Denver Gazette beat writer Vinny Benedetto takes you around the NBA and inside the Nuggets locker room:
NBA Insider
Starting the season strong would be a good idea for the Nuggets, from the players to the coaches and executives.
If the team doesn’t look like a contender when the calendar flips to 2027, there’s a wide array of moves that could make sense for an ownership group that’s in a tight spot. The best player in franchise history is a year away from potentially becoming an unrestricted free agent. The roster is expensive and is only getting costlier with few valuable contracts to potentially trade, while the competition in the Western Conference is only getting stronger.
Here’s how the first few months of the schedule shake out for a Nuggets team that is largely set to run it back with a little more than a month before the team reconvenes for training camp.
October
It starts with a bang.
Denver’s season-opening trip to Oklahoma City on Oct. 22 is the kind of game where people will probably place too much emphasis on the result. The four other games — two against the Pelicans and one against the Warriors and Suns — could reveal more about the roster’s potential.
Losing either of the first two home games — Oct. 24 against New Orleans and Oct. 26 against Golden State — would be reason for some early-season panic.
November
The first full month of the season starts favorably for the Nuggets with home games against the Trail Blazers and Raptors.
Then, Denver embarks on a four-game road trip that starts in Mexico City against the Pacers and continues in Houston, Memphis and New Orleans with at least one day off between each game.
The month’s marquee game is the Nov. 18 home game against Boston. Denver’s November slate ends with the first back-to-back of the season with games at Toronto and Detroit on Nov. 29 and 30. Eight of Denver’s 14 games in the month will be played away from Ball Arena, but it’s more than manageable.
December
The Nuggets might want to use the first five or six weeks of the season to build some momentum.
December kicks off with a trip to Philadelphia to play the reloaded 76ers. The NBA Cup will determine what comes next, but the Nuggets return to the regular season with a trip to Utah on Dec. 12 to face a Jazz team that should no longer be tanking.
The holidays will be spent in California. After hosting the Lakers on Dec. 19, the Nuggets play the Clippers on Dec. 21 and the Lakers on Dec. 23 in Los Angeles before the Christmas Day game at Golden State.
Denver’s final two games of 2026 — a home-and-home series with the Timberwolves in Denver on Dec. 28 and Minneapolis on Dec. 31 — will be the best gauges of where the Nuggets are in what could be a pivotal season for the franchise’s direction.
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver speaks during a news conference at the NBA All-Star weekend in February in Inglewood, Calif. (The Associated Press)
What I’m Thinking
Some of the NBA’s newest owners aren’t making Adam Silver and the association look very good.
There’s the transfer of the Trail Blazers to Tom Dundon. In the months since Dundon took over, the franchise’s future in Portland has been threatened by the Texas billionaire’s unwillingness to sign a lease that would keep the Trail Blazers in town for the next couple of decades. The team and the city have until the end of the year to reach an agreement. If that doesn’t happen, the funding from the state, more than $350 million, goes away, according to an NBC Sports report. The failure to secure a long-term lease in Portland would further speculation that Dundon purchased the team with plans to relocate.
That would be devastating for Portland, a great NBA city, and a bad look for the NBA that’s already had Seattle’s team snatched away from the region.
Then, there’s whatever is going on with the Lakers.
Just a year after buying a majority stake of one of the biggest brands in all of sports from the Buss family trust for $10 billion, a record fee at the time, Mark Walter flipped ownership to a group led by Josh Kushner and Bob Iger for $12.5 billion. Walter’s facing a federal investigation for tax fraud and is reportedly looking to offload his stake in English Premier League club Chelsea FC. Jeanie Buss, who maintained a large enough stake to remain the team’s governor, is now trying to override the sale of her family’s remaining share to the Kushner and Iger group.
Across town, the NBA’s investigation into the Clippers’ potential circumvention of the salary cap under Steve Ballmer’s ownership remains an ongoing mess.
Going back a little further, Mat Ishbia, who purchased the Suns a few years ago, is taking a financial beating after United Wholesale Mortgage, known as UWM, saw its stock nosedive. A UWM statement said the recent losses had no impact on Ishbia’s ability to own the Suns and the WNBA’s Mercury.
They’re four very different situations, but Silver and the association could really use a public relations win sooner than later.
What I’m Reading
The Gazette’s Tyler King profiled the Nuggets’ newest assistant coach and former University of Colorado standout Austin Dufault when he was a member of the Bulls’ organization last year. Dufault will assist David Adelman and serve as vice president of player development, according to HoopsHype.
What I’m Following
Nikola Jokic is the third-best player on the upcoming NBA 2K27 behind Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Victor Wembanyama. All three players are rated 97 overall, but the Oklahoma City and San Antonio stars got the top two spots.
Former Nuggets executive Tommy Balcetis has a new job in Philadelphia. He’s the 76ers’ new head of basketball intelligence, analytics and innovation. Balcetis spent more than a decade in Denver’s front office.
The Cavaliers, one of the teams reportedly pursuing Peyton Watson via a sign-and-trade, cleared up some salary space by trading Dennis Schroder and cash to Charlotte for Tre Mann.