{"id":129958,"date":"2025-03-21T17:08:52","date_gmt":"2025-03-21T21:08:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=129958"},"modified":"2025-03-21T17:10:36","modified_gmt":"2025-03-21T21:10:36","slug":"thunder-weakness-against-nuggets-nikola-jokic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/21\/thunder-weakness-against-nuggets-nikola-jokic\/","title":{"rendered":"OKC Thunder Have One Concerning Weakness Facing Nikola Joki\u0107"},"content":{"rendered":"

With the NBA playoffs just over the horizon, it’s the\u00a0<\/span>Oklahoma City Thunder<\/span><\/a>\u00a0that remain the favorites not just to come out of the Western Conference but also to reach the finals and battle for a championship. Considering what we’ve watched OKC do all season and how dominant they have been, it’s hard to argue this stance. This season will either end in heartbreak for them or in glory. Oklahoma City is not alone in the playoff race, though, and not the only team out West looking to reach the finals. The Thunder will have to contend with\u00a0<\/span>Nikola\u00a0Joki\u0107<\/span><\/a>‘s Denver Nuggets for the same outcome. However, a potential OKC vs Denver playoff matchup carries some concern in the eyes of former NBA player and Cleveland Cavaliers champion\u00a0<\/span>Channing Frye<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

OKC Thunder Have One Concerning Weakness Facing Nikola Joki\u0107<\/h2>\n

Ex-NBA’er Channing Frye Claims Thunder Bigs Aren’t Enough to Stop Nuggets Big Nikola\u00a0Joki\u0107<\/h3>\n

The consensus around the NBA media and with many fans is that two teams in the West could challenge the Thunder: the Nuggets and the\u00a0<\/span>Los Angeles Lakers<\/span><\/a>. The Lakers joined this conversation after the\u00a0<\/span>Anthony Davis<\/span><\/a>–<\/span>Luka Don\u010di\u0107<\/span><\/a>\u00a0trade one month ago. Before that, while LA was handed playoff expectations, being able to compete with the likes of the Nuggets, Thunder, and over in the East, the\u00a0<\/span>Celtics<\/span><\/a>, and Cavaliers was another question. Now, things have changed, and they’re right in the mix as threats. That said, the Nuggets are likely one level higher than the Lakers regarding who can challenge OKC the most.<\/span><\/p>\n

Frye argues that the Nuggets are unquestionably the top challengers to the Thunder for one reason: Joki\u0107.\u00a0In a seven-game series, everything is different compared to the regular season. Frye believes that OKC has one major flaw in going up against Joki\u0107 in a possible playoff series, and it has to do with OKC’s big men,\u00a0<\/span>Chet Holmgren<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/span>Isaiah Hartenstein<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span>Speaking on the\u00a0<\/span><\/a>Road Trippin’ Podcast<\/span><\/a><\/em>, Fry explained why<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span>[32:10 mark]<\/span><\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day they [Denver] got the best bully in the ____ NBA next to Giannis [Antetokounmpo]<\/a>. [Isaiah]\u00a0Hartenstein, listen, too quick homie. Oh, you gonna double? Wink wink wink, what now. Who guarding, Chet [Holmgren]? Wink wink wink. They’re not big enough, they’re not big enough…How many people can guard Jokic?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Is The Joker To Unstoppable?<\/h3>\n

Frye detailed Hartenstein’s size and Holmgren’s height and length but argued neither player has enough to stand up to Joki\u0107. Therefore, the Thunder don’t have enough to stop Joki\u0107. We’ve seen Joki\u0107 get stopped recently when the Los Angeles Lakers swarmed him with multiple defenders every time he touched the ball. For one night, it worked, but for seven nights? That’s asking a lot, and it’s also expecting Joki\u0107 not to adjust. Given his high basketball IQ and greatness, those expectations aren’t realistic.<\/p>\n

Joki\u0107 is virtually unstoppable in the grand scheme of things, and nine times out of 10, whatever defensive designs get thrown at him, he’s usually able to break them down or adjust and still dominate. It’s simply what he does and why he is<\/em> a bully. Whether Hartenstein and Holmgren are enough to squash Joki\u0107’s impact on the game will only be determined if their respective teams meet up in April or June. What a popcorn-worthy series that would be.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a9 Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With the NBA playoffs just over the horizon, it’s the\u00a0Oklahoma City Thunder\u00a0that remain the favorites not just to come out of the Western Conference but also to reach the finals and battle for a championship. Considering what we’ve watched OKC do all season and how dominant they have been, it’s hard to argue this stance. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5081,"featured_media":129959,"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":[22,1608,20,62],"tags":[240,600,4292,306,993,1133,72],"class_list":["post-129958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-thunder","category-basketball","category-nuggets","category-nba","tag-anthony-davis","tag-channing-frye","tag-chet-holmgren","tag-giannis-antetokounmpo","tag-isaiah-hartenstein","tag-luka-doncic","tag-nikola-jokic"],"modified_by":"Aaron J Zacharias","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129958","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\/5081"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129958"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129958\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":129971,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129958\/revisions\/129971"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}