close
close

After the opening loss to the Thunder, Nuggets concerns about shooting and depth attacks are high

DENVER – As great a basketball player as he is, Nikola Jokić will never be known as a major media soundbite. Some players are. You can press play on your recorder and the quotes that flow are worth their weight in gold. Others, like Jokić, prefer to let their game speak for itself.

Still, on Thursday night, Jokić revealed a harsh truth that the Denver Nuggets will have to deal with this season. It's a phrase that's sure to spark debate and questions that the Nuggets will need to answer as this season progresses. And it's a thought almost all of us have had in the offseason, in training camp, during a lackluster preseason and now after a regular-season opener that included a 102-87 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Will they ever be able to fire a shot?

“I think we’re not a good shooting team, except probably (Michael Porter Jr.) and Jamal (Murray),” Jokic said. “We’re all mixed up in some way. Not streaky, you know, just average shooters.”

If Denver continues to win its usual 50-55 games this season, the Nuggets have a longer playoff run and emerge as NBA title contenders, the relative panic that Thursday night's season opener created will fade. Heck, it could be over if the Nuggets get off to a good start in the remaining first 10 games.

But in a top matchup, Denver's performance fueled the narrative that things got even worse in an offseason this summer when starting shooting guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope left for the Orlando Magic as a free agent. The Nuggets couldn't get any shots off. The Nuggets looked old, especially compared to the collective athleticism of Oklahoma City. The Nuggets appeared to be a team lacking depth. Newcomer Russell Westbrook had some good moments, but mostly threw up stones when he tried to shoot from the perimeter. The offense looked disjointed and sluggish, which was a surprising development considering the core of this team has been together for so long.

On the one hand, this is a game. A regular season is 82 games, and there will certainly be a playoff at the end to think about. On the other hand, there were some alarming moments, and if one game is to be believed, this Denver team appeared to be at least a step below a team capable of competing for its second NBA title in three years.

“I thought our defense was great,” Denver head coach Michael Malone said. “I thought the defense was great. But there is of course still a lot of room for improvement offensively. That starts with execution, it starts with tempo and it starts with ability to make shots. We were 7 of 39 from 3-point range and scored 87 points. It shows me that our defense was great, but our offense needs to catch up.”

The underlying fear was that the Nuggets wouldn't shoot enough. That came into play against the Thunder. What's worse for Denver is that Oklahoma City intentionally left out other Nuggets players in almost every lineup Malone put on the court, and Jokić double-teamed almost every time he touched the ball. Christian Braun, Westbrook and Peyton Watson were all players who found themselves wide open to shoot from beyond the arc, while the Thunder were unafraid to commit multiple defenders to Jokić. When the Nuggets began their NBA title hunt in 2023, there was no way teams could do that to Jokić. The Nuggets always had enough shots to keep opposing defenses honest.

Another underlying fear was that the Nuggets wouldn't have enough depth. This became painfully clear on Thursday evening. Denver scored a total of 16 points from its bench against the Thunder, and Oklahoma City went on extended runs in both halves after Jokić went to the bench. The reserves didn't play well on either end of the court and the contrast with Oklahoma City's depth proved stark.

The irony is that the Thunder didn't shoot much better from 3-point range (8 of 36). But the Nuggets need to play more traditionally this season. They have to score points a little differently than the rest of the league. The good news for Denver is that it's not impossible, especially considering Jokić still puts on a Nuggets uniform every night. But this team needs to develop offensively.

““Our question is whether we are implementing things the way we need to,” Malone said. “And we need to get the numbers right when teams are doubling Nikola every time he touches him.”

Go deeper

Amick: The Nuggets' opening night performance against the Thunder reinforces the team's inner angst

This strategy of getting other Nuggets players to win games outside of Jokić is one of the strategies the Minnesota Timberwolves used in the postseason. Ultimately, it wore down Denver, and the Nuggets hit a wall of exhaustion in Game 7 against Minnesota and lost the second-round series.

Having 82 games to tinker with and figure out what works is a luxury. But Denver currently looks like it's at least one level below Oklahoma City. It remains to be seen whether the Nuggets can keep up with other Western Conference powers like Minnesota and the Dallas Mavericks.

So what are possible solutions for the Nuggets?

They could do something drastic and shuffle their vaunted starting lineup and bring Porter off the bench, which would add a dynamic offensive player to the reserve core. If Julian Strawther were promoted, the starting XI would still have enough offensive talent to play well. But that's an extreme thought, and coaches simply won't change rotations and lineups in response to a single loss.

“The bottom line is I have to find a way to get Julian going,” Malone said. “I have to find a way to get Dario Sarić going. So you definitely have to take many factors into account. I think the more our guys play together, the better we’ll do.”

The obvious solution is to take more shots, especially the wide open ones. More importantly, take the ones that are wide open. Despite Denver missing so many looks Thursday night, the Nuggets couldn't take some obvious ones. If you allow an open shot, it is difficult to get the same open shot later in possession.

Denver needs to generate more easy baskets. The Nuggets scored just 12 points in transition, and that's an area that can mitigate the lack of perimeter shooting. And Denver needs to figure out the lineups around Jokić. Unfortunately for the Nuggets, they will have a hard time fielding groups that don't include at least one non-shooter. However, you need to find a way to minimize the missing distance.

The Nuggets know there are ways to figure it out offensively. Still, Thursday night made it clear how far this team has to go to get where it wants.

“There were too many possessions that weren’t Nuggets basketball,” Braun said. “We know that we have to improve in many areas in the future.”

(Photo by Nikola Jokić: AAron Ontiveroz / The Denver Post via Getty Images)

You may also like...