Denver Nuggets

You abandoned it after two.

The Nuggets at four and three.

Real or fake? I think it's real.

It's

Yeah.

They beat Utah.

They beat the Nuggets.

And they beat the Suns.

Don't have a lot of time for it, but Pelicans lost four in a row to start the year.

That included two losses to the Nuggets, and now they've won four in a row.

A mixed bag of wins against a terrible team like the Kings, that's one and seven, against a bad team like the Jazz, who we expected to be better than they are.

They beat them by seven, and they're one and six.

Well, I think, I mean, I'll stick in the Western Conference, division foe.

The Denver Nuggets, which again, I think some people kind of expected, maybe not having the highest playoff ceiling, but a really high regular season floor performance.

look pretty shaky to start this year.

I think we all had questions about their depth, and now Cam Johnson's been in and out of the lineup, but there's been some nights where, you know, Jamal Murray has to score 40 for them to stay in the game.

on Wednesday, so showing that they can do it.

Denver's the odd team out that could be bounced into this playing zone, which I don't think... one, fans, two, you have one of the best players in the entire world should be expecting heading into a season.

Well, I think a lot of that assumption about that top six going into the season was partly a belief in those teams, but also part of it was not much belief in the teams in that play-in mix to really be a solid top six and all of a sudden you're looking at Portland and we don't expect Memphis to continue playing this well but Memphis has had a really nice start to the year they've lost two in a row but you're looking at teams now and especially Portland like well actually maybe this team is way better than we thought maybe the pieces are clicking way faster than we thought they could and then now all of a sudden like With this background and knowledge, if someone asked you today if the Nuggets are a surefire top six team, you'd have to say no, because Portland is playing that well, and the Nuggets don't have many solutions to some of the problems that they face, because their depth is an issue, and they've got that one 20-31 Cleveland pick that they got in the Peyton Watson deal as an asset to try and upgrade the roster, but that comes at the sacrifice of Cam Johnson or someone else on the roster.

So with the questions that they have that they can't seem to answer on the fly besides playing better, I think they're 23rd or 24th in defense, which isn't going to cut it in the Western Conference, and Portland having all these, I mean, how many guys have we mentioned when we talked about Portland? Like, wow, this guy's great and this guy's great and they play so hard and they play physical and they're bombing threes.

Um, I thought that they were out talented more or less against the Los Angeles Lakers, um, and against the Minnesota Timberwolves, the other kind of quality teams they played.

And then, um, and then against Denver sort of same thing.

I think, um, When you look at this group, right, they're not all that different than...

Well, you could argue.

That's a great question, Danielle.

I'm certainly going to be asking that today.

And, um, because we saw when he was healthy the other day, it was Colin Murray-Borles who started against Denver.

It'll be interesting today with, you know, you've got the Bucs and Miles Turner, who's kind of a stretch five.

Like, Quickly has been a guy that when he...

You know, he goes five of eight last night or two nights ago in that game against the Nuggets.

And I don't think that changes everything in the game, but it changes what you get out of him.

It changes your spacing.

David, you want to start us off with a fail?

Yeah, the Denver Nuggets opening gambit here has been a pretty serious fail.

They did have an actual resounding win last night.

But it was the first game that they've had where they were in control of the game.

I have a lot of hopes for the Nuggets.

Their team is not looking like it's sinking right now, although Jokic and Murray are playing really well.

I will, though, add one win.

like a sort of subcategory of a win inside of the Nuggets.

First two games were good.

I was actually at game two at home against the Nuggets.

They got the win.

It wasn't the most fun game, but game number three came and we all know what happened.

Missouri forward Mark Mitchell will be facing Avila and the Billikens on Friday night.

Played for the Denver Nuggets over the summer.

He was part of a lawsuit filed in Kentucky that won eligibility for now for 38 football and basketball players.

You tune into that game, you're going to see a matchup you weren't expecting to see at the end of last year.

Lost to Brooklyn again, and then lost to the Atlanta Hawks, who are also struggling themselves.

So now they have the Memphis Grizzlies, the Denver Nuggets, the Mavs again, the suddenly pretty decent Washington Wizards, the Knicks, the Sixers, the Rockets, the Cavs, the Knicks, the Thunder, the Sixers, and then the Bulls.

Like, this could get really, really ugly for Indiana.

Yeah.