The deadline for the Denver Nuggets to accept or decline the team option for DaRon Holmes II has passed, and they've decided to decline it. They made the right choice in the end, even if it was a steep price that they paid to acquire Holmes in the first place. By declining the option, the Nuggets have kept their own options more flexible for the 2026-27 offseason.
Holmes was set to make $5.55 million on the option next year, but there's no reason to exercise the option if they're not going to play Holmes. He's only seen 6 minutes of floor time this year, and that was in garbage time on both occasions. He's clearly been jumped on the depth chart by Nuggets second-round sensation Trevon Brazile, who's also on a much cheaper, four-year, $9.3 million contract.
Holmes was acquired by the Nuggets from the Phoenix Suns on NBA Draft Night in 2024 for Ryan Dunn and three second-round picks. It was a steep price for the 6-foot-9 forward from Dayton, and unfortunately for both sides, Holmes has just never panned out. He was set back by an Achilles tendon injury in his first Las Vegas Summer League game and missed his entire rookie season. And last year, his first full year in the league, he was relegated to the end of the bench and never cracked the rotation while appearing in just 25 games.
The Nuggets made the right choice
With Holmes not set to make the rotation this year, they had no reason to bring him back next year at the $5.55 million price. The Nuggets need all the cap space they can get to improve the roster, and keeping Holmes wouldn't be an improvement.
The Nuggets will now have seven players under contract for next year, assuming Nikola Jokic exercises his player option for $62.8 million and that Zeke Nnaji will exercise his as well for $7.4 million.
The other five are Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon, Christian Braun, Spencer Jones, and Brazile. And along with the dead money from waiving and stretching Jonas Valanciunas this summer, the Nuggets will enter the next offseason about $23 million below the luxury tax projection, with $190.6 million in total salary.
The only problem is that if the Nuggets use their available exceptions, the mid-level non-taxpayer for up to $16 million in first-year salary, and the bi-annual exemption of $5.8 million, they'd be hard-capped at the first apron. That makes re-signing Cam Johnson and Julian Strawther, plus five other players, more difficult, but not impossible.
The Nuggets could potentially even bring Holmes back for depth on the league minimum. But at the end of the day, the right call was flexibility in the Nuggets' options, and that's what declining Holmes has done for them.
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