What a time!
If you’re a sports fan, this is the best time of the year. The ridiculously long Major League Baseball season is finally over and games are finally watchable. The NHL regular season is right around the corner, as is the NBA season. And of course, the king of the castle, the NFL, is past the quarter mark and chugging along towards the postseason.
If you’re a sports fan and you’re married, unfortunately your wife probably hates this time of the year. If she is a sports fan, then this is the time of year that will bring you closer.
This time of the year is great for all of those reasons, but one sticks out to me: the NBA season, particularly the Denver Nuggets season.
With one preseason game under this young team’s belt, games two and three come this weekend in Los Angeles against another young Lakers squad.
Nuggets head coach Michael Malone joked Thursday at practice that the lure of LA’s nightlife doesn’t bother him, because most of his team is too young to get into any clubs anyway. Malone also spoke of his veterans setting the right example for the younger players, and with vets like Gallo, Wilson Chandler and Jameer Nelson, I would say they right message is and will be sent.
The bad news from Nuggets practice on Thursday was that Gary Harris could miss up to four weeks dealing with a groin injury. It is early and you would obviously love to go an entire season without injury, but if it has to happen, this is the time.
“It leads to great opportunities for guys like Will Barton, Jamal Murray and Malik Beasley who played well up in Calgary” Coach Malone replied to a question about what Harris’ injury means for the team.
A backcourt of Emmanuel Mudiay and Jamal Murray is intriguing, for a couple of reasons. The most obvious being that both were picked at No. 7 in the previous two drafts. But one reason I want to see if the two can work together in the backcourt is because of the way the game is changing. Mudiay, a pass-first point guard, and Murray, a pure shooter who can really run the pick and roll, have the opportunity to perform an extremely dynamic backcourt.
Knock down the three ball and play good defense, and you can win championships — the Warriors are living proof. The team is and will continue to make defense a priority under Malone, and shooting the ball well is a trained skill, which means practice will eventually make perfect.
Don’t get me wrong, the Nuggets still have a long way to go to get on the same level as the Warrior,s but something else Coach Malone said on Thursday that all of Nuggets Nation should be excited about is that he thinks they will have the ability to play “big, small and then really small.”
Good teams play their style of basketball and make other teams adjust, the Nuggets can do that with this group of guys, and it all starts this season!
