Nuggets vs. The Field: Are Nikola Jokic & Denver inevitable? | Hoops Tonight

Nuggets vs. The Field: Are Nikola Jokic & Denver inevitable? | Hoops Tonight

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So you guys don’t miss any of our content over the course of this season all right let’s talk some basketball moving out west so Nicole jic polishing up the jumper getting ready for the postseason um Jamal Murray obviously has been playing at an All-Star level the nuggets have lost just twice since the

Allstar break and both of those losses involved a last second shot that either sent it to OT or ended the game um they have had multiple probably about a half dozen just ridiculous half court ass kicking sessions that they’ve put on at the end of games to put things away I

Denver is just seems like a freight train to me and so I’m going to present this question to you guys like this and I’ll start with you Carson would you take Denver or the field at this point to win the NBA title it’s a really good question I would probably take Denver

But I don’t think there’s a big gap between them and Boston I’m very confident that one of those two teams is going to win the title I think that Boston is the most overwhelmingly talented and I think that as a basketball team they have the highest ceiling with the level that Jaylen Brown

Has been playing at as of late if you got if you get christops porzingis consistently knocking down his shots from the perimeter which he didn’t really do when they played Denver and he was getting good looks there just the overall athleticism that they have the combination of perimeter defense and

Interior defense the fact they’re a good rebounding team they have two star shot creators jaylen’s been balling Jason’s having a career season they can go on these flame-throwing runs from Deep they lead the league in three-point volume and they’re second in terms of their percentage there so the ceiling that

They have is incredibly High I do still think that Denver is is a bit more reliable though because their offensive Brilliance is truly inevitable they are never going to break down in terms of process they are never going to experience the swings in terms of perimeter shot making that although

Boston’s ceiling is very high we saw the Difference Maker in their matchup and Boston fans may say oh well we had a just miserable shooting game from deep but so did Denver Denver made four threes in that game they could not knock down a shot from the perimeter and they

Have one advantage that no nobody else in the league does which is that that offensive machine just keeps churning because of nikolic’s interior dominance offensively because of his ability to create quality shots in and around the paint for Cutters for Aaron Gordon in the dunker spot Jamal Murray’s mid-range

Shot making like Denver is less susceptible to shot variant than anybody else in the NBA they won two games in the finals last year where they made five three-pointers or fewer nobody else did that in the entirety of the postseason nobody else can survive off shooting nights like Denver and by the

Way they’re a really good shooting team but they don’t need to be to win every single game and I think that that’s a huge Advantage I think they’re a top three offense of this Century I mean particularly in the clutch the shot quality they can create with either a

Niik yic post up obviously I think he’s the best post scorer on the planet in the best scorer period and he can get to any of those touch shots and make 65% of them no matter who’s on him but if you dig he’s going to create a good shot for

Shoot if you double from the paint he and Aaron Gordon have maybe the best two-man chemistry that I’ve ever seen and so there is an inevitability there whereas Jason Tatum yes has been on a really good pull-up shooting run but you can see these stretches from Boston where the decision- making from Tatum

And brown isn’t great and they are susceptible to just down stretches in terms of perimeter shot making and Denver’s a really good defensive team too I think that obviously particularly on the perimeter they have uh some good athletes they’re not a team that is at all easy to like pinpoint mismatches

With I think about that a lot where you see it in the Mavs game recently for example where Luca is like trying to hunt switches and go at Jamal Murray late in that game and it’s still not super easy like Jamal’s still a 64 compact pretty athletic guard so I think

They’re underrated defensively and they’re the best offense in the league the offense that I trust the most by a good bit but I just can’t act like they are Head and Shoulders above Boston because I know what Boston is capable of Boston has uh the most talented starting

Five that we’ve seen certainly since the peak Golden State Warriors I think this is a team that in most post-ww Warriors years like would be better than the champion I’m interested in your guys thoughts on that because I think Denver is the strongest Champion we’ve seen since those Warriors I think if you

Dropped this Celtics team against the 2019 field well Toronto just because golden state was hurt that year the 2020 Lakers are tough but the 2021 bucks 2022 Warriors I think this Boston team is so overwhelmingly talented that I would take them against most of those teams

And I think that’s a testament to how strong both these teams are I think that we are headed on kind of a collision course for one of the best finals of this Century I view both these teams very very highly I’m taking Denver and I

Agree with you I think it’s gonna be a battle of the Titans if the Celtics are the Avengers joic is Thanos um and nice to me it comes down to one thing Jason made a I can’t remember what take you made it about Jason you were talking about how star

Players uh their teams assume the identity of their star player and I really think that that’s what it comes down to with both of these teams the Celtics leader is Jason Tatum and Tatum is susceptible to bad pull-up shooting runs uh settling for a lot of Threes And

So that’s what his team does a lot and I’m not putting that all on Jason Tatum’s shoulders but by and large they have assumed the identity of Jason Tatum and there is no team uh more in the NBA that I think has assumed the identity of their leader

Than the Denver Nuggets joic jokic’s impact his unselfishness not only creates open looks and open opportunities for his teammates but it makes his teammates more unselfish like watch a Nuggets game and it will blow you away when you’re watching Aaron Gordon kick it to mpj and mpj will swing

It and it’s just it’s beautiful basketball Carson you talk about them being one of the greatest offenses of this Century it’s the most beautiful basketball it’s like the 20 uh 2000s and 2010 Spurs it’s like the 2010s Warriors the ball movement is unreal and that’s what it comes down to me like the

Entirety of the Nuggets team has assumed part of jokic’s identity is we’re going to play unselfish beautiful basketball we’re going to make that extra pass and it’s going to kill you it’s part in why the nuggets are so infallible when it comes to clutch offense because they are

Looking for that extra pass because they are looking to playmake for their their team is just so unselfish because their leader is and that’s the beautiful thing about the nuggets and that’s why I can’t pick against them I do think the Celtics are probably the most talented team

We’ve seen since the Warriors even with like the 20 and the 2020 Lakers are probably the closest but there’s a depth advantage that the Celtics have that the Lakers don’t have uh when you’re comparing those teams Apples to Apples so I don’t want to undersell Boston but

What it comes down to me is the fact that both of these teams uh you know buy into their identity their culture their leader I trust Denver’s culture and their leader more and I think it is permeated to the rest of the roster in a way that you seldom see with teams man

Like their unselfishness is unreal and that’s why I uh that’s ultimately why I buy in and can’t bet against Denver also the fact like you mentioned Carson you got mpj just banging Nails on contested threes uh every one of their players has something that they can kill you with

Man if it’s an Aaron Gordon dunker spot lob if it’s coming um I do think the nuggets are inevitable and I would really be surprised if they didn’t win the title to be clear I have Denver as my Championship favorite and I’m more confident in them now than I was even to

Start the season they have I think they’re just better than they were last year I think they have more well-defined roles and more well-defined processes on both ends of the floor even than Boston does which I think allows them to kind of reach their ceiling more frequently

Than Boston does even though I agree Boston’s ceiling is higher uh Carson I thought the bit you did on their lack of Reliance on on uh on variance was super super interesting that stat about the five made threes in the finals that’s absolutely crazy and I mean that I think

That reflected in the Celtics games they got outshot by Boston in both games on jump shots in terms of jump shot efficiency and both of those teams are good jump shooting teams they’re both top 10 jump shooting teams in the league by a point per shot efficiency and so

Like their ability to weather that kind of of storm and again then I think like one of the big ones too is just Denver knows exactly like their hierarchy in big situations Boston can get a little bit finicky on that end and they they don’t really know what they want to run

Which I think is part of the reason why they get inconsistent that said winning four Championship rounds is really really hard and even though I would put I would pick Denver over the field in the Western Conference I think once you throw in that Boston variable I think

Like I think that it’s just a it’s a lot to say Denver winning over anybody else as an option and so even though I’m more confident than Denver or in Denver than I have been at all this season I still think like there’s a less than 50%

Chance that they win just because of all of the variables that go into it I would pick them I will pick them in every series I will pick them against Boston if they get to the finals I agree with you Carson I think it’s going to be an

All-time great series uh that said I I I think there’s there’s obviously like just a ton of variance in the NBA I mean even just looking back to the simple fact that we haven’t had a repeat uh conference finalist in the last five years just goes to show you the the the

The stuff that you can run into in a postseason series not to mention the injury risk uh along the way to like it’s just there’s just always a chance that maybe Jal Murray will go down or Michael Porter Jr will go down before you get there and obviously as we know

Denver Synergy depends so much on all five of those guys being healthy and so yeah I I think I think Denver fans should feel very confident uh but if I was you know forced to pick Denver or the field I’d pick the field just because I think the

Field is all unless you’re picking like Tiger Woods in his prime uh to win a major like it’s hard to it’s hard to go against the field in these sorts of Situations

Jason Timpf is joined by the Nerd Sesh guys to debate whether Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray, and the Denver Nuggets are an unstoppable force in pursuit of their second straight NBA title. Would the guys take the Nuggets or the field to win the Finals? Will the Boston Celtics get in their way?

Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/c4kcWo3Vmsw

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