{"id":189496,"date":"2025-10-04T11:37:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T11:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/189496\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T11:37:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T11:37:08","slug":"bench-unit-takes-shape-around-jonas-valanciunas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/189496\/","title":{"rendered":"Bench unit takes shape around Jonas Valanciunas"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN DIEGO \u2014 The luxury of Nuggets training camp<\/a> this year was the peace of mind they already felt about their starting lineup, even before a minute of practice.<\/p>\n

The burden of camp was figuring out how the other variables fit together.<\/p>\n

David Adelman<\/a> has inherited a championship contender from Michael Malone, but he also inherited the baggage of Nikola Jokic\u2019s<\/a> rest minutes. Denver\u2019s fatal flaw, year over year, is now under new oversight. But with access to a deeper tool bag, too. The Nuggets\u2019 offseason moves have introduced an eagerness, rather than dread, to the process of figuring out their bench.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s one of the biggest challenges of camp,\u201d Adelman said during the team\u2019s media day. \u201cI\u2019m not worried about how the starters are going to flow together. It\u2019s just trying to find the right group with that second unit. \u2026 We can\u2019t be minus-12 every night in those minutes. It\u2019s just a killer, and we rarely blew people out because of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here are five things we learned about the bench throughout the week.<\/p>\n

1. The starting point: The second unit has mostly consisted of Bruce Brown, Tim Hardaway Jr., Julian Strawther, Peyton Watson and Jonas Valanciunas. So far. That doesn\u2019t indicate a definitive hierarchy, but it does illuminate what Denver\u2019s staff felt was the most sensible starting point. \u201cThat second unit will fluctuate,\u201d Adelman emphasized. \u201cWe\u2019ll try different people at different positions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brown said that he and Watson have been applying full-court pressure against the starters, an idea that assistant coach Jared Dudley started encouraging earlier this summer. \u201cI think we can do everything,\u201d Brown said of the lineup. \u201cWe\u2019ve got shooters. We\u2019ve got defenders.\u201d Not included in that initial wing-heavy lineup: Jalen Pickett, DaRon Holmes II, Zeke Nnaji or Hunter Tyson. But Cam Johnson said Friday that Pickett\u2019s control of both the second and third units has stood out when he\u2019s been involved.<\/p>\n

2. Playing through Big Val: \u201cKind of like the first unit playing through Jok,\u201d as Brown described it. Adelman wasn\u2019t kidding in July when he described Valanciunas as a point center. That doesn\u2019t mean he\u2019ll bring the ball up the floor, but that he can act as a central hub for half-court execution with his size, skill and IQ. Surrounding him with four smaller, more agile players to cultivate a motion-based offense could be a go-to formula for Denver\u2019s bench.<\/p>\n

\"DenverDenver Nuggets center Jonas Valanciunas (17) talks with media during the Nuggets Media Day press conferences at Ball Arena in Denver on Sept. 29, 2025. (Photo by RJ Sangosti\/The Denver Post)<\/p>\n

\u201cThis has been good for him to get used to our system a little bit,\u201d Adelman said. \u201cHe hasn\u2019t done some of this stuff outside of a couple months in Sacramento, playing off the elbow and the top of the key. \u2026 So I have to do him a service. We\u2019ve gotta get to some post-up plays and things that he\u2019s used to.\u201d<\/p>\n

High praise abounds for the Lithuanian center when you ask around. It\u2019s almost as if the Nuggets aren\u2019t used to having a solidified backup center at training camp.<\/p>\n

3. Watson as a ball-handler:\u00a0Adelman dropped hints throughout the week that Watson might be used a little differently on offense this year. He\u2019s been Aaron Gordon\u2019s understudy along the baseline for the better part of his burgeoning career so far. Now he\u2019s being described as an initiator as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s been really responsible with the ball,\u201d Adelman said. \u201cHe\u2019s had the ball in his hands a lot with the second unit. He\u2019s made really sound decisions. That\u2019s what we\u2019re looking for. Sometimes guys go into the summer, and they want to show off any dribbling mechanics they\u2019ve mastered. He\u2019s played in straight lines. When you do that, you can be a play-maker.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watson might not be a primary pick-and-roll creator, but if the Nuggets can lean on him as a slasher or trust him to push the ball up after a defensive rebound, he\u2019ll add another layer of on-ball offense available off the bench \u2014 as opposed to Denver\u2019s over-reliance on Russell Westbrook last season.<\/p>\n

4. Choosing a starter to stagger: The Nuggets aren\u2019t just going to make hockey substitutions, of course. The preliminary second unit listed above won\u2019t check in together to replace all five starters simultaneously. Minutes and sub patterns will be staggered out so that at least one starter is always on the floor (especially when Jokic isn\u2019t).<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t have to be Jamal or Nikola,\u201d Adelman said. \u201cIt can be Cam (Johnson). Maybe Cam flows well with Tim and Valanciunas. Who plays well with Jonas? That\u2019s key.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson is a more viable stagger option than Michael Porter Jr. on paper. The evidence is in Brooklyn, where Johnson was pushed outside his comfort zone as a scorer and creator. As Adelman has pointed out, the small forward wasn\u2019t dribbling more than once or twice per touch during his time in Phoenix. That changed with a tanking Nets team, attracting Denver to him and preparing him to be more than a complementary off-ball player in lineups anchored by Jokic.<\/p>\n

When Porter was on the floor without Jokic and Murray last season, Denver\u2019s offensive rating was a dismal 96.8 in 291 minutes (leading to a minus-23.3 net rating). Brooklyn\u2019s offense was seven points per 100 possessions better with Johnson than without him.<\/p>\n

5. Newfound optimism: Murray also remains one of the obvious choices to shepherd the second through some of the non-Jokic minutes. The word out of Denver\u2019s scrimmage on Thursday was that he and Valanciunas were playing off each other nicely. Murray had been asked the previous day if he\u2019s excited about playing with the bench \u2014 it\u2019s been a thankless task for him in the past \u2014 and he responded with the most striking statement of the week about Denver\u2019s depth.<\/p>\n

It could be typical hyperbole for this time of year, but it was also emblematic of a noticeably more upbeat tenor around the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re gonna be scoring points and defending at a rate that we\u2019re not even used to (with that unit),\u201d Murray said. \u201cSo I think that\u2019s gonna be really good for us. And just having all these weapons in different spots, I feel like we can have one of the best benches in the league, for real.\u201d<\/p>\n

Want more Nuggets news? Sign up for the Nuggets Insider to get all our NBA analysis.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN DIEGO \u2014 The luxury of Nuggets training camp this year was the peace of mind they already…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":189497,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[3891,64,63,3892,3893,3912,4699,3896,3897,1662,3913,120243,3900,3902,3903,3914,3904,3905,590,3906,3907,120244,3909,10113,85,3910,3911],"class_list":{"0":"post-189496","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-aaron-gordon","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-bruce-brown","12":"tag-cam-johnson","13":"tag-colorado","14":"tag-daron-holmes","15":"tag-david-adelman","16":"tag-denver","17":"tag-denver-nuggets","18":"tag-front-range","19":"tag-hunter-tyson","20":"tag-jalen-pickett","21":"tag-jonas-valanciunas","22":"tag-julian-strawther","23":"tag-latest-headlines","24":"tag-michael-porter","25":"tag-more-nuggets-news","26":"tag-nba","27":"tag-nikola-jokic","28":"tag-nuggets","29":"tag-nuggets-training-camp","30":"tag-peyton-watson","31":"tag-russell-westbrook","32":"tag-sports","33":"tag-tim-hardaway","34":"tag-zeke-nnaji"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189496\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}