Meanwhile, the newcomers brought in to push the Nuggets over the top largely faded in the postseason. Even with a big Game 6, Johnson shot 31.4 percent from 3. Hardaway missed all seven of his 3s in Game 4. Brown had moments while averaging 6.3 points but disappeared Thursday, and Valan\u010di\u016bnas played just 25 minutes all series.<\/p>\n
The Nuggets aren\u2019t stuck \u2014 a team with Joki\u0107 and Murray will always be competitive \u2014 but they don\u2019t have a lot of room to operate. Up ahead are some uncomfortable decisions.<\/p>\n
The Nuggets didn\u2019t just lose to the Timberwolves \u2014 they were bullied, physically and mentally. McDaniels mocked their defensive abilities<\/a> and taunted them on the court. From top to bottom, the Timberwolves roster held a competitive edge. They played harder, were more physical, more aggressive. They simply looked like they wanted it more.<\/p>\n Those eye-opening inefficiencies highlighted in the Minnesota series raise more questions. The Nuggets already know they need more, and better defenders, but do they also need more heart? More physicality? More grit?<\/p>\n Those topics have certainly been on the table for much of this season.<\/p>\n \u201cCoach (David) Adelman has been saying it from the beginning of the year: \u2018We are known as being the finesse guys, the good guys. We have to make teams feel us,’\u201d Wallace, the team\u2019s co-general manager, told The Athletic. \u201cHe would say, \u2018Don\u2019t be afraid to be a little more aggressive, a little more demonstrative defensively. That\u2019s another level we have to go to, especially in the playoffs when it becomes a halfcourt game.’\u201d<\/p>\n The problem is the Nuggets will likely once again find themselves in the bargain bin in the free-agent market, which limits their options. Hardaway and Brown were signed for the veteran\u2019s minimum last summer, and both may be asked back, but their returns do not solve the team\u2019s questions about defense and physicality.<\/p>\n So, how can the Nuggets create some room to pursue players outside of the bargain bin? That\u2019s where it gets tricky, because the Nuggets\u2019 tradeable assets are undesirable.<\/p>\n The two most likely, but uncomfortable, options are trading either Johnson and\/or Gordon.<\/p>\n Outside of Johnson\u2019s expiring $23 million deal, Denver has unappealing options for other teams. Braun will be entering the first season of a five-year, $125 million deal that, if Denver is honest, likely carries some buyer\u2019s remorse. Braun hasn\u2019t been the same since a November sprain to his left ankle, and right now, it\u2019s not hard to imagine the Nuggets\u2019 brass kicking themselves for offering an extension to Braun, and not Watson, last summer.<\/p>\n The Nuggets will have the right to match any free-agent offer to Watson, but will the Nuggets be able to smartly match an offer in the $20 million to $25 million range, considering how deeply it will put them into the tax and potentially push them above the second apron<\/a>? Other teams will know this and will likely make offers that cause Denver to sweat. Besides Watson\u2019s free agency, the Nuggets will have to come up with money to sign Jones, the former two-way player who made their playoff rotation.<\/p>\n Some relief can be created by offloading forward Zeke Nnaji, but the demand is low to non-existent for a guy who made $8 million while playing 12 minutes a game this season.<\/p>\n That leads to the uncomfortable conversation of trading the beloved Gordon, who is nicknamed Mr. Nugget. Gordon has three years and $103 million left on his deal, and while it\u2019s hard to imagine Gordon playing anywhere else, it\u2019s getting harder to justify keeping him on the roster if he is continually unable to perform when it matters most.<\/p>\n \n Trade Aaron Gordon? He is a beloved teammate and fan favorite, but played in just 36 games this year after only 51 last season. (Photo by Francois Nel\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n And then there\u2019s the contractual matter concerning the man in the middle of it all \u2014 Joki\u0107.<\/p>\n While team sources say there is no indication that the three-time league MVP has a wandering eye, and he said as much both on media day<\/a> in late September and (in Serbian) during an interview in early March<\/a>, the fact remains that he chose not to sign an extension last summer and, thus, can be a free agent in the summer of 2027 (he has a player option worth $62.8 million for the 2027-28 season). If, that is, he doesn\u2019t sign an extension again during this offseason.<\/p>\n Joki\u0107\u2019s choice to not extend last summer made complete financial sense. The max he could have earned was a three-year, $212 million deal that paled in comparison to the four-year, $293 million deal he could sign this summer. But the dramatic nature of the Nuggets\u2019 fall, coupled with the reality that every team in the league would line up for the chance to trade for (or sign) Joki\u0107, means the entire league will be watching to see if he signs the extension.<\/p>\n If he does, it\u2019s only natural to wonder whether the Nuggets might have some internal discussion about the second-highest-paid player on the roster: Murray. In contrast to Gordon, whose health struggles might make possible suitors wary if he were made available, the 29-year-old Murray is coming off the best regular season of his career. He is handsomely paid \u2014 three years and a combined $161 million left on his deal \u2014 and there is always robust market for elite scorers and playmakers. The danger is breaking up the Joki\u0107-Murray two-man game that is widely considered the best in all the NBA.<\/p>\n The day before the playoffs started, Wallace and Tenzer took Strawther, their 24-year-old shooting guard, to lunch at Hillstone restaurant in Cherry Creek.<\/p>\n It was a keep-your-head-up meeting, a vote of confidence for the 2023 first-round pick out of Gonzaga. Like in his second season, when he came off the bench to score 15 points in Game 6 against Oklahoma City, they told Strawther to be prepared to come in and win one playoff game per series for the Nuggets.<\/p>\n Strawther ended up playing only 18 minutes in the series \u2014 but the message was clear: The front office believes in Strawther and knows his time is coming.<\/p>\n Strawther, a silky 3-point shooter with a deadly floater, is an example of the delicate task front offices face in threading the needle with up-and-coming players. In championship windows, veteran leadership and experience is needed, but development of youth can\u2019t be ignored.<\/p>\n Denver this season tried to play hopscotch and hit both the experience and developmental boxes.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re mature, but we are not old,\u201d Wallace told The Athletic before the playoffs started. \u201cYou look at OKC and the San Antonios and yes, they are here, they have arrived, and they have a lot of good, young talent. But I think we have a good mixture of both maturity and some youth. Guys like Julian stepping in and playing spot minutes .. how Cam has come along this year.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s why I\u2019ve said over and over again: Player development is such a huge key in our game now.\u201d<\/p>\n Last summer, while they were unsuccessfully negotiating a contract extension for Watson, the Nuggets told Watson to come to Denver and train with their staff.<\/p>\n \u201cPeyton didn\u2019t fight us, and he came,\u201d Wallace said. \u201cAnd look at his development. I\u2019m extremely proud of him.\u201d<\/p>\n If the Nuggets are able to create some room to sign Watson, and they see Strawther as the replacement for either Brown or Hardaway, a new youthful iteration of the Nuggets could be on the way. Or maybe Strawther is used as bait to help entice a team to take on one of the undesirable contracts, allowing the Nuggets to continue to prop open their championship window.<\/p>\n Those answers will be revealed in the coming months. Until then, the resounding thud of a lost season echoes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER \u2014 With a resounding thud, a season of promise for the Denver Nuggets came crashing down Thursday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":617008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[1753,11951,355,99],"class_list":["post-617007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-denver-nuggets","tag-minnesota-timberwolves","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=617007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/617008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=617007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=617007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=617007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2176745962-scaled.jpg\")
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