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About this Episode
On the latest Pickaxe and Roll, Ryan Blackburn reacts to the Denver Nuggets loss vs the Minnesota Timberwolves on Sunday, discussing what went wrong and where the Nuggets are struggling the most. He focuses on Cam Johnson and his latest issues, injury updates for Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson, and more.
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All right, all right.
I'm here.
I am here.
Welcome into Pickaxe and Roll.
Brats by our good friends here at Mile High Sports.
I am your host, Ryan Blackburn, NBA Blackburn on Twitter.
Part of the Mile High Sports podcast now,
and I am here.
I am ready to discuss the Denver Nuggets
and a loss yesterday to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
The Nuggets will play tonight on the second night
of a back-to-back against the Utah Jazz.
We'll kind of bridge those two games.
And in the middle, we're going to talk about Cam Johnson
because I know a lot of people have a lot of thoughts
about Cam Johnson.
I just did some data work that I hope
is going to be valuable for people in terms of exploring
what the issues are, why Nuggets fans feel the way
that they feel, even if the behind the scenes numbers
and impact things are just fine.
We'll get into it for sure.
There's a lot to discuss, though.
There's a lot to discuss.
Denver losing the game that they lost yesterday
after losing the game that they lost to OKC.
It's not a great sign.
It's not a great sign for where Denver is.
Game 61 of the season, the Nuggets post-All Starbreak
have not been very good.
It feels like leading into that game yesterday, David Adamen
said, and I agree with him, that the games against Boston
and OKC were pretty good in terms of what
you want to see from Denver, what you want to see
from the Nuggets and what they're trying to put out
on a consistent basis.
They were physical.
They were intentional.
They were putting in a high level of effort
and they executed pretty well on the defensive ends
of the floor specifically.
But the offense has been struggling
when Denver has been really amping things up.
They've been playing on a physical level.
And I think that those two things are connected.
I think the Nuggets have lost their consistency
and their efficiency with the added level of physicality
and the added level of effort that they've been putting in
on the less glamorous end of the floor.
Only the best teams in the NBA are capable of doing
what you want the Nuggets to do on a consistent basis,
which is to play both ends of the floor,
to dominate games, to go in by 20 to 25 plus.
Like those are what the best teams in the NBA do
and they can do it on both ends because they are capable.
They have depth, they have star power,
they have all the the mixings.
And this is what Nuggets fans thought
that they would have this year, right?
Like maybe not an elite defense,
but certainly a good enough one that it takes advantage
of the fact that they've got a great offense.
But it takes a level of commitment
on the defensive end of the floor in order to do it.
So it's gonna be interesting to see
whether the Nuggets will get better
when Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson do return.
We'll talk about that a little bit for sure.
But I do want to go over a couple of things.
Let's focus on the game yesterday first.
We'll talk about Cam Johnson in the second segment.
And then in the third segment,
we're gonna do best worst case scenarios
as well as the Peyton Watson and Aaron Gordon
potential returns very shortly.
So we'll talk about it in just a bit.
Yesterday the Nuggets lose 117 to 108
to the Minnesota Timberloves.
Not a great performance.
It started off pretty well.
We're Denver got out to a 31 to 22 lead.
It looked like they were in position, in control for sure.
Lots of good things that I think that we saw.
Unfortunately, that was given up immediately
and then actually extra given up
because Denver won the first quarter by nine.
And it was a nine to zero run
that Minnesota went on in the first two minutes
of the second quarter.
That lineup that featured Bruce Brown,
Tim Hardaway, Cam Johnson, Ziknaji,
Jonas Valentinus.
All five of those guys get an F minus for that stretch
and pretty much an F minus for the game.
If I'm being honest, like the only guy who I actually,
I think Tim and Bruce were fine for the rest of that stretch.
But obviously Tim Hardaway was a minus 17
and a game the Nuggets won by nine.
Bruce Brown was a minus 12
and a game the Nuggets are lost by nine, excuse me.
Jonas Valentinus, minus 15 in his 10 minutes.
Just really, really ugly stuff
from the non-Yokitch minutes
and the stretches that the Nuggets have played
without like their best player on the floor.
And this is a little bit more normal
in terms of what we've seen from Denver
and the weaknesses that they've had.
But like you expect a guy like Jonas Valentinus
to be able to be impactful in these situations,
especially when Denver is missing some of the guys.
You need somebody to step up
and he has not stepped up in the last couple of games.
Tim Hardaway, Bruce Brown have been fine
but they're only like two guys
and you would really want somebody like Cam Johnson
to step up in this situation
and he obviously has not done that.
Now we got a little bit of context in last night
where clearly dealing with an ankle injury,
I would expect him to miss tonight's game
against the Utah Jazz.
I don't think I've seen an injury report come out yet
for that, but what I will say is that, look,
Yokitch was fantastic for much of that game yesterday.
Murray was okay.
I would call it a pretty average game.
With the baseline that he has established
for much of this season has been really good.
This was averaging nine of 22 game,
two of six from three, missed a couple free throws
which continue to be a problem for Denver.
Tim Hardaway missed three free throws.
Really bad.
Jamal Murray missed two.
Really bad.
Yokitch missed two.
I don't have the same expectations for his free throws
that I do for the guards, that's for sure,
but still really bad.
But with Yokitch, he went 15 of 26.
He had 35 points on 26 shots.
Only took three point attempts.
The Nuggets as a team only took 22.
I thought that that was interesting.
There were very much bothered
by the Minnesota perimeter defense.
Those guys ran Denver off the line
on a consistent basis, forced them
into some uncomfortable situations.
Minnesota shot 54% from the field and 39% from three.
Denver shot 48% from the field, 27% from three.
Like, look, it comes down to that pretty simply.
Denver only gave up seven offensive rebounds.
The offensive rebounding, not the issue for Denver.
The turnovers were honestly not the issue.
They each had the same amount of turnovers
as 14 as a team.
The bigger issue between those was that Minnesota
only conceded 11 points off of those turnovers to Denver
and Denver conceded 22 points off of their turnovers.
So same breakdown in terms of the amount of turnovers,
but it was what the teams did with it
and how they capitalized on those moments
that were really, really unfortunate.
That obviously translated into a fast break
of a 30 to six.
That's where the games really lost.
Where Minnesota was dynamic
and took advantage of those opportunities in transition.
Bones Highland had a really good game.
Iodosumu did things on both ends
and that really helped the team.
Anthony Edwards is a terror in transition when he gets going
and there were plenty of opportunity for Minnesota.
Jaden McDaniels was dominant.
He scored over Jamal Murray on a very consistent basis
when Jamal was matched up with him.
Nine of nine from two for Jaden McDaniels,
which needs to be like Denver's missing their forwards.
They're missing Peyton Watson and Aaron Gordon.
Those are the kinds of players
that would really help in these situations, for sure.
It's too bad that Denver has been put into that position,
but this is just another one where, like, look,
you can explain away this game.
And I can choose to explain away this game
if I want to.
Denver, like, been poor in Matt Nays all season.
They faced a really good team that was fully healthy
versus them who are not fully healthy.
But at some point, like you just got to rise above that
and play a good freaking game.
Like, it's been, it's been a while since Denver's had a moment
where they've risen above your expectations.
Pretty inexcusable, I would say.
The one time where they really did that,
they won by 54 points.
It's when they actually play well on both ends of the floor
and execute reasonably well and avoid their own gut-wrenching
mistakes.
They can be a really great basketball team.
Unfortunately, they have not done that
on a consistent basis.
And it sucks.
It's just really, really annoying.
Goodbye.
We are gonna say goodbye to you for a while.
Look, Denver is 37 and 24.
They are a good team, but they are not a great team.
And they have not been a great team for a long time.
There have been signs of this happening
over the course of this, this period.
January was good for Denver in terms of,
I think, the number of people who have been
a great team and they have not been a great team
for a long time.
January was good for Denver in terms of surviving
without Yokech, but as I've said it on here,
as I've said it on several platforms,
I even asked David Adamin about it.
Like, I even asked David Adamin about it.
Like, are you worried about burning the candle
at both ends in January?
And he said, yeah, but we don't really have a choice.
And that wasn't true.
They did have a choice.
They chose to actively go and try to win every single game.
That's the mentality that they like to put out there,
that they want to put out there and say, you know what, no.
Like, we don't have Yokech, we don't have Cam Johnson,
we don't have Peyton Watson,
we don't have Christian Brown or Aaron Gordon
or whoever it was at those points, doesn't matter.
We're gonna put our best foot forward
and we're gonna try to win.
And it helped them win some games in various moments.
But I do think, on top of as people have been
consistently saying, the week schedule definitely
was an aid in Denver's favor.
It's something that I said they played nine straight games
against the Eastern Conference.
It's not like they won all of those games,
but they won more than they would have
against the Western Conference during that stretch
because the West would have been like, all right,
Denver's real and we gotta really take advantage
of it, Eastern Conference doesn't care.
Like, they don't care about the nuggets,
especially a nugget scene that didn't have
Yokech or anybody.
So obviously Denver was able to take advantage of that,
but it burned them.
It burned them in a really horrible way.
And now looking at this team,
to me they just look worn down.
They just look like a team that does not
have their best stuff anymore.
And I do not know how they recover that.
I don't know what they're going to look like.
The hope is that Peyton Watson and Aaron Gordon
give them a boost when they do come back.
But the fact is that this is the group
that you're going to go to battle with, go to war with.
And it just looks so difficult for them right now.
And they cannot get out of their own way
with some of these mistakes.
They're trying, there's no question about the effort to me.
There's no question about the desire to win these games.
That's not the issue.
Are they committed to the game plan?
Yeah, are they committed to each other?
Yeah, that's not the issue.
Like last year you could say that that was part of the issue,
was that they were not listening to Michael Malone.
They were not listening to each other.
But this year, they are listening to each other.
And they're going through a rough patch.
Like this is very clearly a rough patch.
And I'm not sure if it is a rough patch
for the rest of the season.
Or if it is just a rough patch for the rest of time
that they don't have their main defensive guys
that connect what they're trying to do.
Not having, not only Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson,
but also Spencer Jones in the last game, it's just really tough.
Denver can't, they don't have any lineup versatility.
Everybody's complaining ad nauseam about like,
oh man, they're playing four guards again,
playing four guards again.
Okay, you want to play Cam Johnson
who was horrible in the last game
and also clearly has an ankle injury that he's dealing with.
You want to play Zeknoji?
Really? You really do?
You saw this last game.
You really want to.
So I understand why the coaches are doing what they're doing
and why they're playing the rotations that they're playing.
But they're just in a really compromised position again.
And it feels like over the course of the season,
they've been in compromised positions
over and over and over again.
And there has never been an advantage opportunity for them.
The one time recently that they had an advantage
was against Boston, where Boston was on the second night
of a back-to-back and the nuggets had two days off.
No crap, they won that game and they looked really good.
Denver also coming off of the loss that they were,
they were like, this is inexcusable.
We can't have this happen.
The Golden State game was horrible for them
and then had a couple days off, had a practice,
were talking about physicality and then they applied it
and lo and behold, they won the game.
They do not have that many matchup advantages
and rest advantages for the rest of the season.
They're gonna be playing pretty much every other day
or they're gonna be playing a back-to-back.
So they have to take advantage of the moments
where they do have a rest.
Tonight they play against Utah,
then they've got a couple days off
in preparation for the Lakers and the Nicks.
My guess is that they will be ready to go for those games.
I actually think that one or both of Aaron and Peyton
will be back for one of those games.
But I do think that at this stage,
Denver's not good enough as a team in their top level
and their top level consistency
that they can survive these absences,
the way that many thought that they could,
or they did for a while because they really did.
They did survive these absences for a long time.
But it does feel like everybody is consistently
like added disadvantage right now
and it is really starting to burn them.
It's really starting to hurt.
So we will see.
Okay, Tony's like, yeah, yesterday he was especially on
about D.A. Matt Ryan and folks at D.A. and VR
give him a pass for the most part though.
I think that D.A. has had a pretty good coaching season.
I think he's done pretty well with the hand
that he's been dealt from an injury perspective.
Do I think that he has been perfect?
Hell no.
Do I think that he had to step in in these situations,
especially with the Aaron Gordon playing back-to-backs,
Jamal Murray playing back-to-backs,
guys playing in a compromised situation?
Absolutely.
Do I think that he had to step in
in those situations to be tougher
and not bend to the will of the players to play?
Yeah.
Do I think that there are some concerns
about the clutch stuff?
Yeah, but that's not all this is.
That's not all that David Adamin does.
Absolutely.
That's not, if you think that's all it is,
then you're missing the points
and you just need to listen to somebody
who's in the building and listening to him
on a consistent basis.
Mr. Exquisite Nuggets says with a super chat,
no Ryan mainstream is calling nuggets overrated.
Boo.
I mean, can you blame the mainstream?
Yeah, everybody's like,
we're worried about the nuggets right now.
We don't think the nuggets are that great right now.
Have the nuggets given them any reason to doubt that?
No, no.
Like the nuggets are currently,
like well, actually, I think they're properly rated
because team like people are just
have made the adjustment of like,
okay, so they're they're gonna really struggle.
They're struggling and they are compromised.
But I do also think that everybody
understands the Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson absences
and how like certainly Aaron Gordon has been a big one
for Denver.
The nuggets have not had Yokech and Peyton Watson play together
or Yokech and Aaron Gordon play together
since mid-November.
It's March, Denver's played like 40 to 50 games since then.
Yeah, not not awesome.
Not awesome.
Thank you for the super chat, Mr. Exquisite Nugget.
Okay, let's take a break.
When we come back, I've got some numbers.
I want some some things I want to show
with regard to Cam Johnson and his role with the nuggets.
We'll be right back on Pickaxe and Roll.
But first, I want to tell everybody about the Vemos app.
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All right, we are back, pick Action Roll, Ryan Blackburn.
Thank you so much for tuning into the show.
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would really, really appreciate it.
There's been a lot of criticism of Cam Johnson
and it came to a head in the game yesterday
in which zero points, zero of six
from the field zero, four from three
got to the free throw line, zero times,
four rebounds, three assists, one turnover,
had four fouls, was a minus 13.
The game before on Friday, he played against Oklahoma City,
was a minus 25 in his minutes in a game
where Yokech was like plus 15
because the minutes where he was staggering
with the second unit where he's out there
with Jonas Valentinus, Bruce Brown, Tim Hardaway,
guys like that, those just weren't good enough.
Those weren't good enough minutes
and he is the guy that is being tasked
with orchestrating that unit
with being the bridge player.
It's not all on him in that situation
but like if he's going to be out there,
he has to be responsible for it
and the nuggets have to find ways
to help him out in that situation.
But he has to help himself out too.
What we did learn after the game
was that he's really dealing with an ankle injury.
And of course, whenever you get onto the injury report,
it means you're in a fair amount of pain.
I mean, you're in a fair amount of discomfort.
So I want to give him the benefit of the doubt
in that regard.
However, nuggets fans don't necessarily want me to do that.
They don't want to give Cam Johnson the benefit of the doubt
because it's been 37 games now of Cam Johnson.
He has been pretty shaky overall
in terms of what the nuggets can expect
from him on a night-to-night basis.
His role vacillates from somebody
that they feel like they can trust
to somebody that probably doesn't really deserve
to be out there and taking the shots
and the shot attempts that he has lately.
On the season, he's averaging 11.2 points per game,
3.8 rebounds and 2.3 assists.
Now, shooting efficiency wise has been pretty good.
He's at 44.5% from the field, 40.6% from three,
84.8% from the line.
When he's been able to get up shots for the most part,
he has been really good.
Obviously, he's struggled lately, post-all star break.
I think he's down to 27% from three,
which isn't that crazy against Boston.
He was three of six against Portland.
He was two of five.
He has had some decent shooting games,
but more often than not, it's been pretty shaky.
So you can understand why things have gone that way.
You feel pretty stressed out about Cam Johnson
and his overall role.
He has not played well for the Denver Nuggets.
And the thing that I think,
because I'm trying to figure out exactly
what people are most frustrated about with him,
what people are most bothered by in terms of his,
like what's the statistical production and things like that?
Because you go over the actual impact numbers
and the net rating stuff and what lineups he's contributing to
and things like that.
And the Nuggets are still playing pretty well
when he's on the floor overall.
When he's out there with Yokech, he's great.
When he's out there with Aaron Gordon, he's great.
When he's out there with Christian Brown,
he's generally pretty great.
Like when those starters have been together,
the Nuggets have been good.
And prior to this last couple of stretches
where it's just been absolutely horrible
with Jonas Valentinus,
the one starter that Jonas Valentinus is positive with
is Cam Johnson.
Like those minutes prior to,
like our pre-all star break will say,
have been pretty good.
And so you wonder why, like, okay, what's going on?
What's the issue?
To me, it's the production.
It's everybody is looking at the production.
Everybody looks at the box score
and they're thinking,
and Cam had eight points.
Man, Cam had four shots.
Man, Cam had four rebounds.
It's like, wow, pretty good rebounding day for Cam.
He's got four rebounds when Michael Porter Jr.
last year was averaging seven or eight
for the Nuggets on a consistent basis.
And you're looking at the production.
You're looking at the involvement
on a consistent basis.
And that has really changed things.
I went and did some digging.
I went and looked.
And I wanted to do this
because I thought that this was a good way
to visualize some of the issues that the Nuggets are having.
You want somebody whose usage is higher.
You want somebody whose usage is,
like, he's staying involved.
He's taking shots.
He's being involved in the offense
and being aggressive.
And Cam, for a lot of,
like, he does have positive qualities.
I know people don't want to think that he does,
but he, one of his positive qualities
is that he makes the right play more often than not.
With Michael Porter, that was a concern at times
where he was often in this battle of shot selection
and things like that and making the wrong decision
and a porousist to turn over ratio
on things of that nature.
I think these are things that he struggled with
throughout his time with the Nuggets.
But what he didn't struggle with was getting shots.
He's getting shot attempts
and getting the scoring and the consistency there
that you came to expect from a player
that makes that much money and plays that role.
If you're a starting small forward for the Nuggets
and especially if Aaron Gordon is out,
if Christian Brown is the role player that he is,
many people would want Cam Johnson
to be the third leading score for the Nuggets.
And that I think is a pretty reasonable request.
It's very reasonable.
It's as a Nuggets fan, you should be like,
yeah, if Aaron's out and if Christian plays,
like, Christian was out for much of his time,
he was dealing with injuries.
He gets a little bit of more of a pass
because his clearly he is still learning how to do this
and learning how to be more consistent to that regard.
But that was what you brought in Cam Johnson to be.
You brought him into be a pretty consistent starter.
Somebody who you could trust
and Nuggets fans don't feel like they can trust him.
Here's the number.
Here's a histogram for you.
On the X axis, on the bottom axis, the horizontal,
is Cam Johnson's rank among Nuggets players
and every single game, every single game
in terms of what his overall
was did he rank first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth,
seventh, eighth or ninth or tenth on the team
in total shot attempts?
And on the Y axis is how many times it happened
throughout this season.
Cam Johnson so far has three games
in which he's been the second highest ranked player
on the team in terms of the total shot attempts.
Third, he's done it six times,
fourth, he's done it nine times,
fifth, he's done it eight times,
sixth, he's done it five times, seventh, he's done it twice,
eighth has been once and ninth has been three times.
It's a relatively even distribution
with a peak levels of about the fourth or fifth highest
shot attempt rank on the team.
And this is not what Nuggets fans were expecting.
They're expecting him to be a little bit more
in the third range.
And there was one of the reasons why I put this together
was there was a something that Matt brought up to me last night
was that when Jamal Murray talking about the addition
of Cam Johnson says there's going to be
sometimes where he leads the team in scoring.
That just hasn't happened.
And in order to do that, you have to lead the team
in like volume.
That's what's going to happen for the most part.
You have to actually lead the team in opportunities
and volume and things of that nature.
And that hasn't happened for Cam Johnson this year.
Now, what I'm about to show you is pretty graphic.
What I'm about to show you is pretty,
you're gonna hate this.
Adjusted for total games played,
Cam Johnson's played 37 games out of like 61.
What we'll call it 37 out of 82.
This is the proportion of games that he's played.
Michael Porter Jr played 77 out of 82 games last year.
And so what I did was I put this histogram
in comparison to Michael Porter Jr's shot distribution.
And here's what it looks like.
Michael Porter Jr.
I have the tallies here.
He led the team in total shot attempts
seven times out of 77 games.
That was nine to 10% of the season.
He was second on the team in total shot attempts.
24 times.
He was third on the total shot attempts, 28 times.
He was fourth, 13 times.
Obviously they've played a different number of games.
So I adjusted this in terms of the actual
like total number of games played on the season.
But it is pretty clear what Nuggets fans feel like.
And how like this is a good visualization
in terms of what you were expecting
from Michael Porter Jr on a consistent basis,
what you got from Michael Porter Jr on a consistent basis
versus what Cam Johnson is doing
from a volume shooting perspective,
which is how most fans perceive this.
Now, one of the reasons why Cam Johnson's
distribution is like this versus Michael Porter's
shot distribution was like last year.
It was because there were definite stretches
during Michael Porter's season
where Jamal Murray was out more frequently.
Nicole Yokch missed some games obviously,
but obviously was very happy to pass the ball to Michael Porter.
Aaron Gordon missed a whole bunch of time,
but Aaron Gordon was missed time this year.
Christian Brown was just in his first season
as a starter, where this is the second season
as a starter and a little bit more of an opportunity here
to try to expand his game a little bit.
You've got Tim Hardaway coming off the bench
as opposed to Russell Westbrook.
Russ is more of a passer like he did score in volume
and did like take a lot of shots,
but I think Tim is somebody that they're trying to feature
as a score.
You've got Bruce Brown who's also filling a role.
You've got Jonas Valentinus,
who's you're going to try to feature a little bit more
than somebody like Deandre Jordan or Ziknaji, most certainly.
And yet, Aaron Peyton Watson has taken a step forward
in terms of what his role is for the team this year.
But Cam Johnson didn't overlap with Peyton Watson
in his breakout that much.
So this is to me the relative usage comparison
between those two guys.
It's night and day in terms of what you were expecting,
what you were going to get from Michael Porter Jr's role
on a consistent basis versus what you're getting
from Cam Johnson.
And I'm not really sure how to parse it.
I'm not really sure how to fully put this into context
for people, but it's clear that Cam Johnson is like very much
more evenly distributed.
His role doesn't necessarily matter.
He could be he could be second in terms of shot attempts,
but more often he's like fourth, fifth or sixth,
third, fourth, fifth or sixth.
With Michael Porter, he was either second or third.
And if he wasn't second or third, he was fourth or first.
Like that was the average for him about two and a half,
maybe three.
Whereas with Cam, it's like four and a half, closer to five.
I find this fascinating.
This is a graphic that I think I hope helps people
kind of contextualize that.
Now what I want to say in is this.
Shot attempts are not like inherently a value stat.
That is not how it works.
Yes, it does frame your role.
Yes, it does kind of try to contextualize
who has the largest role,
who has the highest expectations, things of that nature.
What is most valuable for the nuggets
is that they have a valuable offense.
Is that their offense generates a good shot.
Is that they are consistently generating
those like positive place on a consistent basis.
And in the Yokech led offense,
isn't it the theory behind the practice
that a good shot is the open shot?
It is not just a Yokech shot,
it is not just a Murray shot,
it is not just a Cam Johnson or Michael Porter shot or whoever.
It is about who is open
and where the ball ends up going is to the open guy.
That's at least the theory behind the practice.
But this is where I can understand
the feeling of nuggets fans.
Cam Johnson has not been in an opportunity
or has not, there was chosen to not be in the opportunity
to step up and take on more of a scoring responsibility.
And that is where I think people get very frustrated.
Cam fades into the background.
He's somebody that isn't always going to be aggressive
and try to make an impact in that way, shape, or form.
That's not how he's wired.
Michael Porter is wired as a scorer.
He is trying to score the basketball.
When he wants to make an impact,
he's going to go score the ball.
When Cam Johnson wants to make an impact,
he's going to try to make the right play.
He's been doing that less frequently of late.
He has had less success doing that of late.
Does it make him that much worse of a player?
No.
I actually don't think that he's that much worse of a player.
I think they're still in the same.
Like, Mike is really elevated in terms of his tier.
But Nuggets fans have to recognize that like,
some of the impact metrics that Mike is benefiting from
are very much tied to his usage
and would be tied to his usage again.
Cam Johnson would have a higher usage in Brooklyn
and would probably be just as successful.
What the Nuggets have to get to right now
is figuring out how they can incorporate Cam Johnson's skill set
without him having to be a volume scorer
because he's just not going to.
Like, it's not going to happen.
I thought that he would be a little bit more consistent
in terms of getting up shots
in terms of the Nuggets being able to feature him
on a consistent basis,
but it has not worked in that regard.
Now, the offensive rating for the team,
it's still the best in the NBA, I'm pretty sure.
I guess still a really good team
and Cam Johnson has contributed to that.
But the difference is he's contributed.
He has not been an integral part of what they have done
and the shot attempts, I think, reflect that.
Okay, let's take a break.
When we come back, we are going to discuss
best of worst case scenario for Denver going forward
as well as imminent returns for Aaron Gordon
and Peyton Watson.
We'll be right back here on.
Sorry, I completely forgot.
When I was gonna press the button.
Okay, there we go.
We will be right back here on, pickaxonal.
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All right, we are back, pickaxe and all Ryan Blackburn here.
Thank you so much for tuning into the show.
I hope you guys enjoyed that in terms of the context stuff.
That actually took me a little bit of time to prepare
because I went through every single game.
That's why I was a little bit late to the show.
I went through every single game log for each of those guys.
And I ranked Cam Johnson's shot attempts
versus Michael Porter's shot attempts.
So hopefully that is a pretty decent breakdown
of what you are seeing and trying to contextualize it
at least a little bit.
Okay, the nuggets at this point have 21 games remaining.
They have a game tonight against the Utah Jazz.
I expect them to be better for that game.
I expect them to be in a decent situation
where they can win that one.
Obviously Utah has dealt with several injuries themselves
and whether they are legitimate or not remains to be seen.
But the nuggets at this point,
they have not submitted their injury report
as of the most recent releasing.
Of the NBA's injury report for Utah,
Jaren Jackson is out to Walker Kessler's out.
Kevin Love is out due to rest.
Larry Markin is out use of knurkages out
in Vince Williams, Jr. just towards ACL.
So like they have no bigs remaining among like who I would
expect them to be out there.
Kevin Love is out due to rest.
They're giving the nuggets a gift here.
They do not have any bigs to match up with Yokech.
If I look at their roster and I look at who they currently
have at this point, Kyle Filipowski will probably start
at center and then Mobamba, shout out Big Mo.
They've got Oscar Shibwe as well off the bench.
So as a two-way contract.
So he's probably going to play.
But Mobamba I'm pretty sure has a 10-day contract
for them if I'm not mistaken.
And that will be who they feature going forward.
So Denver's got a like Kyle Filipowski will shoot.
He will probably score more points against Nicole Yokech
than you would want.
And just guys like Isaiah Collier, Kianta George
and the back court, Kianta George is pretty good.
Isaiah Collier can get downhill and we'll do some things.
But like this has to be a game that is featuring Yokech
and Valentinus for sure.
They will definitely be out there.
Yokech and Valentinus for sure, they will definitely figure it out.
Just laughing at it.
Be respectful, be respectful folks.
It's not a don't do that to me.
So Denver should be able to win this game tonight.
If they do win this game, I don't want to put the card too far
before the horse, but like look, they are currently 37
and 24, I believe they'll be 38 and 24 after this.
The Lakers are 36 and 24.
Denver's four and six in their last 10.
Obviously they have really struggled out of the break.
The Lakers will play and then Denver and the Lakers will play
on Thursday later this week.
That's a huge one.
The Lakers, the nuggets and the nicks will play on that Friday.
The second nine to go back to back.
And then you start to get into some really uncomfortable scheduling stuff for Denver.
They've got a lot of issues that they have to go over.
And they've got a pretty tough matchup against the.
I obviously you've got the Lakers in the next coming up.
But then you've got the OKC Thunder.
You've got the Houston Rockets.
You've got the spurs on the second night of the back to back.
You've got the Lakers again.
And then you've got the sixers.
Denver's got some issues that they're going to have to go over here.
And they have to figure this out.
I guess there's no doubt in my mind that they are not in a good place.
Yeah, they're not in a good place.
Ryan, and this is from scammer and Johnson.
I'm sure sure this was a nuggets fan who's really happy with Cam Johnson right now.
Ryan, it's time to stop making fun of the Lakers for being mid because the Denver and the Lakers are in the same tier.
Both not serious contenders, both bad at home.
I think the nuggets are better than the Lakers.
I think that the nuggets have been way more impacted by injuries than the Lakers have.
Yes, the Lakers have had injuries themselves.
Austin Rees was out for a while.
Luca Donchitz was out for a stretch.
LeBron James took him a while to get ready for the season.
But like they have also been very bothered.
And I just think that Denver's like their ceiling is still so much higher than anything that the Lakers can provide.
Because Denver does have a whole bunch of guys and like you can be mad about Cam Johnson all you want to.
But like you'd rather have him than Rui Hatchimura, I think.
I think I would.
Rui is a pretty good player, but I think I'd rather have Cam Johnson the Rui Hatchimura.
And that like Rui is maybe their fourth best player.
Like Denver has so many different pieces that they will in theory be able to go to when Aaron Gordon and Thierry
and Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson come back.
And here's here's the kicker.
Like I think that one of those guys at least will be back on Thursday.
I think like Denver's going to try to get them back over the course of these next few days.
I don't think they're going to be tonight.
But they're they're getting close.
Like this is what David Adam said.
He would like to have those guys for if he can the final 20 games of the season.
And if he did, then like Denver's in a really good spot.
Like Denver's still in a really good spot to be able to rattle off some wins to get themselves a little bit more consistency.
Because one thing that Jamal Murray said last night in his post game presser stands out to me is that it feels like Denver is trying to solve different problems every night.
It feels like they are like if it's the four words that are out then they have to like really range defensively and they're playing small on those aspects of things.
If it's the centers that were out during January, Denver had to really compromise their offensive and defensive schemes and play a little bit differently.
Play big hustle really hard and like they're in these these different situations and it feels like every time you turn around they had different players that were out.
So the theory is that when they get everybody back that David Adam and can then deploy these players in different situations and in better situations that are more advantageous for them that are more advantageous for the team.
Because there are better options on the table.
Now whether that happens or not, I don't know.
Denver might have to deal with a whole bunch of other injuries going forward.
Who knows that Cam Johnson's already dealing with an ankle, Spencer Jones has got a shoulder injury he's dealing with Jamal Murray may go down next.
Knock on wood like we don't know.
But I do hope that Denver over the course of these final 20 games gets into a rhythm of understanding.
Okay, here's what Aaron Gordon is going to impact in the starting unit.
Here's what Aaron Gordon's going to impact in the bench unit.
Here's how he can play next to Jonas balance.
Here's how Peyton Watson is going to look when he's helping to run the second unit next to Cam Johnson as opposed to Cam Johnson just kind of doing it by himself.
Here's what it looks like when Denver stackers a whole bunch of starters with the second unit.
Here's what it looks like when they play big.
Here's what it looks like when they play small.
They can go through all those things in the final 20 games of the season and still win at a decent clip.
Like they're going to have to stay certainly top six.
They're going to try to get into top four again.
Like they still have a capacity to do that whether they are actually able to or not remains to be seen.
The standings would reflect that Denver has an opportunity but they still have a very tough schedule like with what they've done.
So it's going to be tough.
I'm not going to say here and say that it's going to be easy.
I think best case scenario.
The nuggets get both Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson back on Thursday.
They win that game against the Lakers.
Maybe they rest everybody against the Nixon and maybe like or maybe it's not resting Yoke because obviously Yoke is going to try to stay eligible for awards races at the end and play as many games as possible.
But he's going to try to stay available.
The nuggets will have enough guys.
I think that they can trust at that point and the hope is that you just play pretty hard.
You can do what you can do and you try to steal that one at home as well.
And then after that, you're hoping, OK, well, can you recover against the Oklahoma City Thunder, even if you lose against the nicks.
You've got a couple days off before you face OK, see again in theory, having all three of Christian Brown, Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson back for that game will really help Denver.
Because it means you don't really trust Cam Johnson at the end of the game.
If you don't really trust certain guys in different situations, you don't have to play him.
You don't have to put them in those uncomfortable places.
I think Denver's still going to start Cam Johnson.
I think he's still going to start for the entire rest of the season, as long as he's healthy.
But I do think that over the course of the stretch, you'll be able to see Denver get into a better position.
And I think best case scenario for Denver is that they go about 15 and 5, 14 and 6, the rest of the season, if they go 15 and 5, they win 52 games.
If they go 14 and 6, they win 51.
It's funny.
Last year, Michael Malone got fired in the midst of a 50 win season.
And it was probably the right call.
But it is kind of funny the way that these things work out.
I do think that if last year's team dealt with the injuries that this year's team has faced, they would have had 42 wins.
42.
Mark was like 15 and 5 really.
I know that sounds really far fetched right now.
Based off of what Denver's done so far and how it feels right now, it's not that far fetched.
It's really not Denver plays hard on a consistent basis.
They get better shooting performances from guys, they get a little bit better volume.
They actually apply some of the stuff that they've been doing defensively because like this last game, they weren't that bad defensively.
They were actually fine.
It was the offense that really betrayed them.
And the hope is that you've got these other defensive guys that can help you play even better on the defensive end with Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson kind of connecting what the nuggets are trying to do.
And so if you can play on a consistent basis on the defensive end for the rest of the year and you're at least like average on that end.
And then you're in a lead offense still.
Is it unreasonable to think that Denver could maintain a plus seven net rating, a plus eight net rating for the rest of the year?
That translates to about 15 and 5 for me.
And so you got to go through each of these like each of these other teams could be in different situations from the nuggets.
The nuggets are getting healthy at the right time and the the OKC thunder are really struggling from a health perspective at that point or the spurs miss one of their guys.
And then Denver, like the Lakers have Luka don't just sit in one of their games or something of that nature, like it gets a little bit easier after this tough stretch.
But like nuggets can get through Lakers next thunder rocket spurs Lakers sixers.
It gets a lot easier after that it gets a lot more straightforward and Denver will be at home for much of that stretch and there'll be a lot more comfortable I would say after that sixers game.
They go on the road and they face at Memphis on March 18th second out of the back to back if they can take care of that one after that they have 12 more games and three of them are road games.
That's nine home games during that stretch that should be a place where they can get much more comfortable.
Measers writes probably about 12 and eight I think is the most likely outcome.
I think you're that's your your average outcome and the worst case scenario is Denver goes like nine and 11 or 10 and 10.
I think if they go 500 into the playoffs they're probably not winning a title like they're probably falling to the six seed they might even fall into the play it.
If that's the case Denver's in a pickle they're in a really tough situation at that point but I mean if that's the case and it's probably not Denver's year anyway because they've dealt with as many injuries as they've had and nuggets fans are not going to want to hear that like it might just be true.
Might just be true that it might not be Denver's year and if that's the case that would suck that would really suck because Denver really tried to gear up for this season with the types of players that they're getting.
If it falls apart you're looking at changes in the off season you're looking at pretty significant changes in the off season I think Denver's structure will be different whether they have the same head coach or not remains to be seen.
I would guess that they wouldn't fire David Adam and after one year that would be it would be pretty quick especially with the injuries that they faced.
But could you see Aaron Gordon gone yeah you'd probably see Cam Johnson gone at that point you might see Peyton Watson gone especially if he has an opportunity to go get a whole bunch of money that the nuggets are unwilling to pay.
Definitely see Denver duck the luxury tax again if they were either a first round exit or just held on for dear life to get to the second round or something.
We're going to find out we're going to find out I think it would be extremely disappointing if Denver were to falter that way because I thought that they could win a title I still think that they can win a title.
I have more confidence in Denver right now in this moment than I did on March 2nd of 2025 for last year's team I will say that.
You have to have some patience and seeing what Denver looks like with Aaron Gordon he is the player that swings so much for Denver from a just a versatility standpoint and a production standpoint if you get that back if you put Denver to a better position I think it looks a lot better.
So we'll see.
All right.
Everybody that is going to do it for this episode of pickaxe and rollbrats back good friends here at mile high sports thank you for tuning into the show I hope you enjoyed apologies for being a little bit late I'm going to try to get this one up for the audio listeners before the game tonight.
Thank you for tuning in hit that like button hit that subscribe button on the way out.
Got a meeting tomorrow with MHS that will disrupt the normal schedule tomorrow so I will try to figure some stuff out maybe I'll do a pre recording will just have to see.
Everybody have a great day go nuggets for tonight.
Talk to you guys very soon.
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