Nuggets Offseason is Here!

The Knicks win a title in a wide-open NBA, and we use that run to rethink what “the blueprint” even means anymore. Then we lay out realistic Denver Nuggets offseason scenarios and what we’d change around Nikola Jokic before the draft and free agency hit. 
• why the Knicks championship run feels like a matchup and health story 
• the NBA parity era and why there is no single roster blueprint 
• realistic Nuggets offseason trade scenarios based on Jake Coyne’s preview 
• a “war chest” reset built on expiring deals and first-round picks 
• the painful case for trading Aaron Gordon to add depth 
• the video-game style roster turnover swing centered on Kawhi Leonard 
• the fear that the most likely plan is simply ducking the luxury tax 
• why we’re ready to consider a Jamal Murray trade and prioritize athletic defenders 
• minimum-contract targets and why bench ball-handling matters 
• three NBA draft names we like at pick 26 
• a closing reflection on fandom and a tribute to a lifelong Knicks fan 

Transcript

Knicks Win And Parity Era

Brian 0:04

Alright everyone, welcome back to Fandom from Afar. It's been a bit, but the NBA finals are over. And congratulations to the New York Knicks for being NBA champions. I obviously did not see that coming from my season preview to my playoff preview or even during the playoffs. I don't ever think I thought that the Knicks could actually win the championship. So I congratulate them. I think that they had one of the most impressive runs I've ever seen. I want to bring on my friend Mason, who's been on the podcast multiple times before. He's a big Knicks fan, and it would be interesting to hear his thoughts, just the whole playoff run, because it really was just insane what they just accomplished. And so it'd be fun to get Mason on to get a little bit more details and really hear from a true fan on the Knicks championship run. We're not only going to talk about the Knicks here at the beginning. I want to do a little bit of an off-season preview with for the Nuggets, and then we'll finish up with talking about the draft a little bit. So the Knicks, is what they just accomplished good news or bad news for the Nuggets? Did did the Knicks prove that maybe a little bit of cohesion cohesion and just some mature players that have been together for a while can come together and win a championship? Or did it just kind of prove that the Knicks were in the right place at the right time? They just happened to find the right matchups? Or were they a team of destiny? It really could be a combination of all those. It could be any one of those. And how do you build a team if you believe in one of those options is more of a reason why the Knicks are your NBA champions over the others? So yeah, it's it's gonna be interesting. I'm interested to talk to Mason about that. We'll kind of frame the Nuggets off season into how do they become the next New York Knicks? How do they win the championship? And I gotta say, I I don't know the answer. The Knicks, they built their team, and obviously because they had this magical run, it all looked like every move was the right move, but so many things could have gone differently, and and we'd be looking at them completely different. So I think that's kind of what makes basketball so fun.

Matchups Feel Like Paper Rock Scissors

Brian 2:34

We're we're in the era of parody. They showed the stats so many times that there's now been eight champions in the last eight years, and each team is so different just in the last couple years. The Knicks, they play amazing team basketball with a really incredible little point guard. Jalen Brunson, he has gone up so many levels in my eyes. I thought he was a solid to great player, but man, what he did was all time. Last year, the Thunder, all around great team defense with a superstar point guard. The year before that, I think it was the Celtics just bombing threes with two great wing players, and then obviously before that was the Nuggets with a great big man. So there there is no blueprint, it's hard to adjust because I was telling my kids the other day, basketball is really like paper rock scissors, where each matchup kind of beats a specific type of matchup. Just this year, the thunder were dominating everybody, yet the Spurs seemed to beat the Thunder every single time. And then somehow the Nuggets were beating the Spurs every single time, yet the Nuggets were getting beat by the Thunder. So it's it's just paper rock scissors. You gotta get the right matchup, you gotta be healthy at the right time and have a little bit of luck on your side. So depending on how you all look at those scenarios and those factors, I think are gonna be important with these scenarios that I'm gonna go over and what you want the Nuggets to do this offseason. So,

Setting Realistic Nuggets Offseason Paths

Brian 4:06

with that said, let's get into what I think some realistic scenarios are and what I think will actually happen. Now, after the elimination, there were some wild trade suggestions out there for the Nuggets, and and truthfully, it was fun. Like trading away Jamal Murray and getting superstars in return, trading away some of our bench guys and getting solid young players or draft picks in return. And and while all that is extremely fun, it's not necessarily the most realistic of uh scenarios. And so as the off-season has come and extended for the Nuggets, that seems like they've been off for quite a long time. I would say the best source that I've found over the past couple years is a it's it's an off-season preview by a guy named Jake Coyne, and he always posts it on X, formerly known as Twitter. And I just think it is just so great to put everything in perspective. I think Jake takes a ton of time to put these together. They are realistic, they are extremely thorough, and I love that he gives multiple scenarios. So I want to give all credit to these scenarios to Jake Coyne. If you haven't seen his off-season preview, it is on Twitter, and it is 73 pages long, and I read those 73 pages, so you don't have to, but I will say, if you're a basketball fan at all and you like the Nuggets, then it is an enjoyable read. So all of our scenarios are based on scenarios that Jake brought up in his off-season preview, and I'm gonna give each one a title just just to kind of clarify how I think this scenario could possibly happen. So it could be like most likely to happen, or it could be best chance to win us a title next year, and so I just want to kind of frame each scenario. I'm not gonna go over all 10 scenarios that Jake gave, but I'm gonna go over a few of my favorites and just why I picked those out. So I will say all the scenarios are great, each in their own way, but I picked out four. And

The Wild War Chest Reset Idea

Brian 6:20

so I'm gonna say this first one I'm gonna go over, I titled Least Likely but fun. And so this was actually scenario number 10 in Jake's offseason preview. And basically, I won't go over all the details because there was a lot of moving parts, but basically, in separate trades, we traded away Jamal Murray, Julian Strather, Zeke Najee, Cam Johnson, and Peyton Watson. And we basically got a whole group of expiring contracts and first round picks. So it would Jake called it a not a gap year, but an evaluation year. But we would have kind of a war chest full of contracts and first round picks to trade. And the reason I put it's least likely is because there had to be so many things to kind of go right in this scenario. But the big payoff in this scenario is with that war chest of picks at the next trade deadline or even the next offseason, we could offer quite a large package for the next disgruntled superstar. In his paper, Jake mentions someone like Anthony Edwards. So can you imagine Joker and Ant-Man together? I think that would be just amazing. And so while this would take us out of contention for this upcoming year, man, would it be fun to potentially get a superstar to go with Jokic the following year? And someone like Anthony Edwards obviously would be perfect, but you just never know in today's NBA who's going to become unhappy all of a sudden, or which team is going to pull a Nico Harrison and all of a sudden trade their Luka Doncic to a random team. And so having those options available would be nice, and it would take us out of the tax for this upcoming year, which is apparently the ownership's number one goal. You will probably hear me mention that in each and every one of these scenarios because I really do think that is their number one goal for the offseason, which is kind of sad. But that's the first one I want to go over. I think it is not very likely, but man, would it be fun to think of the possibilities of just oh man, who can we get to come join up with Joker for the last part of his career? I think I think that would be extremely fun.

Trading Aaron Gordon For Depth

Brian 8:46

The second scenario I titled I Hate It, but once I started thinking about it more, I had to consider it. This was number four in Jake's scenarios, and it's basically trading away Aaron Gordon, re-signing Peyton Watson, and we would trade Aaron Gordon to the Pistons and acquire Isaiah Stewart and Karis Levert. Now, it would kill me to trade away Aaron Gordon. Like we've said multiple times in the past, he he's the heart and soul of the team. He is Mr. Nugget. He's just such a perfect player to be around Jokic. Just his skill set matches so perfectly with Jokic. It's just that AG cannot stay healthy, and getting two solid players back for him would be would be a nice, nice addition to give some depth. And so in this scenario, he also has us trading Zeke Najee for Daron Sharp. So all of a sudden we have a couple of bigs in Isaiah Stewart and Daron Sharp, and then a kind of a gunner in Karis Levert. So like I said, I hated it at first because we're trading away Aaron Gordon. But it would be nice to have the depth. It would be nice to get off of Zeke Naji's contract, and I don't hate it. I I I think it's something that the Nuggets might have to do. I think they're gonna have to make some tough decisions this offseason. Or I should say I think it would be wise to make some tough decisions. We'll go over what I think is most likely here coming up in a few moments. But this scenario would be kind of fun because we'd be going from Aaron Gordon, who is the most chill, laid-back person in all the NBA, and there may be some medicinal reasons for that. But we would trade him for Isaiah Stewart, nicknamed Beef Stew, who is a ticking time bomb and seems to want to fight everybody. So that would be interesting. And yeah. At first I hated it, but now I kind of like it. The next scenario.

The Big Swing For Kawhi

Brian 11:04

So obviously that is what our ultimate goal should be, even though, as I mentioned, the goal seems to be getting out of the tax. But I want to win a championship. So this one does take a lot of moving parts. This is number six on Jake's paper. This is he titled it roster turnover, and man would there be some turnover. This one involves multiple trades, just to kind of summarize, I won't go over all the details. We pretty much trade away Peyton Watson, Cam Johnson, Jamal Murray, Teron Holmes, Julian Strother, and Christian Brown. But we acquire Kawhi Leonard, Chris Dunn, Corey Kispert, and Patrick Williams. So this is kind of like a video game. Like when I'm playing 2K and I don't have a great season, I trade away everybody and I just get the bunch of new players. I kind of love it though. A starting five of Jokic, Aaron Gordon, Kawhi, Chris Dunn, and then insert whatever shooting guard you want. It is long, it is athletic, it plays defense, it gives us some depth too, with Corey Kispert coming in for some shooting, Patrick Williams is a defender. In this scenario, we we can re-sign some minimum guys as well to kind of fell off the bench, but just the combination of Jokic with Kawhi, I think could be pretty unstoppable. Now health would be a huge concern in this scenario. Obviously, we still have AG and Kawhi is well known for missing quite a few games. But I'm hoping Kawhi would be healthy, maybe motivated, because it didn't work out with the Clippers. He obviously had some off-court issues with the maybe a legal contract, shall we say? But I'm hoping he could kind of come in, even if it's for one year, because his contract is only one year long, but pull a Toronto Raptors, just dominate the league for a year, and then he could move on and go get a giant contract from somebody else or resign with the Nuggets. But I think this would give us the best chance of winning a championship because I think the combination of Kawhi and Jokic both offensively and Kawhi would help out so much defensively. And then with all the other intangibles of what Chris Dunn can bring, and the combination of those four together, I I would absolutely love it. It's exactly what I'm looking for for the Nuggets. But it would be the most Nuggets thing ever to trade for Kawhi Leonard, get extremely excited, and then the NBA finally comes down and suspends him for a year for the whole aspiration illegal contract, and he would never play a game for us. That's Nug Life.

The Tax-Ducking Move That Looms

Brian 13:49

And the last one I want to go over is a scenario I ta I titled it Sadly The Most Likely. And I say sadly because the main goal of it is to just duck the tax. Now our owners are the Walmart family, they have unlimited money. But in every interview this offseason, anyone associated with the ownership group has mentioned how daunting the tax is and how they don't want to pay a tax. And so it just really seems like the main goal will be to save money, and that's going to come with a decrease in talent. So sadly, this most likely scenario, it's number two in Jake's paper, and basically we're just trading away Cam Johnson to save money. We get back Corey Kispert, which he's he's a good player, but he's a downgrade from Cam. And really all it accomplishes is saving our extremely rich owners some money. So it's not the most exciting one. And unfortunately, I just think it's more and more likely. So I watch a lot of the DNBR coverage, and when the Nuggets first got eliminated, they were talking about all these big changes and really getting excited about potential moves and everything. But DNBR speaks to guys inside of the organization, and while they can't flat come out and say what they're hearing from these people, they they kind of shift their tone on the shows and on the coverage. And the last couple weeks they have not mentioned big trades. They just are kind of preparing the fans for what they think is most likely, and it it seems to be this situation where they're gonna trade away probably Cam Johnson, but it could be Aaron Gordon, just to save some money and then try and run it back with everybody else, hoping that we stay healthy. Now, I've gone over it many times. I understand that the the Nuggets had a good team last year, and we got injured and and maybe a bad matchup in the playoffs, but I would just hate to go through a whole nother season of solid basketball, but then we get to the playoffs and Jamal Murray gets overwhelmed by athleticism. We don't have the depth to hang with some of these other young teams, and we get eliminated again. And then we wish we would have made changes. So I'm really hoping that this most likely scenario does not come true, but I'm afraid it is the most likely.

What Jokic Needs And Minimum Hits

Brian 16:22

So as we head into the offseason, I hope I'm wrong. I hope what I just said is not the case. I hope they are aggressive and try and improve the team to try and win a championship. We only have Jokic on our team for so long, and I would just hate to throw away another year just to save some money or just to hope that we can stay healthy. I am at the point where I love Jamal Murray, but I'm ready to trade him away. I think we need to try something different. I do not want to hope that he can all of a sudden handle these long athletic defenders. And I think it's time to cash in while his value is still high. I think we need to be more athletic ourselves. I think we need to surround Jokic with defenders. It's it's really there's parts of each of these scenarios that I went over that I love, and obviously in an ideal world we could do it all, but with with so many cap restrictions nowadays, it's it's going to be tough. And I I am realistic about that. Like I know, especially that video game style one is going to be very difficult to pull off. One that I didn't even mention that it wasn't in Jake's piece, but it was mentioned as as a possibility, is I think there's some trade to be made with Orlando because it seems like Jamal Murray is exactly what Orlando needs, and Orlando has a lot of young, long athletic defenders that we need. So I feel like there's something there, and I would I would love it if we could make that happen. And then another key piece of this offseason is going to be hitting on the minimum contracts again. We did an amazing job of that last year. I think Tim Hardaway was a home run. He was awesome off the bench, just hitting a ton of threes. And Bruce Brown, he he brought that attitude. He brought some defensive, really hard-nosed play that no one else on the team did. And so I thought we went two for two with our minimum contracts last year. Some guys that are being thrown out this year. There's Bogdanovich from the Clippers, he's going to be a free agent. Him and Jokic, I think, are pretty pretty good buddies from the Serbian national team. I think that would be a great backup point guard. Jacques Londale, he's, I think, would be a good solid backup center. I think we should bring back David Roddy and Spencer Jones. I think both of them are the type we need to fill the team with as far as there's their solid all-around players, they play hard, and they're not going to complain about shots or minutes. And then truthfully, Tyus Jones, if we don't get Bogdanovich, I thought he did a great job just towards the end of the year of being able to have someone else on the team that can dribble the ball up the court. For some reason, the Nuggets just struggle to find guys that can actually dribble the ball up the court. And so if we bring back Tyus Jones, I wouldn't complain about that either. So I think change is needed, but we'll see if the owners prioritize winning or money. And it all starts next week.

Draft Targets At Pick 26

Brian 19:17

So just really quick, I am obviously not a draft expert, but I do like looking at all the mock drafts and kind of looking at the players that are kind of within the range of where the nuggets pick. So if we do pick, if we do keep our number 26 pick next week, the three guys that I would love, and again, this falls in the category of long and athletic defenders, just add more of that versatile athleticism to our bench. The three guys that I'm looking at are Terrace Reed from Yukon. You'll probably remember him if you watched Indian March Madness. He was just killing guys on the board, and he's just kind of like a solid low post guy. Zubi Edgefore from St. John's. He he reminds me a lot of Kenneth Freed. He's just like a super athlete, just bouncing all over the place, but plays hard, plays defense and rebounds. That's what that's the best we could hope for at 26. I would love it. And then Coa Pete, kind of the same thing. He's like a super athlete. He can't really shoot, but he's gonna do everything else for us. And I just like the idea. He's kind of like a raw player that hopefully we could shape and he could turn into the next Aaron Gordon. But obviously, that's the dream scenario. So Terrace Reid, Zubie Edge 4, or Coa Pete, I would welcome them all to the Denver Nuggets. And again, hopefully that's just the first step in an amazing offseason for us. So that's my offseason preview. There's so many possibilities for what could happen, but like I said, most likely Nuggets are just gonna make a few smaller trades on the fringes, but you never know, they could surprise us.

What Comes Next And A Knicks Tribute

Brian 20:53

So we will be back. Like I said, I want to get Mason on here to talk about the Knicks a little bit more. I think that would be fun to hear if I'm a true Knicks fan. I couldn't help but think about my buddy Colin. He's no longer with us, but he was the biggest Knicks fan I knew. I know he'd be crazy this week. And so definitely thinking about Colin as his Knicks won the championship for the first time in 54 years. And yeah, it's just it's what being a fan is all about. You gotta, you gotta go through the tough times, and it makes these championships even more special. So, all right, y'all. Hope you enjoyed the offseason preview. We will be back because there's gonna be all sorts of changes coming in the next few weeks, and we'll be here to talk about them.