The Nuggets lost a tough home game to the reigning champion Boston Celtics on Tuesday night but can take solace in the fact they played very well despite missing the MVP, Nikola Jokic. The Joker was added to the injury report in the morning with an illness and was ruled out just before tip-off.
His condition worsened over the course of the day and it turned out he was too sick to play. It’s annoying but not a huge deal overall, except it’s further complicated because the Nuggets have a back-to-back, hosting the Clippers on Wednesday night.
It’s obviously just a couple of regular season games in January, but every game in the standings is going to matter in the Western Conference this year. The Celtics loss dropped the Nuggets to 20-15 on the season. That’s good for fourth in the conference at the moment, but they’re just four games up on the 12 seed.
The season-long battles for home court, to avoid the play-in, and even to make the play-in are going to come down to the wire, so every game matters for a Nuggets team that has championship aspirations.
Furthermore, there’s not a team in the entire league that is more impacted by one player than the Nuggets are by Jokic. If he can’t play, it will be an uphill battle against a Clippers team that can leapfrog them in the standings with a win on Wednesday night.
Nikola Jokic officially ruled out with illness
The Joker was listed as questionable early on Wednesday and was downgraded to out shortly after 5 PM MT. He’ll miss his second straight game and the team will have to find a way to win without the sun in its universe. Hopefully, the extra night off will give the Joker time to fully recover and be feeling close to 100% for the Nuggets' next game on Friday night.
Aaron Gordon remains out with his calf injury, so with Jokic also out again, the Nuggets will be forced to play extremely small lineups with Peyton Watson and Michael Porter Jr. in the frontcourt or cycle through the likes of DeAndre Jordan, Dario Saric, and Zeke Nnaji. In other words, a less-than-ideal scenario.
Kawhi Leonard out for Clippers due to wildfires in LA
The Clippers got a massive boost as their superstar, Kawhi Leonard made his season debut on Saturday, but Leonard has taken a leave of absence from the team as his family was forced to evacuate their home due to the wildfires in the Los Angeles area.
First and foremost, hopefully, Kawhi and his family are safe and doing as well as possible. In a basketball sense, Leonard’s absence definitely takes some of the shine off of this matchup, but the Clippers have been playing well without him for the entire season. They are much better equipped to play without their former Finals MVP than the Nuggets are theirs.