All-star weekend is over, and even though the Denver Nuggets don’t play again until Friday, the front office has plenty on their plate this week. The NBA trade deadline is this Thursday, and it’s widely expected that the Nuggets are going to be one of the most active teams on the trade market.
That’s because the Nuggets have only one player that’s untradable – rookie center Jusuf Nurkic. Everyone else is in play, even, according to Grantland’s Zach Lowe – point guard and best player Ty Lawson. According to Lowe (who breaks down all of Denver’s possible trade partners and much more) the Nuggets have already had talks with the Boston Celtics about Lawson. In addition to Lawson, rumors have centered around guard Arron Afflalo and forward Wilson Chandler as players who could help contenders, though the Nuggets would no doubt like to rid themselves of a few more contracts along the way.
Of course rumors always run rampant at this time of year, and it’s not as if the Nuggets and general manager Tim Connelly have opened the doors and said everything must go. As Lowe points out, Connelly and the Nuggets did really well in getting two first-round picks for center Timofey Mozgov earlier this year, and that success might have them thinking that they can get similar steep ransom for players like Chandler and Afflalo.
But Mozgov was almost too logical a fit for the Cavaliers – and Cleveland, at the time, was bordering on desperate, a franchise that went all-in and needed this year to pay off. There’s not really another team out there that fits that profile, excluding maybe the Thunder (hence the persistent talk about Oklahoma City’s Reggie Jackson).
If the Nuggets are (as reported) asking for at least a first-round pick for Afflalo, it would take a arm and leg to pry Lawson away from Denver. Connelly will also have a tough time finding suitors for center JaVale McGee, and Kenneth Faried has done the Nuggets no favors with a disappointing season right after signing a new contract.
So it’s not exactly a fire sale here in Denver, although things do get wacky around this time of year. It’ll be interesting to see if the Nuggets have to come down on their asking price, but Connelly’s track record – however limited – is pretty good in this department.
He’s never had an opportunity like this, however. The Nuggets look like they’re headed towards a full-boar rebuild, and how the organization makes out this week can go a long way towards deciding how long that rebuild will take.
By the time the Nuggets do take the court Friday after their mid-season intermission, it could be with a whole new cast of characters.
Zach Marburger is a staff writer for Mile High Sports. He can be reached via email at zmarburger@milehighsports.com or on Twitter @BurchBurger.
