How This Nuggets Title is One of the Most Gratifying in Years

Superstars make the league go round. Basketball teams, more than in any other sport rely on their best players to truly carry the team.

Historically, you need a star — usually at least two — to be considered a real threat. So typically, it’s with good reason the front office will try to move heaven and earth to keep that guy happy.

As annoying as it can be as a fan watching your team cater to a top-tier guy, it can be exponentially more annoying (or heartbreaking, defeating, soul crushing, etc. Pick whatever most accurately describes the state of mind in which you consume sports) when that top-tier guy doesn’t come through when it matters most.

The NBA is littered with examples throughout its 57-year history.

Wilt Chamberlain, a pioneer in so many ways during the NBA’s early days, was also a pioneer in the art of falling off come playoff time — dominating the 60’s, yet always losing to Bill Russell and the Boston Celtics in the postseason.

Most recently, we have James Harden. An absolute maestro in the regular season — oftentimes putting up regular season numbers that we hadn’t seen since Wilt — he’s yet to come through when it matters most.

He has a pair of very famous 2-for-11 performances in elimination games (2015 WCF vs. Golden State and 2017 West Semis vs. San Antonio). And his shining playoff series came early in his career with Oklahoma City, when he was a sixth-man on a team that also featured Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook.

I know what you’re thinking: Chris, I’m eight paragraphs in and you haven’t even mentioned Nikola Jokic one time.

So … What does any of this have to do with Nikola Jokic?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. And that’s the beauty of it.

Jokic is that guy, pal. Period. Plain and simple. He’s shown it time and time again.

He has literally NEVER let me down.

And as a Nuggets fan, that’s pretty rare. Actually, extremely rare. Nugglyfe has left us all a bit guarded when it comes to our Nuggets optimism.

But Jokic has found a way to breakthrough. Through a mix of extraordinary passes, tip-to-himself rebounds, and one-legged fadeaway 3’s to beat the buzzer, the goofy (compliment) 7-footer from Serbia has came out on top of a tradition as old as the Nuggets themselves.

HOW DOES HE DO IT?

Simple answer: he’s just that good.

Jokic is a talent like no one has ever seen before. He’s 6’11”, 284 pounds wrapped in a body it looks like he’s still getting used to.

His arms are littered with bright red cuts and scratches. And no matter how good of shape he gets himself in, he still looks like he’s lumbering up and down the court like 7-footers in the 90’s.

But don’t let any of that fool you.

He may look heavy: he’s just stronger than 99 percent of the league.

He may look slow: he’s still beating his matchup down the court in transition, no matter how athletic they are.

And he may look awkward: it doesn’t matter. Whatever position his body is in, whatever angle his arm is at, whatever foot he jumps off: it still goes in.

It simply always goes in.

Jokic shot 63.2 percent from the field — a mark typically reserved for the rim-runners and lob-catchers of the league — not the hub of an offense that shoots over 15 times per game.

His true shooting percentage? A league-best 70.1 percent.

And that’s not even what he’s known for.

What have we heard all playoffs? *insert mocking SpongeBob meme* YoU hAVe tO mAkE HiM a ScOrEr!!!

While it’s ridiculous to try to force one of the most efficient scorers of all time to do just that, maybe I — and Erik Spoelstra — scoff at the notion a bit too much.

I mean, he is the best passer in the NBA. And conservatively one of the best seven or eight in the history of the league.

Jokic racked up 9.8 assists per game this season — a number that almost surely would have eclipsed 10 if he was the stat padder he’s been accused of being.

And during Denver’s playoff run, the Nuggets did go 0-3 when Jokic scored more than 40. Though that may be more a symptom of him realizing his teammates didn’t have it on a given night than any brilliant coaching move.

Because for every pass he whips to the corner for an open 3, there was an eight-foot floater he passed up that almost surely would’ve went in.

Because he’s just that good.

HOW’D WE END UP HERE?

As great as he is, he’s not perfect. This was his eighth season, and the first that ended with a postseason win.

So, of course there have been a few bumps in the road. But just about all of them — at least the important ones — have been outside of Denver’s control.

The Nuggets — and Jokic by extension — didn’t garner much attention his first season and a half. Then, sometime between Dec. 15, 2016, when Malone finally inserted Jokic in the starting lineup in lieu of Jusuf Nurkic (Merry Jokmas to all who celebrate) and Feb. 12, 2017 when the Nuggets shipped Nurkic to the Blazers, things started to fall into place.

Denver narrowly missed the playoffs that season — thanks in large part to Nurkic cooking the Nuggets for 32 points and 16 rebounds in a late-March loss that effectively knocked the Nuggets out of playoff contention.

They somehow more-narrowly missed the playoffs the season after. The Minnesota Timberwolves — and then-star Jimmy Butler — beat Denver in overtime in a winner-take-all game 82 to once again keep the Nuggets out of the postseason.

With a second-round playoff loss the next season, and a Western Conference Finals appearance the year after, Denver had taken just about every lump scripted in building a young contender.

Add a trade for Aaron Gordon at the next deadline and the Nuggets looked like a bonafide contender. And for eight games they showed it.

For eight sweet games — highlighted by a dominant win over a Clippers team complete with Kawhi and Paul George — Denver looked like they really had something special.

Then on April 12, it all came crumbling down. With under a minute left in a game against Golden State, Murray went down on a drive to the basket and was holding his left knee before he even came to a stop.

And just like that, all the progress the Nuggets had made in the six seasons leading up to that moment grinded to a halt.

The Nuggets lost in the second round that year. Their first step backwards of the Jokic era.

Couple that with a first-round exit the next year — Murray was still sidelined and MPJ missed basically the entire season with back problems — and the Nuggets had fallen completely out of the National eye.

Despite winning back-to-back MVP awards, Jokic didn’t have much in the name of playoff success to show.

Through no fault of his own, I should add. In three series from in those two seasons, Big Honey averaged 30.2 points, 12.1 rebounds and 5.2 assists.

So while Jokic has never let us down — especially when it matters most — he’s never really had the chance to.

Just as he took the next step to a guy who can be the centerpiece of a championship team, his team crumbled around him.

It’s hard to blame Jokic for losing to the eventual Western Conference champions when his biggest help came from the likes of Will Barton and Austin Rivers.

Through it all, Jokic never wavered. He accepted his second MVP from a horse stable in Sombor without much fanfare. He signed the biggest contract in NBA history a couple months later — a five-year, $264 deal that will keep him in Denver through his age-33 season — with somehow even less media attention.

He’s the selfless, go-about-his-business, lunch pail star that every NBA fan swears they want. Yet, those also seem to be the points coming from his biggest detractors.

“He’s boring.”

“He never promotes himself.”

“He doesn’t even look like he cares.”

And honestly, it’s all true. He’s wired so differently from almost any other high-level athlete we’ve ever seen, it’s hard to come to terms with how amazing he truly is.

But after a 16-4 run to the NBA Championship, there’s only one thing anybody can say that really matters.

“He’s a champion.”

WHAT IT MEANS

In March of 2021, if someone had told me the Nuggets would lose in the second round, then first round in back-to-back years I’d surely wonder what happened.

I’d ask if MPJ’s back issues kept flaring up. I’d ask if Aaron Gordon wasn’t willing to accept his role. I’d ask if Jokic got exposed on the defensive end in the playoffs.

Hell, I’d probably even ask who they flipped Jamal for heading into this season. Silly me would’ve hoped for Jrue Holiday.

Then, when they’d mention the Murray injury — and of course the return and title run this season — it would all make sense.

For everyone who has been watching for the past eight years, this was almost an inevitability. This team is built different — by just about every definition.

Other teams don’t fire off six straight wins with their season on the line to force a winner-take-all game 82. Other teams don’t come back from back-to-back 3-to-1 deficits in the same playoff run. And other teams don’t stick by a coach for eight years with almost nothing to show.

What the Nuggets have built is special — it has been for years. And as someone who had been screaming that from the rooftops to anyone who would listen, it’s cathartic to see the rest of the world finally take notice.