Hoops Tonight - NBA Power Rankings: Nuggets & Thunder BEST IN WEST, who is Celtics top challenger?

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at the volume heavy Tuesday. Everybody hope love you guys are having a great week so far. Got a jampack show for you today. We're continuing our season preview series with number three, the Oklahoma City Thunder and number two the Denver Nuggets, So two season previews today, You guys have the trip before we get started subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channels. You don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore JSNLT so

you guys don't miss show announcements. Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever you podcast under Hoops Tonight, and then keep dropping mail bag questions in those YouTube comments. We keep hitting them throughout the rest of the season. Little little update on how this week's going to go. Before we get to the regular season opener, which is literally one week from tomorrow, we will be going live on YouTube that night, but obviously we still have a bunch

of stuff we need to hit right. So I got three more season previews to do. We're doing two of those today. Number one obviously the Boston Celtics, we will get to at some point later this week. There are several preseason kind of like check ins that I want to do on some of our contender tier teams, the teams in that top eleven that we haven't touched yet in preseason that I want to get to. I have

Sam Vessini coming on the show later this week. Every year we do like a debate of our tender rankings, and so he'll be coming on to do that at some point later this week, so we will get some If you're waiting on preseason reaction on one of the teams that haven't hit yet, we will get to that later this week. And then obviously we'll have more of a big picture debate with Sam, and then I've got these last three season previews, and then next Tuesday, we're

just getting back into the usual routine. Some a good mix of instant reactions at night after games and then a lot of that sort of thing in the morning, a lot of film breakdowns, a lot of the usual stuff that you are used to. So our last week of preseason prep this week, and then we'll get into our routine. So not any further, dude, let's get started. Number three the Oklahoma City Thunder quick recap of their offseason. They lost Josh Gitty, Gordon Hayward, and Mike Muscala. They

added Alex Cruso and Isaiah Hartenstein. Nicole a Topic their first round pick, kind of like a shot creating guard. I'm not sure how much he'll play this year, but obviously added to the roster Crusoe and Hartenstein. Alex Crusoe instantly gives Oklahoma City a perfect fitting five man lineup for their Chet at center. Looks he's a much better off ball offensive player than Josh Gitty was. Right. Josh Kitty obviously is a very interesting on ball shot creator.

We're gonna find out a lot about him in Chicago this year and what he can do getting better defenders from the other teams, more of the game plan being kind of centered around him. We're gonna learn more about Josh Kitty, but he wasn't necessarily the right fit for this iteration of the Oklahoma City thunder Right. Alex Russeau much better off ball offensive player, a better shooter. He's shot thirty nine percent from three over his last four seasons on about three attempts per game, and he's a

very active off ball screener and cutter. Those of you guys who watched our TIMPs tape segment on Friday, we'll remember some of the clips that I showed you guys of just ways that Alex like always is moving. He's always either like cutting into the dunker spot to make himself available, or screening to get another shooter open, or relocating on the weak side to try to find an opening for himself to get a catch and shoot shot. He is just a very active and productive off ball

offensive players. Then on the other end of the floor, he's one of the best perimeter defenders in all of basketball. He's in that top tier of guys that you want to put on opposing stars. He kind of fits into this like new archetype that I actually like a little bit more. I talked about this with Claire to Loon.

If you guys remember the other day when we were discussing the Defensive Player of the Year stuff, and one of the things that I was kind of venting about is like there's a lot of like there's there's a lot of attention that goes to the lanky perimeter defenders. Right these are the guys that are like six ' eight, six ' nine, super long arms, and they're definitely is

advantage there. I'm not gonna sit here and pretend like that's not an important type of defender, especially against like pull up shooters, right, like guys that love to get to their spots and shoot pull up jump shots over the top. Length has real value. Length has real value off the ball, playing passing lanes, length has real value. Covering ground in rotation, length has real value defensive rebounding, but I've always been more drawn to like the bigger, stronger,

perhaps a little bit shorter types of perimeter athletes. One, they have the foot speed to still cover ground and to still help in defensive rebounding situations, but they're more physical. They're usually able to get away with more in terms

of officiating. And then when it comes to the best players in the league, I tend to think most of them are bothered more by physical ball pressure than they are length in disruption using long arms, and so like, we've seen this a lot in recent years, right like the Bruce Brown archetype. Lou Dort is already kind of

doing this for Oklahoma City. Alex Cruso kind of fits into this mold Christian Brown with the Denver Nuggets, where it's like six five six six, built like a truck, can slide their feet and keep guys in front and chest them up. And then in the more physical NBA they've actually become a very valuable archetype, especially as the league has kind of changed the way that they've officiated and let more of this type of contact go. Alex Caruso fits that mold perfectly. He's gonna beat guys to spots.

He's gonna bring physicality, he's gonna force them to shoot over the top, and he just brings that big, physical perimeter athlete to the table. He's also just a super smart defender within the team context. He understands game plan, always does his job. Those are you guys who watched the our film session last week will have remembered some of these examples that I'm talking about. But he communicates

really well. He understands like defensive spacing, meaning like where you want players in help side, like keeping Chet in a low man position. He'll identify a switch and push Chet down and make sure that he's in the right spot, communicating coverages. He's just a massive connective piece, a leadership piece within a defensive unit. I think he's one of the best defensive players in the league. He's gonna help the Thunder a lot. In addition, he just has an

incredibly high motor. He is consistently one of the best plus minus guys in the league. I went over onto cleaning the glass today and I just went back through every single season of his career, every single team he's ever been on in his entire NBA career has been substantially better when he's on the floor versus when he's off. The plus minus splits have been crazy. He is quite simply one of the very best role players in the NBA, and it is a huge get for the Oklahoma City

Thunder Isaah Hartenstein. This is a rock solid, starting caliber center On offense, He's a very good connective piece in five out concepts. He's a great screener and seiler. As he rolls to the rim, he seals rim protection away to create driving lanes. He makes quick decisions on the ball as he's flowing from side to side in action keeps the ball moving. He's great at making passing reads.

Like when you're playing in five out concepts, as the big man is dribbling to one side, you usually have like a pinned down into a screen or some sort of like there's two perimetive players. One of them is usually going to cut and one of them is usually going to come off of that screen, and a lot of times defenses will deny the ball or top lock and it actually triggers those cuts. Right in those situations, you need a big man who can consistently read and

make those passes. Hartenstein is very good at that sort of thing. Those are he's good at beating the overplays that you're gonna see, and then he has just enough scoring pop to keep the defense honest and to remain a threat when he needs to score right like, he can face up and give a really good, hard left handed drive and get to the basket and finish. He's got a good floater, like a little left handed floater that he makes when he's finishing off of short roll

passes in pick and roll. And he's an excellent offensive rebounder. These are ways that he can keep the defense honest when guys try to help off of him or overplay what his teammates are doing. He is a rock solid starting caliber center in this league. On defense, he's a perfectly functional defensive center. He's not great at anything, but he's pretty good at everything. He's a decent shot blocking

rim protector. He's a decent ball screen defender who gets up to the level and is active with his hands. He does have a tendency to commit fouls compared to some of his peers at the center position, but he's active with his hands. I'd rather be active with your hands and commit more fouls than completely stand back with your hands and just let dudes shoot open shots all game long too. So again, he's not great at it,

but he's okay at it. He's decent on switches. He was really good statistically on switches in the regular season last year, and only okay in the playoffs. But overall, I think he's a fine switch defender. And then he's a very good defensive rebounder. So these are all things that make him into just a solid center, which in the context of what Oklahoma City needs from him, is perfect. He can anchor bench units, so like some of his defensive limitations aren't as big of a deal because he's

anchoring bench units. And then when Chet is out there, it gives okay see a big look. Puts Chet and help and unlocks a whole other form of defense that they can get to that they wouldn't be able to get to otherwise. What does that mean? Why is it that Hartenstein can unlock more for Oklahoma City defensively because it allows Chet to operate out of ball screens. Right, very simple way to put it. If Cheed is at the five, he's probably going to be guarding fives. Chet

is guarding fives. They're going to bring fives into ball screens, and his job is going to be to come up to the level of the screen to handle the ball

handler coming downhill. Most teams now have to bring their ball handler or their ball screen defender up a little bit more because so many perimeterive players in the NBA now are so good at coming over the top of those screens and hitting shots like contested mid range shots, floaters, threes, when guys die on screens, that sort of thing you like. The guard play is just so good, especially in the

Western Conference. You gotta have guys that come up to the level of the screen, right, And so if the big man has to come up to the level of the screen, then he can't be in help. He's not

around the basket as much. Right. In a lot of cases, it forces you to defend the ball screen three round two by bringing another defender over to handle the role man as chet is up at the level and the role man gets behind him, right, and that low man in a lot of situations for the Thunder in years past, was a player that was either not particularly athletic like Josh Gitty, or not particularly tall like the rest of the guys in the lineup, right, and that is just

a little bit difficult to work with as a defensive foundation. Right when Hartenstein is on the floor, you can ask him to defend the other team center, you can ask him to defend ball screens. This allows Chet to guard the weakest offensive player among the one through four spots, and then in most cases he can operate as a lowman. What that means is when Hartenstein comes up to the level of the screen to guard the ball handler and the screener gets behind him, Chet is the guy that's

on the backside. Very tall, very long, very athletic. He can help on the role man while also having the physical tools to be able to recover and guard that corner shooter. Right. That is the dynamic we're talking about here. This is what made Yannis one of the best defensive players in the world. His ability to partner with Brook Lopez as the hell defender, as the low man who

is not in the ball screen. That is a look that Oklahoma City basically didn't have before this deal, and so it unlocks a lot in terms of defensive versatility for this Thunder team. So two massive role player upgrades that specifically addressed the three biggest weaknesses that this Oklahoma City roster had. The three biggest weaknesses were Josh Gitty was a clunky fit with the starters, good player, just kind of a bad fit teams regarding him with centers,

and sagging in the paint. It was an issue to their frontline size. They were a horrific defensive rebounding team, and they were vulnerable to centers that could throw Chet around because they were too big and strong for him. And then three versatility, they just didn't have a ton of flexibility to change the way they play on either end of the floor. Crusoe and Hartenstein provide multiple answers to all three of those issues, the Josh Gitty problem.

Now you have three different five man groups that all make perfect sense. Shay J. Dow Lou Dort, Crusoe, Chet, shae jadab Cruso, Chet, Hartenstein, shae jadab Dort, Chet Hartenstein. All three of those five man groupings are substantially better fits on both ends of the floor than what they had to work with last year. Completely solves that problem frontline size well. Hartenstein makes your front line substantially bigger, stronger,

and more physical. And gives you a two big look just like fundamentally alters the physical profile of the team. And then lastly, now you have all sorts of versatility on both ends of the floor, Cruso gives you optionality for guarding opposing stars. Like Cruso's a little bit quicker, Dort is a little bit stronger, right, So like now you can kind of tinker with who they guard based

on what actually suits their defensive skill sets. Not to mention you now had Originally you had Lou Dort, let's call it thirty five to forty minutes a night of top tier perimeter defense, and then you had other good perimeter defenders on the team, but not like top tier guys. Now you have forty eight minutes to top tier perimeter

defense held more than forty eight minutes. If Lou plays around, you know, thirty thirty five minutes and so plays twenty five ish minutes a game, you're looking at fifty five ish minutes of top tier perimeter defense that you're able to deploy over the course of a game. That's a real asset. Isaiah Hartenstein unlocks several different styles on both ends of the floor. On offense, there are five out concepts you can run now that Hartenstein was better at.

Like Hartenstein, Chet's a better basketball player than Hartenstein. No one's arguing that, But Hartenstein he's a better screener, he's a better passers. He's just a little bit more used to playing that like five out kind of folkrum on the offensive end of the floor. And so he unlocks some stuff in the five out concepts that Chet wasn't able to do. Chet able to run action. Now you're gonna have to guard Chet with certain types of players that can deal with his tools. Those types of players

tend to struggle to navigate screens. Now you can have Chet operating in screening action with the ball in his hands. We saw an example of that in preseason where he got a dunk out of it, right, So, like that's a concept that you can get into Hartenstein high low come. We saw examples of passers at the top of the key and Chet and Isaiah Hartenstein screening for each other underneath the basket to try to create advantage situations. Those are looks that they didn't have in years past. Isaiah

is a professional big man. Chet is more of a primitive player that can do big man's stuff. Hartenstein unlocks some of the stuff that Chet's not particularly good at. He gives him a bunch more scheme versatility. And then on defense, as we talked about the two big look, that's something that they might absolutely need for certain matchups.

Right teams like the Lakers, teams like the Denver Nuggets, teams like the Minnesota Timberwolves, teams with a lot of physical power on that frontline, they're gonna need bigger looks. That's something they can go against. Right bully ball centers Nikole Jokic, Usuf Nurkic, Demonis Sabonis, even ad to a certain extent, these are guys that Hartenstein is a better look for than Chet is. And so there's just so much more versatility and malleyability with this team on both

ends of the floor. With the signings of Caruso or the trade for Cruso and the signing of Isaiah Hartenstein. Other things to watch with the Thunder this year. One hunting more threes. The Thunder were number one in three point percentage last year, but they were twentieth and three point attempts per one hundred possessions. They were top ten in mid range volume they took eleven mid range shots

per game. So far in preseason, they've only taken eight mid range shots per game, and they are sixth in three point attempts per one hundred possessions so far among preseason teams. So like, they have clearly been trying to shift their shot profile a little bit. Shay and Jalen Williams in particular looks like they're looking to take more pull up threes off the dribble, and again, the pull up twos are important. Those are big playoff shots. Those

are shots that you can get to consistently. They're coverage beaters. We've seen Shay, even just in last year's playoff run, be able to lean on that skill in big moments to generate offense. No one's saying stop taking mid range shots altogether, but if you can take it from eleven to eight and you turn those three into three point shots or high quality grim attempts, that is an improvement in your overall shot profile. And I think that that's

something we can keep an eye on. Specifically, Shay and j Dubb looking for more pull up threes driving kick decisions is something I want to keep an eye on this year. The Thunder offense was not great in the postseason. They had just a one to ten point nine offensive rating wasn't good in either round as it worse against the Pelicans, was only one twelve against Dallas and down

substantially from where their regular season efficiency was. It actually reminds me of some of the stuff that we saw from Boston in years past, where like they need to get better at being more deliberate about passing up okay shots or good like ok ish shots early in the clock to try to find better shots and then lean more on the tougher shots in late clock situations when

you have to rim decisions. Was a big issue in the Dallas series, where guys would beat guys off the dribble and then try to go make some sort of crazy contested finish in traffic when there were kickout reads that were available. Again, but there's a level that Boston got to last year in addition to their talent, where they got super deliberate about they're spacing and super deliberate

about their process. Let's beat somebody off the dribble, Let's make a couple kickout reads, Let's get the ball driving and kicking and see if we can't get great shots out of it. That made them more resilient as an offense, right. I want to see some of that from Oklahoma City, just getting a little bit more deliberate about chasing great shots. Chet's perimeter skill development. Two big lineups with Isaiah Harten sign on the floor will put more stress on Chet's

ability to shoot, dribble or pass. In the playoffs, he shot twenty six percent from three and had nineteen turnovers

to twenty one. As says he was a rookie. Not trying to overreact to that, but his development in those areas will be an important factor in their ability to actually go to two big looks when it matters, because if they go too big but they feel like they can guard Chet, the opponents feel like they can guard Sheet relatively easily because he hasn't developed enough on the skill front, then it kind of defeats the purpose if you just suddenly can't score the basketball, right and as

we saw, the Thunder offense did a bog down at stretches in the playoffs last year. Keep an eye on Chets perimeter skill development, and then lastly, what kind of leap are we gonna get out of j Dub this year as a rookie, he had fourteen points per game on sixty percent true shooting. Last year, nineteen points per game on sixty two percent true shooting in his second year, and then nineteen points per game on fifty four percent tru shooting in the playoffs. Where's he gonna get to

this year? Is he gonna get up to twenty two points a game? He's gonna get up to twenty four points per game? Is he gonna make an All Star team? Is he gonna make Is he gonna be in consideration for All NBA at the tail end of the year. Probably not, But like, how how much of a development are we gonna get out of j Dub this year? How much closer is he going to get to the idealized version of himself. That's a big variable in how things turn out for the Thunder this year, because here's

the thing. When push comes to shove, he is the number two option on a Bona FID Championship contender. A lot of big moments this year, a lot of big stretches, a lot of big possessions are gonna rest in Jadubb's hands. So his development will be a big swing factor for this team. In summary, on Oka see, I think this is a total ass kicker of a regular season team. They have six starting caliber players in a bunch of

different configurations. They have a deep bench of athletic young players who all play on both ends of the floor pretty well. They have a bona fide MVP candidate leading the way in Shag Gildes. Alexander All goes far to say I would be shocked if they weren't the number one seed in the West. Like I think they're gonna be the number one seed. I wouldn't be surprised if they had a three to four game advantage over the

rest of the field. As far as the playoffs go, they should feel internally like they have a good shot to beat anybody out West. Now that they have this big look, the two big look, it gives them much more to deal with teams like Denver or Minnesota or the Lakers. They came extremely close to beating Dallas last year, and they're more well equipped to beat them now. They got another big, strong defender to throw at Luca. They

got demolished on the glass in that series. Dallas rebounded a third of their own misses in that second round series. You can imagine how much Hartenstein could help with that. Like, I think I would pick Oklahoma City to beat Dallas they were to play again this year. They match up super well with teams that have perimeter speed, like teams like Golden State and Sacramento rely on like quick guards to generate offense. Oklahoma City's bigger and faster on the

perimeter than those teams. They're built perfectly for that. They have length for pull up shooting teams like Phoenix or New Orleans that They're just built really well. I think they are a rock solid championship contender. I think they have as good a chance to win the title as anybody in the league, aside from maybe Boston, and you could argue they have the best set of tools to deal with Boston as well should they meet in the finals. So I'm super interested to see where they can get to.

I'm super excited to cover them closely this year. I've always been fascinated by the idea of scar tissue, too, like how a team responds to a disappointing playoff loss, Like I mean, they had a lead in Game six that they could have had a Game seven at home if they get a stop on that final possession. How

much did that hurt those guys? How much is that scarring those guys emotionally in the way that they play, so that when they get out their next time, there's another layer of desperation and intensity that reflects in the way that they play like that. That's something I'm just really curious to see and I to keep an eye on this year and just how they look heading into this opportunity where there's some real pressure, all right. Number

two the Denver Nuggets quick off season recap. They lost in Pavis called Well Pope, Justin Holliday, and Reggie Jackson. They added dal Ron Holmes. He's a backup center who got hurt. He'll be out for the season, but a backup center that I think is fascinating. I'm curious to see how he turns out in the long run. Dario Sarch and Russell Westbrook on the Russell Westbrook front, I've talked about him extensively this preseason, and I'm not gonna talk about him too much more. He's just a more

volatile version of Reggie Jackson. He'll have higher highs and he'll have lower lows. That's just the Russell Westbrook experience. I'm not gonna talk very much about Russ this year. Nobody can handle it. He's the biggest roarshacked test in the NBA. You either see it or you don't. I'm not gonna get into those arguments with people. It's just

not a big enough deal too. I don't think Russ is gonna make that big of a difference for this team either way, because they're not going to be closing games or going down in the playoffs with him on the floor, and in all likelihood he's a backup guard. But I just view him as a more volatile version of Reggie Jackson. If you're interested in more of a breakdown of Russ, just go back to my breakdown of the Boston Celtics Denver Nuggets game from the first game

of preseason. Darios rich good backup center option. One of the things that I've always found interesting with Denver is their bench units. Most teams defend Denver bench units by switching, so it kind of turns into Jamal Murray or Aaron Gordon match up hunting. Dario Sarich gives them another option to help hunt matchups in those situations. He personally shot fifty seven percent out of the post Lie year with Golden State was really good in post up situations, including passes.

It just gives him another option to, you know, send him up to run a ball scream with Jamal Murray that probably is going to lead to a switch, at which point Jamal doesn't have to just attack the big on the switch, he can also dump it into Dario Sarge and Darius Sarge can go to work in the post.

Hopefully that generates more rotation situations for them. Denver's bench has been bad even when they won the title, So like, there's not really they have nowhere to go but up on that and on that side of things, and so like, it just kind of gives it a lot more margin fair because they're already they've already been so bad on the bench. Christian Brown moving into the starting lineup, he's not the offensive player that KCP is. He was four for nineteen on jump shots in the playoffs. He's one

for eight so far in preseason on jump shots. Most importantly, the teams aren't guarding him out there when he catch in preseason, when he's coming off with the starters and getting dribble handoffs, guys are going underneath the pick and just basically can seating the shot to him. So he's gonna need to eventually hit shots more consistently, especially in terms of just the overall spacing, but he can be

helpful in other ways. He's a big, strong athlete, right so off ball screening, cutting corner crashes, he's the getting offensive rebounds just by being a better athlete running out of the corner, transition pushes, just kind of hitting the jets in transition when he sees angles. There are ways for him to compensate for the KCP offensive gap, but he is a legitimate size and athleticism upgrade over KCP, and I think Christian Brown is overall a better and

more versatile defender. One of the big things I've been talking a lot about over the course of the summer is the concept of keeping Aaron Gordon in help. One of the issues that Denver has had, especially in the Western Conference that has all these star forwards, right Like in the Western Conference, it's like here comes Lebron, you know, in years past, here comes Kawhi, here comes Kevin Durant.

You know, it's just it's big star forward after big star forward, and so the option that Denver had in those cases was to put Aaron Gordon on him because KCP just wasn't big and strong enough to guard those kinds of forwards. And as soon as you put Aaron Gordon on a perimeter defender that is generating shots now all of a sudden, if the defense skews that way and you end up in rotation, now on the backside, you don't have six ' ten Aaron Gordon and help you have him on the ball, and so your help

side defense just becomes smaller, less athletic, less impactful. By virtue of Christian Brown being bigger and stronger than KCP and he is big and strong enough to guard forwards, that allows you to keep Aaron Gordon and help more frequently, which will help your defensive rebounding and help your help side defense and just in general make you bigger and more athletic a lot. There's a trade off going from

KCP to Christian Brown. I think ACP is a better player than Christian Brown at this point in his career, but that gap is smaller than I think people think, and I don't think Christian Brown going into the starting lineup is that much of a downgrade. They definitely need some of these young guys to pop in terms of just their depth for the regular season. Like Julian Strawther, he's been shooting the ball well in preseason, how well is he gonna play this year? Peyton Watson, he's been

dealing with the hamstring injury. Young guys popping will go a long way towards helping them in the regular season. But there's no question that this Denver team is a lot younger and not as deep as they were when they won the title. We can like hope for a certain amount of development in progress, but there's really only one surefire way that Denver can maintain their high ceiling in this phase of their timeline. In terms of roster building, Yokich and Murray have to get back to what they

were in twenty twenty three. Both guys declined last year. Jokicch wasn't as good defensively in twenty twenty four as he was in twenty twenty three, and he completely lost the ability to shoot the basketball relative to where he was a Yokics jump shot in the playoffs last year. Each single jump shot was worth zero point three to eight points less per shot than it was worth in

the title year. Think about that, four tenths of a point per shot worse than what it was when they won the title, and it became a massive problem, especially in the Minnesota series, where like he started popping in ball screens and Minnesota was like, go ahead, shoot it out there, We're not worried about it. And again that was a huge part of their offense in the title run.

Yokitch made thirty five threes in the title run and that doesn't even factor in the fact that he was driving closeouts in those situations as guys were chasing him off the line. One more stat to drive this home. In twenty twenty three, Jo Kich rolls which includes pops, We're worth one point two six points per possession in this last playoff run one point zero seven, so two

tenths of a point worse. Converting role possessions spot up possessions in the title year one point one six last year in the playoffs one point zero zero, so point one six points per possession worse. Yo Kich with a deadly jump shot is by far the best player in the NBA. Yo Kitch with a broken jump shot is the best player in the NBA, but by a slim margin, Like in my opinion, I haven't met number one, but

I think Luca's right there. When you'll get to shooting forty five percent from three, no one can mess with him. He's just better than everybody by a wide margin. That's

the difference. And then lastly, obviously that defense and conditioning piece, where it's like, looks like he ran out of gas a little bit in the last year's playoffs and guys were just starting to beat him to the basket, beat him offensive rebounds, and some of that was He's just played a ton of basketball over the course the last couple of years, right, But like him getting back to defensively where he was in twenty twenty three and as a shooter where he was in twenty twenty three, that's

a massive influx of talent to this roster and their ability to win games. Jamal Murray will keep it real simple. In the twenty twenty three playoffs, he averaged twenty six points on fifty nine percent true shooting. In the twenty twenty four playoffs, he averaged twenty one points on forty seven percent true shooting. Yes, he heard his calf, but he was already struggling before that happened. The two game winners against the Lakers salvaged what was a pretty bad

playoff run for him. He had more shot at ten then points in this playoff runt. So like, if he can get back in shape, if he can get healthy and get back to that level, that goes a long way towards buying them margin for air. So kind of in synopsis here, everyone seems ready to give up on

the Denver Nuggets. I saw another anonymous executive quote the other day about how the Nuggets are stuck and overrated because Michael Porter Junior is a one way player and Jamal Murray's on the decline and all this kind of stuff. I obviously still have them as my second best team in the entire league. So why am I still so high on the Denver Nuggets. I'm gonna put it in a very simple way to start. In twenty twenty three, when Yokich and Murray were at the top of their games,

they demolished everyone. They played good teams loaded with stars in every round, and they weren't even remotely threatened on their way to getting the trophy. In twenty twenty four. Everything went wrong right. They lost depth, they lost Bruce Brown, they lost Jeff Green. Jokic declined to a certain extent,

Jamal Murray declined to a certain extent. A bunch of stuff went south for them, and they were still up by twenty in the second half of Game seven with a trip to the Western Conference Finals on the line. And if they would have gotten to the Western Conference Finals, I would have picked them to be Dallas. They certainly

would have been favored in Vegas. Dallas doesn't have the front line to deal with Jokic the way that Minnesota did in terms of like big strong athletes on the front line that can bang with him, like Denver would have been favored. Maybe Dallas wins, who knows, but Denver would have been favored. So, even with everything going south, they were this close to being favored in the conference finals to go to the NBA Finals. So, like, think

about how high that is as a floor. The team was worse by almost every measure, and they were basically one bad run, a few minutes of bad basketball away from being favored to go to the finals. That was so much going wrong. Why is their floor that high? Because they have the best player in the world by some margin depending on how well he shoots the jump shot, and they have a perfectly compliment and starting five Aaron Gordon is still one of the best four men in

the league. Michael Porter Junior is still one of the very best weak side spacers in the league who's also a good health defender and a good defensive rebounder. Jamal Murray still makes for a devastating two man game with then Kol Jokich. It's a rock solid foundation and so if Jokich and Murray can return to form, they can just be that much better. People are wishing and hoping on the downfall of the Denver Nuggets, and I'm not

there yet. They accomplished too much last year for so much going wrong, and I think a lot more is going to go right this season. They are my pick to win the Western Conference this year. All right, guys, that's all I have for today. We'll be back tomorrow with some preseason reaction, getting to some of the teams we haven't hit yet. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting the show and I will see you then the volume. What's so, guys? As always, I appreciate

you for listening to and supporting OOPS tonight. It would actually be really helpful for us if you guys would take a second and leave a rating and a review. As always, I appreciate you guys supporting us, but if you could take a minute to do that, I'd really appreciate it.