Just above the waterline, with 11 wins for 9 losses and 8th place in the West, the Nuggets are having a hard time establishing their identity this season. Very crumbly defensively (20th in “Defensive Rating”), Nikola Jokic and his teammates thus seem to have very limited room for maneuver.
“After twenty games, we should know who we are, and we should know what we should do”, could only let go of Nikola Jokic after the defeat, logically, against the Cavaliers. “I don't know how to answer this question. We're still finding (our identity) and we seem good at times, we seem to know how to play. Then we just stop playing like we should, and then we look bad. »
Too fluctuating defensive energy
It mostly feels like the Nuggets are good when Nikola Jokic is on the court, and bad when he's resting. According to data from the Cleaning The Glass websiteDenver is thus virtually a team with 66 victories in the regular season when its triple MVP is on the field, and a team with 7 victories when he is on the bench…
“We have far too many defensive failures, and we give the impression of not knowing what we are doing” thus concludes the Serbian pivot. “However, we talk about it. We should know now. »
An observation confirmed by his coach, Mike Malone, who has a hard time knowing which levers to activate.
“There are periods when we can't make a single defensive stop, and we look like five strangers on the field. And then we find ourselves down 16 points, I call a timeout, I shake the guys up, we come back and all of a sudden, we're playing like we should be playing for 48 minutes. But there is no consistency. It's too little, too rare. »
| Shots | Rebounds | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Players | MJ | Min | Shots | 3pts | L.F. | Off | Def | Early | Pd | Bp | Int | Ct | Party | Pts |
| Nikola Jokic | 17 | 37.7 | 55.9 | 50.0 | 81.7 | 3.9 | 9.5 | 13.4 | 10.4 | 3.7 | 1.8 | 0.8 | 1.9 | 29.9 |
| Michael Porter, Jr. | 20 | 35.6 | 50.9 | 41.1 | 67.3 | 1.6 | 5.6 | 7.2 | 2.7 | 1.3 | 1.0 | 0.4 | 2.3 | 19.0 |
| Jamal Murray | 17 | 36.0 | 42.0 | 33.3 | 80.3 | 0.5 | 3.5 | 4.0 | 6.2 | 1.9 | 1.4 | 0.6 | 1.7 | 17.8 |
| Christian Braun | 20 | 35.2 | 57.1 | 43.4 | 78.4 | 1.1 | 4.0 | 5.1 | 1.9 | 1.5 | 1.2 | 0.7 | 2.3 | 15.4 |
| Aaron Gordon | 10 | 30.3 | 55.2 | 53.3 | 78.4 | 2.1 | 4.3 | 6.4 | 3.3 | 1.4 | 0.6 | 0.2 | 1.6 | 15.1 |
| Russell Westbrook | 20 | 24.1 | 38.8 | 36.0 | 66.7 | 0.8 | 3.1 | 3.9 | 5.9 | 2.4 | 1.4 | 0.6 | 2.4 | 11.7 |
| Peyton Watson | 20 | 25.2 | 48.6 | 37.5 | 78.6 | 1.0 | 2.5 | 3.5 | 1.3 | 0.9 | 0.8 | 1.0 | 2.1 | 9.5 |
| Julian Strawther | 20 | 20.2 | 43.8 | 38.8 | 79.4 | 0.3 | 1.7 | 2.0 | 1.3 | 0.9 | 0.8 | 0.4 | 2.7 | 8.4 |
| Dario Saric | 10 | 13.6 | 30.0 | 26.3 | 83.3 | 0.9 | 2.6 | 3.5 | 1.1 | 1.1 | 0.6 | 0.0 | 1.4 | 3.4 |
| Deandre Jordan | 8 | 9.8 | 55.6 | 0.0 | 25.0 | 1.3 | 2.0 | 3.3 | 0.5 | 0.9 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 1.4 | 2.6 |
| Hunter Tyson | 12 | 9.2 | 43.5 | 23.1 | 85.7 | 0.3 | 1.3 | 1.7 | 0.5 | 0.4 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 1.2 | 2.4 |
| Vlatko Cancar | 4 | 8.6 | 57.1 | 50.0 | 0.0 | 0.8 | 1.3 | 2.0 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 1.0 | 2.3 |
| Zeke Nnaji | 14 | 5.1 | 40.0 | 0.0 | 25.0 | 0.1 | 0.4 | 0.5 | 0.2 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.4 | 1.2 |
| Trey Alexander | 8 | 5.2 | 20.0 | 16.7 | 100.0 | 0.0 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.3 | 0.1 | 0.0 | 0.1 | 0.4 | 0.9 |
| Pj Hall | 4 | 2.0 | 33.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 0.5 |
| Spencer Jones | 2 | 1.9 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Jalen Pickett | 2 | 1.9 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
