The most valuable thing sitting on the Nuggets bench during the playoffs was the first aid kit.
Until that changes, neither will anything on Nikola Jokic’s spring travel itinerary.
Another Memorial Day in Sombor. Another June with no parade. Another year closer to the end of the greatest career in Nuggets history.
So, to the next Denver general manager, especially if that’s interim Ben Tenzer, we humbly beseech three things.
First: Be heartened by the pluck and guile the Nuggets showed against the Thunder three weeks ago.
Second: Do not be fooled or charmed by it.
Third, and this is key: Do not give in to insanity. Do not do the same thing, over and over, and expect a different result.
Do not run it back. Please. For the love of Pete Williams, do not run it back.
Do not look at Thunder vs. Timberwolves or Thunder vs. Pacers and decide, in your head, that the job is mostly done. Do not settle. Do not tell yourself that rest, a coaching change and schematics are the only things between you and a return to the NBA Finals.
“You know, we took the Oklahoma City Thunder, (which) is playing some of the best basketball in the league, if not the best right now, to seven games,” Nuggets president Josh Kroenke reflected late last month. “Which, you know, is great. We took a great team to seven games. That series could have been 4-0 the other way. That series could have been 4-1 us. I don’t think we lost Game 7 during Game 7. I thought we lost Game 7 during Games 4 and 5.
“These series are very fragile things, and they come down to little moments in time and certain actions over the course of a few-minute span in games. And so while I think we were close in some ways, I don’t think it was a 4-0 sweep for Oklahoma City.”
It wasn’t. And they are close. But not “Nuggets-Thunder was the real NBA Finals!” close. You don’t hang banners for almosts.
Yes, the Nuggets took the best team in the West to seven games with their “Core Six” — the starting five plus Russell Westbrook — held together by guts, gauze and chewing gum. Michael Porter Jr. had one good shoulder. Aaron Gordon had one hamstring. Westbrook had one good hand.
The Nuggets played the underdog card as if Michael Malone, a terrier of a man who loved punching up, had never left. It was beautiful. Well, except for Game 2. And Game 7.
Ask yourself this question, and be honest: What would’ve happened to this same Nuggets team if it had sprung the upset vs. OKC and landed Minnesota in the conference finals?
Oh, you know. Anthony Edwards knows. Chris Finch knows. Russ knows. The Joker knows.
Deep down, Josh knows, too.
“We’re close,” Kroenke said, “but I don’t want to be naive in thinking of how close we are. But I don’t want to underestimate how close we were either. I mean, shoot, thinking back to the first round, I mean, we’re an Aaron Gordon tip-dunk away from perhaps coming back (to Denver) down 3-1. And then what does that series look like? Do we even have the opportunity to go out and try and chase a team as great as the Thunder? So there (are) lots of ways to kind of weigh how close we are.
“But I think that as a group, we feel confident that we can go toe to toe with a lot of teams around the league. And now we’re going to get to work seeing about how we can go toe to toe and then overtake them.”
For a start, the most impactful piece sitting next to Jamal Murray can’t be a heat pack.
The Nuggets, bless them, emptied the tank. They gave all they had. Which, by mid-May, wasn’t much. A roster that runs six deep won’t last two rounds before you throw a rod, before a timing belt snaps like a dry twig.
“I think that the way that our players responded over the last six, seven weeks or so really told the world that the Nuggets’ job, whether it’s coaching or front office, is a really special one,” Kroenke continued. “And especially where we are right now,”
Hope is fine. Delusion is the enemy of progress.
Until that bench gets addressed with more than lip service, someone’s always going to come along by Mother’s Day to steal Jokic’s Thunder. At this time of year, a first aid kit will carry you only so far before the plaster cracks.
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