to slow down MVP candidate Ja Morant, and Steven Adams is big and strong enough to affect Jokic as well. The Grizzlies are just a deeper, more talented, grittier group than the Denver Nuggets at the moment.

Memphis, and Morant in particular, have been excellent against top teams this season, and after their playoff experience last year, this feels like the time Morant’s time to lead a deep playoff charge.