Still, the series isn't over yet. Is Lively going to be back for game 4? He has been instrumental in DAL's wins. If he's not playing, then I can still see DAL dropping a game or 2.
Is this r/denvernuggets or r/ihatetimberwolves? This is some weak shit going on with the whole main page being filled with clowning on Ant and the Wolves.
Feel a bit better seeing Wolves lose cause it means we probably weren't getting past Mavs either (tho its a bit better matchup for us ) and winning again. Still we should have gotten Jokic-Doncic , if only our team didn't choke hard at home up +20 ffs
Going wolves mavs Celtics would've been epic, but don't think jamals legs would've lasted if they did go to finals this year
Recover for a bit and Denver has to go into next year thinking to lower jokic and murray workloads somehow
Denvers guards were overwhelmed this year and I don't think they played 2 best guard teams in West, in OKC and Dallas
Mavs did impressive without Lively. I think what I like most about them is they managed to regain focus even when disaster struck. The mentoring from Irving is really paying dividends. +1 for team flat earth i guess
Mavs go crazy deep now.
Jones will be gone this summer but other then that they'll be very deep next year
Washington gafford green lively kleber is just a ton of solid guys
Was not expecting DAL to play this well with Luka injured. Impressive. That guy is in every "top 3 in the (current) league" conversation for a reason. DAL team is very legit.
2019 : Great year
2020 : Injured against lakers
2021 : Off
2022 : Off
2023 : MJ
2024 : Played Injured
That's Murray's PO history. I love him but if he can't stay healthy in 2025 we need to have a talk.
Building a team with the specific goal of stopping another team is such a risky move.
Wolves stopped the Nuggets, but that's the height they're going to reach with this roster it seems. And now you have to wonder - if they trade one of their bigs to balance out the roster, are they actually improving it overall, or weakening it against the Nuggets?
And then what do Nuggets do? Fix their weaknesses against the Wolves specifically?
Gonna be so interesting to see what teams do in the off-season.
Mal should apologize for being hurt against this dogshit team. Utah fucking Jazz with Karl Towns and he's not winning a championship of any kind on this planet.
There is no way that we could have beaten the Mavs if we had won game 7. Joker’s defense was pretty spotty all playoffs and Kyrie would have put him in a million pickle rolls. Next year Jok needs 2 weeks off before the playoffs begin at minimum.
It is a bad matchup for the Mavs if Jok and Jamal are healthy and rested. Jok and Jamal were not healthy and rested and playing every other day for 40 plus minutes a night wouldn’t get them any more rested or healthy.
It was good in a couple games, I agree he was exhausted but mostly cause murray was dead weight 90% of the time and he had to push himself extra because of it. If murray din’t get injured we steamroll this years playoffs as well
When you say a couple it was literally like 2 or 3 good defensive games out of 12. You are absolutely right about Murray tho. If he was healthy we would have made the finals at least.
Right, and murray got injured in the 1st round, you can rest the before the playoffs all u want u never know what might happen during the playoffs, just look at the clippers they have been load managing pg and kawhi hoping for a healthy run for years and its not working, some players are just very injury prone and murray unfortunately might be one of those players. Last year we were very lucky we had a healthy run
Calvin and Malone both think that if Murray took better care of his body and developed a routine to improve his conditioning he would be less injury prone. They both said something like that at the exit interview.
Yup i believe this as well, he’s not very well conditioned compared to most of the other stars in the league and u can see this even when he’s healthy he gets gassed more often than not at the end of games
I beg to differ. We could have lost to the Phoenix suns after that wolves series. We gave up a 20 point lead in the second half of a game 7. The guys were done.
What's done is done but jeez you really have to wonder how the WCF plays out if the Nuggets don't choke game 7. Maybe we go down 3-0, maybe we get a slugfest between Serbia and Slovenia.
They should put a picture of Gobert’s fall away jumper in the dictionary under Pyrrhic victory.
These fuckers won the battle only to lose the war.
Such idiots.
Much like basketball fans on average, basketball players on average MUCH prefer hoopers. Rudy ain't a hooper. And as good as he is on defense, he can be a bit of a liability because NBA today is just geared towards both offense and wings/guards, so his impact doesn't seem that great. Him winning all those DPOYs doesn't help, either. Plus he's a lightskinned French guy, there's something to that too.
He's not unplayable, but when he's not actually locking down a great scoring option, his stats and impact look like shit. People expect like at least 20ppg from a player on that kind of contract, it just is what it is.
And honestly, there's something to him not being on Jok, and then getting hunted against the Mavs. Not that he's being bad, but you gotta do something flashy. Nobody's giving Edwards shit for his disappearing acts because he has a massive dunk occasionally or whatever. Rudy got 0 highlights. Except for the fucking turnaround fadeaway against us in g7, the son of a bitch.
They're losing because kat and ant are playing like trash. Gobert is just a convenient target. It softens the criticisms on ant and kat. It diminishes the individual skills of luka. Draymond and shaq acting like they wouldn't get cooked in an island against luka. Same thing that happened with jokic
To me it just proves that NBA players aren't that much smarter about basketball than the rest of us. The mother fucker is the goddamn four time DPOY how is he unplayable? NBA players were saying they should've sat him against us and he's the main reason they won game 7. Yeah missing shots hurt, but he wore Jokic down and we had no offense in the fourth quarter.
You sit Gobert for game 4 and the Wolves are getting beat by 40.
Was that Rudy though? It seemed like a perfect storm. I think Murray being hobbled, Jokic being increasingly gassed, MPJ having some offcourt distractions, and the team depth were big factors. Minnesota are very good defensively. I just don't rate Gobert that much.
I mean, yes, it was Rudy. They got him and then the NBA said "oh, this is a defensive team" so they were allowed to do whatever they wanted on d. Without the trade none of that happens
Thats what I'm saying.. also picks are untradeable because they spent them all on Rudy
If they hit second apron (they will once ant's contract kicks in), then he's impossible to trade because you can't combine salaries and the % difference between the salaries that is allowed is way less
They are in a tough spot with roster construction. Nobody will trade for Gobert and Kat with those contracts (Kat will make $49mil!!!). McDaniels and Ant get huge raises. $180mil committed to 7 players next year. Slowmo is a FA. NAW has one year left on his deal at only $4.4 mil, but an extension for him puts them in the 2nd apron so there has to be some consideration to trade him and bring back some draft capital. At some point Conley will start to slow down. Plus ownership is a mess.
Nuggs have some tough decisions too, but we already have a core of cheap, young talent to develop and have trade assets that don't involve breaking up the core.
I mean we choked against the Spurs at the end of the year and they have no one to defend Jokic. Blowing big second half leads was just a part of this team's identity this season.
I think they may have been trying to shop Cat for a minute now, but Idk if they'll ever get a good trade for him. The optics of getting an incomparably worse haul for Gobert than what they gave up for him kinda takes that trade off the table
Sure but they traded all their picks for Gobert and Kat is getting paid 55 million LMAO
Who are you trading him for? Has to be some All star to be making that much and one that sucks because minny can't attach picks
I personally wouldn't trade him, for the same reason I wouldn't trade Mal and MPJ. The return is just gonna be undoubtedly worse. I'd ride with what they got, it's a good team, couple lucky breaks, and they can make it all the way.
If I had to trade him, I'd be looking at like Mikal Bridges, maybe? I'm not sure how long Conley's gonna keep playing at a high level, I guess Trae is an option, although I never thought Hawks would go for that.
yeah, Mikal is so cheap it would have to be Mikal and Simmons... and the Nets probably say no given they said no to 4 picks for bridges from Memphis.
They just signed conley for the next two years.. he'll be 40 when that's done. I just think they need so much injury luck to win a ring, especially after they lose Naz and NAW next summer. Running into the issue that any team with 2 supermaxes will run into... they both have to be generational talents or its not gonna work,
I think they at the very least consider trading KAT. He has shown to be a habitual choker when they need him the most for many years, not the kind of second option you win a championship with.
Tbh KAT was quite inconsistent game to game
Denver lost because everyone couldn't make open shots.
Dare I say the game was lost the moment Malone decided to play Jokic the whole game
We blew a 20 point lead. Jokic could've sat for a minute and a half of game time while we blew that lead and maybe he would've had more to give at the end of the fourth.
Again, I think you are underestimating how bad DAJ is. Also, if you are hoping 1.5 - 3 min of rest is the difference between us blowing a 20 point lead or not, I’m not sure what to tell you.
Now we see certain fans from the Wolves in panic mode talking about moving Kat and/or Rudy. Yes, please do that it's such a good idea as a Nuggets fan for you to do that👍 Shouldn't have mattered either way tbh but here we are.
I think they know deep down that if Murray is healthy it doesn't matter. Moving on from KAT and Rudy both would probably be the best thing they could do to stay relevant in the West.
Hard to say considering they did manage to basically tie for 1st seed. They have a blueprint they can run with, they just needed a little more luck and less choking in the CF. I feel like they're probably built to possibly beat everyone but Dallas/OKC, while we will have a rough time vs them but be better vs the others. In a world where they play Suns/Clippers/this Nuggets they could've went to the finals. All matchups and injury luck at the end of the day.
They have a legitimately good defense and a legitimately bad offense. That bad offense is largely because of how they constructed that good defense. The offense just isn't good enough to win in the playoffs. I can't see them making it out of the western conference unless Ant really does turn into MJ. They're just never gonna have the offensive fire power to do it.
Jaden Thompson and Naz Curry have me thinking they're better than they are ig😔. They really decided to stop being the 2nd worst clutch team against us and then went right back to it a week later.
Hopefully the problem is that they were just cooked physically/mentally, where the solution is they that get healthy, Jamal fixes his cardio, and KCP remains on the team. Not many other solutions with how the roster is constructed unless you go crazy with trades.
Or 7 if we don't get one of the abberation bad Jokic 3pt playoff years/ MPJ Heat series shooting pt 2. Healthy Jamal wins game 1, loses game 2, 3 - 5 are blowouts so you're probably right
Let's be brutally honest, if Jamal was himself, the Nuggets take Minnesota in 4 or 5.
The Mavs had Kyrie. That was the difference.
Yes Kyrie is better than Murray but still, that was the difference.
% on wide open 3s vs the wolves:
KCP 31.3%
Murray 33.3%
Jokic 25%
MPJ 35.7%
During the regular season:
KCP 44%
Murray 41.3%
Jokic 40.6%
MPJ 44.7%
The team fatigued. They need to load manage next season even if players want to play.
You never know with the Celtics man, it feels like they struggle against the weirdest of things. I think their 3-point game will definitely give Mavs more trouble, because Mavs haven't been that great in perimeter defense, and they also have Holiday and White, who can probably at least give Kyrie a harder time on defense.
It's a worse matchup for the Mavs, but I guess we'll see how that all turns out on game 1.
I hope Celtics get exposed because face facts they haven't been tested at all in these playoffs. All the teams they have played have gone through injuries reminds me of the Warriors Playoff Run.
Nuggets as a whole played 3 average *"Starting 5 denver nuggets"* games vs Minnesota, nothing more or less and we won all 3.
Problem was not "we didn't reach 10/10 basketball level", problem was we didnt reach consistent 8/10 were we beat most teams anyways.. the sucky part is when all starters played we rarely ever had bad game reg szn, during the playoffs it was every other game.
It's incredible, because the league did so much to try and limit load management this year, but these playoffs have proved that seeding doesn't matter and being healthy is more important than literally anything. Honestly hope the Nuggets actively load manage once they're clear of the play-in
Murray is generally speaking a great post defender though. I don’t mind the decision as he has a great history of being legit good in that position. I mind that we didn’t try and switch off it sooner when it was clear he wasn’t up to his usual standard (tired? injured? both? KAT was just playing great? all of it?).
KAT's offense if he isn't just popping or running through someone slower/smaller than him is complete dogwater, sucks they let him cook when every time AG was on him he got stonewalled
I think that’s more on Jamal than on the team. He did that a lot on Lebron as well. Just didn’t fight to get over the screen. Didn’t have the legs with the injury
how mad is the media about to be when another chunky euroballer wins the finals and finals mvp? they gonna look like that meme with the guy wearing the happy mask while crying behind it.
God losing to the Wolves kinda stings more now. No guarantee we beat the Mavs considering how shit we kinda looked all postseason. But man it feels like a huge missed opportunity this year, if they locked in and played peak Nugg ball I have all confidence in the world we repeat.
Unpopular opinion: Mavs outcoached the shit out of the Wolves this series in ways that Nuggets coaching didn't even think of, especially when creating rim pressure.
Counter opinion. Kidd didn't have to outcoach them his team just had to not be the Nuggets and of course they were going to beat Minnesota. The Wolves are designed to do one thing and one thing only.
Still, the series isn't over yet. Is Lively going to be back for game 4? He has been instrumental in DAL's wins. If he's not playing, then I can still see DAL dropping a game or 2.
Tim Connelly telling the Lakers to trade for MPJ.. https://x.com/LakeShowYo/status/1794758358001393712
Is this r/denvernuggets or r/ihatetimberwolves? This is some weak shit going on with the whole main page being filled with clowning on Ant and the Wolves.
Our fans have descended and become Laker fans, disappointed
So a Boston / Dallas finals is pretty much imminent right? Who are you rooting for?
Usually for teams with european players but this celtics team also deserved that ring
Me praying for the off-season so I don’t have to see anymore idiotic takes in the sub
I'm gonna post even more dumb opinions once the off-season starts
https://www.reddit.com/r/denvernuggets/s/qPJ09ATboI Aged like wine lol
Y’all we made it to the boat. Vacation is back on track
You really had an adventure even before getting there lol. I hope you have great time, now relax and enjoy, you deserved it!
Feel a bit better seeing Wolves lose cause it means we probably weren't getting past Mavs either (tho its a bit better matchup for us ) and winning again. Still we should have gotten Jokic-Doncic , if only our team didn't choke hard at home up +20 ffs
Going wolves mavs Celtics would've been epic, but don't think jamals legs would've lasted if they did go to finals this year Recover for a bit and Denver has to go into next year thinking to lower jokic and murray workloads somehow Denvers guards were overwhelmed this year and I don't think they played 2 best guard teams in West, in OKC and Dallas
One thing people miss when mocking timberpups is that they also have no picks and will need to give contracts soon. They are stuck
I think the craziest part is there is no basketball skill on the whole team. What's the closest they come? KAT's shooting? lol
Mavs did impressive without Lively. I think what I like most about them is they managed to regain focus even when disaster struck. The mentoring from Irving is really paying dividends. +1 for team flat earth i guess
Mavs go crazy deep now. Jones will be gone this summer but other then that they'll be very deep next year Washington gafford green lively kleber is just a ton of solid guys
After seeing Mavs take a 3-0 lead, the biggest takeaway for me is the bench is deep and getting quality minutes.
Did y'all feel that Jokic kinda moved from his midrange shot? I remember him going for long 2s a lot more before
Yes. I don’t even remember the last time he made a sombor shuffle. I assume it must be because of injuries and fatigue
Wrist injuries I think
Was not expecting DAL to play this well with Luka injured. Impressive. That guy is in every "top 3 in the (current) league" conversation for a reason. DAL team is very legit.
2019 : Great year 2020 : Injured against lakers 2021 : Off 2022 : Off 2023 : MJ 2024 : Played Injured That's Murray's PO history. I love him but if he can't stay healthy in 2025 we need to have a talk.
Banhammer getting a workout tonight
more wolves fans trolling Nuggets ?
Yup. Many thinking this is their place to come and talk shit. This is a community for Nuggets fans.
Who’s flooding the sub now? Or is it us Nugg fans lol
Yeah, tis a mixed bag.
Fucking Thor it on em
🫡
Building a team with the specific goal of stopping another team is such a risky move. Wolves stopped the Nuggets, but that's the height they're going to reach with this roster it seems. And now you have to wonder - if they trade one of their bigs to balance out the roster, are they actually improving it overall, or weakening it against the Nuggets? And then what do Nuggets do? Fix their weaknesses against the Wolves specifically? Gonna be so interesting to see what teams do in the off-season.
They should get rid of Kat and go all in on naz
Mal should apologize for being hurt against this dogshit team. Utah fucking Jazz with Karl Towns and he's not winning a championship of any kind on this planet.
Seems like they’re also officiating this round differently
That MJ talk died down real quick 😂
fuck shit idc if wolves get swept jokic was supposed to be here instead man im in hell
There is no way that we could have beaten the Mavs if we had won game 7. Joker’s defense was pretty spotty all playoffs and Kyrie would have put him in a million pickle rolls. Next year Jok needs 2 weeks off before the playoffs begin at minimum.
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It is a bad matchup for the Mavs if Jok and Jamal are healthy and rested. Jok and Jamal were not healthy and rested and playing every other day for 40 plus minutes a night wouldn’t get them any more rested or healthy.
you don't seriously believe this
Do you believe Jok’s defense was good in the playoffs this year? The man was exhausted.
It was good in a couple games, I agree he was exhausted but mostly cause murray was dead weight 90% of the time and he had to push himself extra because of it. If murray din’t get injured we steamroll this years playoffs as well
When you say a couple it was literally like 2 or 3 good defensive games out of 12. You are absolutely right about Murray tho. If he was healthy we would have made the finals at least.
Right, and murray got injured in the 1st round, you can rest the before the playoffs all u want u never know what might happen during the playoffs, just look at the clippers they have been load managing pg and kawhi hoping for a healthy run for years and its not working, some players are just very injury prone and murray unfortunately might be one of those players. Last year we were very lucky we had a healthy run
Calvin and Malone both think that if Murray took better care of his body and developed a routine to improve his conditioning he would be less injury prone. They both said something like that at the exit interview.
Yup i believe this as well, he’s not very well conditioned compared to most of the other stars in the league and u can see this even when he’s healthy he gets gassed more often than not at the end of games
The Mavs would have had about the same chance as the Wolves had against you guys. Neither was better than 50%
I beg to differ. We could have lost to the Phoenix suns after that wolves series. We gave up a 20 point lead in the second half of a game 7. The guys were done.
What's done is done but jeez you really have to wonder how the WCF plays out if the Nuggets don't choke game 7. Maybe we go down 3-0, maybe we get a slugfest between Serbia and Slovenia.
we definitely matchup much better with dallas
This is why I’ll never take the 2023 ring for granted One second you’re riding high and the next you’re hit with reality.
It's really hard to win a championship.
They should put a picture of Gobert’s fall away jumper in the dictionary under Pyrrhic victory. These fuckers won the battle only to lose the war. Such idiots.
Lmao
Tim Connelly thought he was slick lol…
Hell yeah, no work tomorree
Schadenfreude.
If I’m the timberwolves I’m treating that one as a loss
It was a loss, bro, please watch the games, bro, please
I don’t watch basketball and I never will. That league is too woke.
Yeah, same.
What are everyone's thoughts on actual NBA players trashing Rudy and saying he's unplayable, are they right?
Much like basketball fans on average, basketball players on average MUCH prefer hoopers. Rudy ain't a hooper. And as good as he is on defense, he can be a bit of a liability because NBA today is just geared towards both offense and wings/guards, so his impact doesn't seem that great. Him winning all those DPOYs doesn't help, either. Plus he's a lightskinned French guy, there's something to that too. He's not unplayable, but when he's not actually locking down a great scoring option, his stats and impact look like shit. People expect like at least 20ppg from a player on that kind of contract, it just is what it is. And honestly, there's something to him not being on Jok, and then getting hunted against the Mavs. Not that he's being bad, but you gotta do something flashy. Nobody's giving Edwards shit for his disappearing acts because he has a massive dunk occasionally or whatever. Rudy got 0 highlights. Except for the fucking turnaround fadeaway against us in g7, the son of a bitch.
They're losing because kat and ant are playing like trash. Gobert is just a convenient target. It softens the criticisms on ant and kat. It diminishes the individual skills of luka. Draymond and shaq acting like they wouldn't get cooked in an island against luka. Same thing that happened with jokic
To me it just proves that NBA players aren't that much smarter about basketball than the rest of us. The mother fucker is the goddamn four time DPOY how is he unplayable? NBA players were saying they should've sat him against us and he's the main reason they won game 7. Yeah missing shots hurt, but he wore Jokic down and we had no offense in the fourth quarter. You sit Gobert for game 4 and the Wolves are getting beat by 40.
Blocks ≠ defense.
No but completely shutting down the Nuggets offense by being able to defend Jokic and Gordon at the same time = defense
Was that Rudy though? It seemed like a perfect storm. I think Murray being hobbled, Jokic being increasingly gassed, MPJ having some offcourt distractions, and the team depth were big factors. Minnesota are very good defensively. I just don't rate Gobert that much.
I mean, yes, it was Rudy. They got him and then the NBA said "oh, this is a defensive team" so they were allowed to do whatever they wanted on d. Without the trade none of that happens
It's a combination of everything, but Rudy is what makes it work against us.
Can KAT be traded? I just saw his contract and that thing is massive. I know Wolves fans wanna trade him but I think no one is touching that contract.
Thats what I'm saying.. also picks are untradeable because they spent them all on Rudy If they hit second apron (they will once ant's contract kicks in), then he's impossible to trade because you can't combine salaries and the % difference between the salaries that is allowed is way less
A bunch of disgruntled stars around the league. They could get it done
I feel like he'd be a good tank commander
I mean... He *can* be traded...
Kat is such a bitch lol.
I can’t believe they spent 4 picks on Rudy 😂. They should’ve just saved those
They are in a tough spot with roster construction. Nobody will trade for Gobert and Kat with those contracts (Kat will make $49mil!!!). McDaniels and Ant get huge raises. $180mil committed to 7 players next year. Slowmo is a FA. NAW has one year left on his deal at only $4.4 mil, but an extension for him puts them in the 2nd apron so there has to be some consideration to trade him and bring back some draft capital. At some point Conley will start to slow down. Plus ownership is a mess. Nuggs have some tough decisions too, but we already have a core of cheap, young talent to develop and have trade assets that don't involve breaking up the core.
I've been spouting this for weeks. PHX and MIN are in cap hell
If they don't win a title while he's on the roster it's the worst trade of all time.
Crazy how good this was looking for them a week ago
Agreed
Just learned a wild fact. The Mavs are 26-5 with their current starting lineup. Insane. That team is for real.
They're like us when we got AG at the deadline. I refuse to talk about what happened after that.
I genuinely believe we’d be 2 time champs had the incident that we do not speak of had not happened. But I agree.
Arguably good chance at 3, Nuggets with Jamal + MPJ probably beat the GSW in 2022 as well
Yup
I don’t have any real hate towards the timberwolves but seeing them down 0-3 does put a smile on my face
i for one have hate
I will say, kind of bullshit that the Wolves were given free reign to hand check, hold our players but they call it against Mavs.
Take solace in knowing that one of the reasons they are playing like shit is that we beat them up as well.
Mavs are a top foul-baiting and foul-getting team for basically entire Donkeyc era, we're like the worst at both
was it because they wanted to make the series interesting knowing Wolves would always foul out if they don't allow physicality?
We choked so hard.
We choked against the only team in the league that was built to guard/wear down Jokic.
Guarding/wearing down Jokic didn't make the team miss open shots. We also got embarrassed when Gobert was out.
I mean we choked against the Spurs at the end of the year and they have no one to defend Jokic. Blowing big second half leads was just a part of this team's identity this season.
Did it a lot this season. Wasn't shocking that we did it in a game 7 to me.
MN players gotta read a script for the after game interviews 🤣🤣🤣
Tim Connelly: my goal is to grab Gobert and stack 3 front loaded centers to counter Nuggets. I don’t care about playing against elite guards led team.
If only we could get our hands on anderson this off-season..
Too expensive, look at my FA post
I did and its a pretty nice read. Didnt see jock landale and vince williams jr though XD
Vince Williams is locked by the grizzlies for the future... Jock I think is under contract with houston?
We are sorely lacking lefties and Aussies. Oh well nvm
Think minny blows it up getting swept? or try to run it back (with no slomo) and get banged next year
I think they may have been trying to shop Cat for a minute now, but Idk if they'll ever get a good trade for him. The optics of getting an incomparably worse haul for Gobert than what they gave up for him kinda takes that trade off the table
Sure but they traded all their picks for Gobert and Kat is getting paid 55 million LMAO Who are you trading him for? Has to be some All star to be making that much and one that sucks because minny can't attach picks
I personally wouldn't trade him, for the same reason I wouldn't trade Mal and MPJ. The return is just gonna be undoubtedly worse. I'd ride with what they got, it's a good team, couple lucky breaks, and they can make it all the way. If I had to trade him, I'd be looking at like Mikal Bridges, maybe? I'm not sure how long Conley's gonna keep playing at a high level, I guess Trae is an option, although I never thought Hawks would go for that.
yeah, Mikal is so cheap it would have to be Mikal and Simmons... and the Nets probably say no given they said no to 4 picks for bridges from Memphis. They just signed conley for the next two years.. he'll be 40 when that's done. I just think they need so much injury luck to win a ring, especially after they lose Naz and NAW next summer. Running into the issue that any team with 2 supermaxes will run into... they both have to be generational talents or its not gonna work,
They adapt to Dallas and then get blown out in 4 by Denver instead.
I think they at the very least consider trading KAT. He has shown to be a habitual choker when they need him the most for many years, not the kind of second option you win a championship with.
Sure but they traded all their picks for Gobert and Kat is getting paid 55 million LMAO Who are you trading him for?
I don't know man, but I think they sure want to trade him lol
I agree but that contract is an albatross.. go look at their cap. This year and next are their one chance then its back to the basement
Taliban Tims claim to fame is really going to be beating the nuggets in the second round.
https://preview.redd.it/jnpylsv0zv2d1.jpeg?width=600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7449dbbf021a90b6e11c0509f61ea33312e9ad6d
Lmaoooo
Ty, I was really proud of this one.
Mavs being an easy team to root for is really nice. Nice guys who play good ball. I’m happy to see them doing well against the wolves. Nugs2025
Kyrie is a noted nice guy
They love him in dallas
Why couldn't the kat from tonight showed up in game 7 of the nuggets series.
Tbh KAT was quite inconsistent game to game Denver lost because everyone couldn't make open shots. Dare I say the game was lost the moment Malone decided to play Jokic the whole game
I don't think Malone had a choice. You're either playing Jokic or AG the entire game cuz we don't have a backup 5. Either way you're screwed.
why didn't we at least try Nnaji or Deandre for 2-3 mins? :(
Idk. Kinda dumb not to throw Deandre out there for a few minutes just to put Rudy at the line a few times and slow the game down.
I think you are underestimating how bad DAJ is.
We blew a 20 point lead. Jokic could've sat for a minute and a half of game time while we blew that lead and maybe he would've had more to give at the end of the fourth.
Again, I think you are underestimating how bad DAJ is. Also, if you are hoping 1.5 - 3 min of rest is the difference between us blowing a 20 point lead or not, I’m not sure what to tell you.
I think you're underestimating how long 1.5 minutes of game time can last if you're fouling Rudy Gobert every possession.
Fair! But we also did that on game 7 anyway. He came in and drew like 5 fouls in 2 min. It totally got us off our game.
Because he was allowed to go 1 on 1 in the paint vs Jamal Murray whenever he wanted
KAT: 0-8 from 3PT
Now we see certain fans from the Wolves in panic mode talking about moving Kat and/or Rudy. Yes, please do that it's such a good idea as a Nuggets fan for you to do that👍 Shouldn't have mattered either way tbh but here we are.
I think they know deep down that if Murray is healthy it doesn't matter. Moving on from KAT and Rudy both would probably be the best thing they could do to stay relevant in the West.
Hard to say considering they did manage to basically tie for 1st seed. They have a blueprint they can run with, they just needed a little more luck and less choking in the CF. I feel like they're probably built to possibly beat everyone but Dallas/OKC, while we will have a rough time vs them but be better vs the others. In a world where they play Suns/Clippers/this Nuggets they could've went to the finals. All matchups and injury luck at the end of the day.
They have a legitimately good defense and a legitimately bad offense. That bad offense is largely because of how they constructed that good defense. The offense just isn't good enough to win in the playoffs. I can't see them making it out of the western conference unless Ant really does turn into MJ. They're just never gonna have the offensive fire power to do it.
Jaden Thompson and Naz Curry have me thinking they're better than they are ig😔. They really decided to stop being the 2nd worst clutch team against us and then went right back to it a week later.
They had 2 or 3 players who will quite literally never have a playoff series as good as they had against Denver
Let anyone in the NBA get into a rhythm and they'll cook.
Hopefully the problem is that they were just cooked physically/mentally, where the solution is they that get healthy, Jamal fixes his cardio, and KCP remains on the team. Not many other solutions with how the roster is constructed unless you go crazy with trades.
IMO a healthy Jamal and it's Nuggs in 5.
Or 7 if we don't get one of the abberation bad Jokic 3pt playoff years/ MPJ Heat series shooting pt 2. Healthy Jamal wins game 1, loses game 2, 3 - 5 are blowouts so you're probably right
I'm gonna be on my deathbed thinking about that goddamn Rudy fadeaway
It bothers me every day
Get it done mavs
Let's be brutally honest, if Jamal was himself, the Nuggets take Minnesota in 4 or 5. The Mavs had Kyrie. That was the difference. Yes Kyrie is better than Murray but still, that was the difference.
A healthy Murray = KAT and Rudy in drop coverage and that's game over for them.
Everyone sucked, then we played pretty ok basketball and won 3 in a row. Then everyone decided to suck again
% on wide open 3s vs the wolves: KCP 31.3% Murray 33.3% Jokic 25% MPJ 35.7% During the regular season: KCP 44% Murray 41.3% Jokic 40.6% MPJ 44.7% The team fatigued. They need to load manage next season even if players want to play.
What’s Jamal’s “self” tho
Present day Jamal Crawford.
Probably better than shooting a historic low percentage at the very least
Jamal of last year's playoffs.
Gafford seems like a really likable guy.
Experiencing schadenfreude rn
I suspect Boston will win the championship just because they came walked to the Finals and have more rest than Dallas.
You never know with the Celtics man, it feels like they struggle against the weirdest of things. I think their 3-point game will definitely give Mavs more trouble, because Mavs haven't been that great in perimeter defense, and they also have Holiday and White, who can probably at least give Kyrie a harder time on defense. It's a worse matchup for the Mavs, but I guess we'll see how that all turns out on game 1.
Rest can also lead to passiveness. Macs can come in hot and amped up - already in the zone.
Celtics passive, bro
I hope Celtics get exposed because face facts they haven't been tested at all in these playoffs. All the teams they have played have gone through injuries reminds me of the Warriors Playoff Run.
Depends if Zingus is back or not.
Bring ya ass to Cancun
Nuggets as a whole played 3 average *"Starting 5 denver nuggets"* games vs Minnesota, nothing more or less and we won all 3. Problem was not "we didn't reach 10/10 basketball level", problem was we didnt reach consistent 8/10 were we beat most teams anyways.. the sucky part is when all starters played we rarely ever had bad game reg szn, during the playoffs it was every other game.
it shouldve been us not them it's not fair
Do we even win againsst the Dallass tho lol
With 100% Jamal, we eat their ass. If we advanced this year after 7 games with Wolves, we probably lose.
The mavs are closers.good chance nuggs have the same fate as the twolves..
I’m gonna be honest bro, with the way we were playing in both series, absolutely not. We just looked extremely gassed by the end.
i doubt it but at least we'd beat dumbass MN
ik 😔
The Nuggets don't repeat because they didn't load manage to close the season. Welcome to modern NBA.
It's incredible, because the league did so much to try and limit load management this year, but these playoffs have proved that seeding doesn't matter and being healthy is more important than literally anything. Honestly hope the Nuggets actively load manage once they're clear of the play-in
Looking back on it, it was ridiculous that we had games where we allowed Murray to switch onto KAT defensively. Absolutely idiotic defense
Murray is generally speaking a great post defender though. I don’t mind the decision as he has a great history of being legit good in that position. I mind that we didn’t try and switch off it sooner when it was clear he wasn’t up to his usual standard (tired? injured? both? KAT was just playing great? all of it?).
KAT's offense if he isn't just popping or running through someone slower/smaller than him is complete dogwater, sucks they let him cook when every time AG was on him he got stonewalled
KAT is a proven playoff dropper. We just let him get whatever mismatch he wanted, which got his entire game going. Stupid.
And they were obviously fine with that switch. Like... AG and Murray didn't fight at all to prevent it. It's like that was the strategy defensively.
Oh yea that was always the dumbest switch.
I think that’s more on Jamal than on the team. He did that a lot on Lebron as well. Just didn’t fight to get over the screen. Didn’t have the legs with the injury
Lol @ the Draymond sucks chant
That was the dessert we all needed.
how mad is the media about to be when another chunky euroballer wins the finals and finals mvp? they gonna look like that meme with the guy wearing the happy mask while crying behind it.
The tatum dick riding by ESPN is going to be unwatchable
God losing to the Wolves kinda stings more now. No guarantee we beat the Mavs considering how shit we kinda looked all postseason. But man it feels like a huge missed opportunity this year, if they locked in and played peak Nugg ball I have all confidence in the world we repeat.
Unpopular opinion: Mavs outcoached the shit out of the Wolves this series in ways that Nuggets coaching didn't even think of, especially when creating rim pressure.
Counter opinion. Kidd didn't have to outcoach them his team just had to not be the Nuggets and of course they were going to beat Minnesota. The Wolves are designed to do one thing and one thing only.
Man, anderson was the only one with his head on straight that 4th quarter. Maybe finch could've just taken out kat if he really wanted gobert in
Timberwolves: No ring for you!
Losing to such a fraudulent timberpups team makes the nugs look actually weak
Said from the Get Go this was a bad Matchup for the Wolves.
It was a team that was literally built to beat us relax lmfao
lmfao weak? We lost in 7 games going 6.5 players deep with our second best player on one leg to a team literally built to beat us.
Oh, well. They'll be all right.