The Nuggets are off to an ugly 0-2 start to the 2024-25 NBA season after rough home losses to the Thunder and Clippers. The team looks disjointed, unathletic, and almost lethargic. The bench and three-point shooting have been completely disastrous, and there aren’t a lot of obvious fixes in sight.
The players need to play a lot better, but is that a realistic expectation? If this continues, we are going to be forced to look more closely at the roster and wonder if this is just who the team is. Jokic is obviously the greatest player alive, but beyond that, there may just not be much there.
The team is preaching patience though. We are supposed to believe in the supporting stars, Jamal Murray, Michael Porter Jr., and Aaron Gordon. We are supposed to believe in the young up-and-comers like Christian Braun, Julian Strawther, and Peyton Watson. We are supposed to believe in veteran additions Russell Westbrook and Dario Saric.
But through two games, it would take quite an imagination to believe in all those things. It’s asking for a lot of things to go right, and in a very deep and competitive Western Conference, it may just be too much to ask.
After just one game, the vibes seemed a little off, both on and off the court. The team got punked on their home floor, showing some understandably poor body language. Then the coach and star player took the podium and both seemed to take shots at the front office and criticize some of the players.
Jokic and Malone both criticize Nuggets roster
Nikola Jokic and Michael Malone were both asked about the team’s three-point shooting and they each gave brutally honest responses. Malone told the media, "Going into the season, shooting was a concern of mine. You lose a guy like KCP, who's a 40% 3-point shooter."
Then Jokic was even more forthcoming, saying "We are not a good shooting team, except Mike and Jamal. All of us are kind of streaky, not streaky, but just average shooters."
It seems like both figures are taking some backhanded jabs at GM Calvin Booth and the people who put this Nuggets team together. We all know that Malone loves his veterans and in the last 15 months, Booth has allowed Bruce Brown, Jeff Green, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Reggie Jackson, and Justin Holiday to walk out the door.
That may not seem like a superstar lineup, but those are all trusted, proven NBA players, and several of them are above-average three-point shooters. Now, the Nuggets are stuck with players who are unproven or past their prime and they have far too many non-shooters on the roster.
Teams are daring half of the Nuggets’ rotation players to shoot open threes and the Nuggets are mostly missing. They have to figure this thing out quickly. Maybe the answer is trying guys like Zeke Nnaji or Trey Alexander. But those seem like optimistic ideas to fix this problem. They may just be stuck and forced to rely on internal development and improved play. It has been a grim scene so far, there’s no sugar-coating it.