One of the most amazing aspects of sports is how unpredictable they can be. In the Denver Nuggets case, the unpredictable saved their season.
Stop me if you had this on your bingo card: Julian Strawther and Christian Braun will each have their best career playoff games and help Denver force a Game 7 versus the 68-win Oklahoma City Thunder. Yeah, neither did I.
On Thursday Night, two draft picks of former General Manager Calvin Booth proved to be the difference in one of the biggest elimination games of the Jokic era.
Braun had a monster game and affected winning in just about every category. The third-year Swiss army knife was a demon in transition, and he calmly stepped into his long-range jump shots with confidence throughout the night. He also positively affected the game with his passing and provided the usual pesky defense, to finish with an impressive final stat line.
But the biggest feel-good story of the night was Strawther, who recorded a personal 8-0 run in the third quarter to blow the roof off Ball Arena, and whose clutch three with 3:54 left in the game prompted ESPN play-by-play commentator Dave Pasch to coin Game 6 as “The Julian Strawther Game.”
They also got solid minutes from Peyton Watson, who, despite shooting 1-7 from the field, played terrific defense. Yes, the uber-talented but inexperienced Watson can still look like a lost puppy with the ball in his hands, but plays like this momentum-changing chase-down block show his value on a team that needs athleticism and defense.
While watching Watson chase down Jalen Williams like a gazelle and Strawther pound his chest after sticking big corner threes, it’s unquestionable that these guys are both talented. Which raises a question.
Did Booth receive too much blame for what at one point looked like a lost season?
Booth has shouldered an unfair amount of criticism
Let me be clear: I do not think Calvin Booth was great at certain aspects of his job, and he isn’t perfect.
But while fans and the media have (fairly) criticized him for many blunders (most notably the disastrous Zeke Nnaji contract and the failed Dario Saric signing), Booth also did a lot of things right.
His biggest strength? The guy had an eye for drafting talent.
Obviously, Christian Braun was a hit. He also got great value snagging Strawther with the 29th pick in the 2023 draft, and Watson with the 30th pick in the 2022 draft.
The biggest critique of Booth, and the center point of the tension between him and Michael Malone, was that Booth should have been going after veteran players instead of young guys. To that, I say, look around the teams still standing in the NBA.
The Indiana Pacers are incredibly young. The Minnesota Timberwolves' best player is 23 years old. The Thunder, who are still heavy favorites to win the NBA title, are the youngest team in the NBA, with an average age of 24.148 years.
Coming into the season, the top five oldest teams (ranked by average age) in the league were as follows: Philadelphia 76ers, Phoenix Suns, LA Clippers, Golden State Warriors, and Dallas Mavericks.
Someone tell me, how did those teams' seasons end up going?
In a league that is drastically different than ten or even five years ago, roster flexibility is about as important as it’s ever been. To navigate the current CBA, teams have to have a plethora of young, cheap assets to provide depth and avoid the dreaded second apron.
The Oklahoma City Thunder have epitomized that, and as they’ve displayed in this series, they have the deepest team in the NBA.
Nuggets' young talent has had to overcome unfair roadblocks
Game 6 was only one game. If Julian Strawther played like that every night, the Nuggets would have already beaten the Thunder. So, why has he mostly been an afterthought?
The biggest hurdle facing guys like Strawther, Watson, and Jalen Pickett is that they had their growth stunted due to the stubborn game of tug-of-war between Booth and Malone.
After the firing of Booth and Malone, many pieces came out describing the dysfunctional relationship between the two. Booth, who (correctly) believed the Nuggets would need young guys to compete under the new CBA, angered Malone, who purposefully sabotaged some of Booth’s draft picks by burying them on the bench, and even putting them in positions to look bad.
While Strawther and Watson were in Malone’s rotation throughout the regular season and treated better than Pickett, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we’re seeing them start to thrive post the firing of both Malone and Booth, due to the absence of the toxicity that existed between them.
Nuggets will need young talent to win the series and a title
While I do think Booth is disproportionately blamed for Denver’s turbulent season compared to Malone, ultimately, both of them deserved to be fired. Booth, like Malone, was too stubborn, and his inability to consistently sign any productive free agents hurt the team.
Now, with Booth and Malone both gone, the Nuggets have an opportunity to rewrite their season.
On Sunday, Denver is flying to OKC and going into the belly of the beast to play the NBA title favorites in their house. The winner advances to the Conference Finals, where the race to the NBA title is wide open.
If the Nuggets are going to have any shot of pulling off a road upset, they’ll need their young players to meaningfully contribute, as OKC’s supporting cast is sure to shoot better on their home floor.
If Denver loses this game, a large portion of the roster will be inserted into trade rumors heading into a critical offseason. Almost no one will be untouchable, and that certainly pertains to guys like Watson and Strawther.
I don’t know what will happen Sunday, but I do know this: Denver’s young guns will have at least one more chance to help the Nuggets make history and prove that Calvin Booth was right to believe in them.