{"id":111096,"date":"2024-12-08T06:30:40","date_gmt":"2024-12-08T11:30:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=111096"},"modified":"2024-12-08T05:33:40","modified_gmt":"2024-12-08T10:33:40","slug":"nikola-jokic-comments-wizards-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/12\/08\/nikola-jokic-comments-wizards-loss\/","title":{"rendered":"Nikola Jokic Comments After Embarrassing Loss To Wizards"},"content":{"rendered":"

It has always been said that it\u2019s never easy for an opponent to head on the road to play the Denver Nuggets<\/a>. The high elevation results in quicker fatigue and certainly can take time getting used to. The Nuggets have the opportunity to get used to it since they get to play 41 games in the Ball Arena each regular season.<\/p>\n

On November 25, the New York Knicks<\/a> didn\u2019t seem to mind playing in Denver. They scored a whopping 145 points in a 27-point win. After the poor display, especially on the defensive end, Nuggets head coach Mike Malone called out some of his veteran players to begin speaking up when the performance isn\u2019t up to standard.<\/p>\n

Their biggest superstar, Nikola Jokic<\/a>, took that to heart after Denver\u2019s embarrassing loss on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Nikola Jokic Comments After Embarrassing Loss To Wizards<\/h2>\n

Jokic\u2019s Career-Best Night Goes For Naught<\/h3>\n

Entering Saturday, the Washington Wizards<\/a> had lost 16 straight outings. They went the entire month of November without putting one in the win column. Proving the mantra that anyone can win on any given night to be true, Washington beat the Nuggets 122-113 at the Capital One Arena. What made the win more incredible was that it came in a career-best night for Jokic, the three-time league MVP.<\/p>\n

In the loss, Jokic poured in a career-high of 56 points, besting his previous high of 50 which came on February 6, 2021. In his magnificent performance, the 6-foot-11 center shot 22-38 from the field, 3-5 from beyond the arc, and 9-13 from the foul line. He also added 16 rebounds and eight assists. Somehow, it wasn\u2019t enough.<\/p>\n

Bennett Durando of the Denver Post tweeted out some of Jokic\u2019s comments after the game. Apparently, he took coach Malone\u2019s comments from a couple weeks ago to heart. Durando tweeted<\/a> Jokic\u2019s response when asked what the team needed,<\/p>\n

“A reaction. In my country, where I’m coming from, after this kind of stretch, you\u2019re gonna get a paycheck that is a little bit less than you are worth. So maybe that’s what we need to do. Maybe a little motivation that way.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Jokic is Serbian, so he is talking about what happens in Serbia. While they don\u2019t skimp paychecks in the NBA, Jokic\u2019s point is that the team doesn\u2019t deserve their full paycheck after performances such as Saturday.<\/p>\n

Durando wrote in the tweet\u2019s comments that the 29-year-old Jokic also stated,<\/p>\n

“What’s the name of it? Being benched? Being on the bench, I think that’s really good motivation, too.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Now Durando added that Jokic was smiling as saying that, but it\u2019s evident that the Nuggets, particularly Jokic\u2019s teammates, need a little kick in the behind to get going.<\/p>\n

Can Comments Motivate Disappointing Nuggets?<\/h3>\n

The loss to the lowly Wizards dropped the Nuggets to 11-10 on the season. That places them just ninth in the Western Conference and just a game above the 11th-place San Antonio Spurs<\/a>. It has been yet another season where the on\/off splits of Jokic are about as extreme as they can be. They essentially look like title contenders when he plays and like a tanking team when he\u2019s on the bench.<\/p>\n

Denver has now lost two straight and four of their last six. Their next opportunity to get things right is Sunday on the road against the Atlanta Hawks<\/a>. Will Jokic\u2019s comments motivate his teammates?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It has always been said that it\u2019s never easy for an opponent to head on the road to play the Denver Nuggets. The high elevation results in quicker fatigue and certainly can take time getting used to. The Nuggets have the opportunity to get used to it since they get to play 41 games in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5060,"featured_media":111102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,20,62,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-111096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-nuggets","category-nba","category-news"],"modified_by":"Kenny Kluska","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5060"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111096"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111096\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111099,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111096\/revisions\/111099"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}