The Denver Nuggets season is over as they lost in Game 7 to the Portland Trail Blazers in the second round of the 2019 NBA playoffs. Denver made great progress throughout the season, going from out of the playoffs to the number two seed. As the youngest team in the playoffs, the Nuggets had a very successful season and have a very bright future ahead of them. However, they must look ahead to the offseason to see how they can improve the team, and become legitimate contenders.
Offseason Plans for the Denver Nuggets
Priority 1: Health
The first priority for the Nuggets should be health. Denver had four starters miss a total of 73 games. While they performed well in those games, they’re number one priority should be to stay healthy. This was a problem last season as well. Paul Millsap, normally an iron man, has missed nearly 50 games the last two seasons with injuries. Gary Harris has missed nearly 30. If Denver had been healthy the last couple seasons, we may have seen them in the conference finals this season. They must stay healthy to become contenders. Nearly every team in the finals every single year has had their best player(s) healthy. Without continuity, it will be hard for the Nuggets to become great.
Priority 2: Frontcourt Depth
Denver started the year strong on their depth in the frontcourt. With Trey Lyles coming off a career year, and Mason Plumlee playing well, they seemed to be in good shape. That fell apart quickly. Lyles had a terrible season and soon fell out of the rotation, and Plumlee had a disappointing final stretch and playoffs. In Lyles’ case, help could be quickly on the way. The Nuggets have Michael Porter Jr. in the wings waiting and with his size, he could fill in nicely as a stretch 4. Denver also has Jarred Vanderbilt to play at the four, as he is more of a power forward. For the center position, they might have to work a little harder. Denver doesn’t have any prospect at the 5 waiting, so for help, they will have to look for free agency or the trade market.
An interesting choice would be Brook Lopez. Lopez is a free agent and would fit in great with Denver. He just had the best defensive season of his career and shot exceptionally well from three. Plumlee lacked the offensive repertoire to help the Nuggets in the playoffs, but Lopez would space the floor, provide scoring off the bench, and give a defensive anchor to a team that struggled to contain the paint. Not to mention that when Lopez would play with the starters, he would be getting consistent open looks from Nikola Jokic.
Priority 3: More Shooting
In this day and age of the NBA, there is no such thing as too much shooting. The Nuggets had a big problem in the playoffs with consistent shooting. In one game they would shoot the lights out, like in both game 5s they played. But then there would be a game where no one can make a shot, like game 1 versus the San Antonio Spurs. It also happened in game 7 against the Blazers. If you can’t shoot in a game 7, when your season is on the line, then you have no chance. One of the problems Denver had was that their usual sharpshooters were ice cold in the playoffs. For example, Monte Morris was a 41.4 percent three-point shooter in the regular season. He made zero total threes over 14 playoff games. Gary Harris was hampered by injuries the whole year. He made 40 percent of his threes last season and 42 percent the season prior to that, but only 34 percent this year, and 35 percent during the playoffs. Jokic was the only player who improved his shooting in the playoffs, going from 30 percent to almost 50 percent.
As mentioned before, the best thing Denver can do right now is staying healthy. If they can have all starters play at least 75 games, then the shooting can stabilize itself. The number of open shots that they missed in the playoffs was staggering, however. As shown by the Golden State Warriors, too much shooting does not exist.
Looking Ahead
Denver has a bright future ahead no matter what they do. If they just bring back their free agents and stay relatively healthy throughout the season, then the Nuggets should be a high seed once again next year. But if they can bolster the frontcourt depth with an addition like Lopez or Kevon Looney and strengthen the consistency of their shooting, Denver can become a contender for years to come.
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