Nuggets coach Michael Malone talks with Randy Foye during the fourth quarter of their game against Houston on December 14.
(Photo by Brent Lewis/The Denver Post)
It’s easy to dismiss right now. The notion is laughable at the moment.
Or is it?
We’re talking about the playoffs here, but the Nuggets aren’t talking about the playoffs. Not right now anyway. Twenty-five games doesn’t warrant it, they say.
“It’s not even Christmas yet,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said. “We’re trying to get through Christmas.”
The Nuggets, however, are giving themselves the best present they could — relevancy in the playoff picture. There are many reasons for this, none the least of which is a Western Conference, which this year has limped out of the gates and is doing a role reversal with an unexpectedly stronger, deeper, Eastern Conference.
The Nuggets sit in the eighth spot in the West, and this, despite a recent eight-game losing streak. And this, despite being three-games under .500.
But there should be no shame in the Nuggets’ game. Far from it.
It is a fact: This is early.
It is a fact: There is a lot of basketball to be played.
But there are also things starting to shake out a bit.
As early as it is, we already know that Golden State and San Antonio are the class of the West — of the entire NBA, if we’re being honest. We know that Oklahoma City isn’t far from joining the Warriors and Spurs on the elite level.
And then we know there are a bunch of teams with flaws. Many, many flaws.
Think about this: If the Nuggets had gone 3-5 instead of 0-8 during that fateful stretch, they’d be 14-11 right now. And that would put them in FIFTH PLACE in the West. Fifth. I’m blowing your mind right now, I know. They’re only 2 1/2 games out of that spot right now as it is.
It’s a safe bet that no one thought going into the season that A) the Nuggets would sweep the Houston Rockets and that B) they might actually need the tiebreaker. Houston is hovering right above the Nuggets, and if they don’t get things together to match the immense amount of talent on the team, in late March and early April they could find themselves in cauldron of teams desperately scrambling to get in the tournament.
Malone grinned. He had a joke.
“I told my coaches to start putting together the playoff books on Golden State,” he said. “We’re in. We’re in.”
Playoffs talk is of great amusement to him right now, and maybe it should be. All he, and anyone else associated with the team has done is maintain that steady improvement is the only goal of this season. There is risk in broaching the ‘P’ word, and the Nuggets are not in a gambling mood with fans’ emotions just yet.
“All we harp on is, nobody is talking about us, and that’s great,” Malone said. “We’re just worried about ourselves. We don’t want distractions. Our goal everyday is let’s get better.”
They’re doing that. If you remove the five games against Golden State, San Antonio and the L.A. Clippers, the Nuggets are 11-9 against the rest of their schedule. That means, no they aren’t beating the top teams in the league, but yes, they are playing winning basketball against most everyone else.
And with a schedule that features most everyone else from here on out, it’s suddenly very interesting to see what this team can do.
And as it appears more and more that a .500 or worse team — or two — might sneak their way into the Western Conference playoffs, all the Nuggets have to do is stay the course and games might become more undeniably meaningful as the season wears on.
Danilo Gallinari wasn’t buying it.
“Nah,” he said. “It’s early in the season, anything can happen. So, we’ve just got to keep thinking about it game-by-game, taking it game-by-game and not think about where we are in the standings right now.”
Now’s not a good time for playoffs talk. But it might not be too far off.
Follow Chris Dempsey on Twitter @dempseypost or email him at cdempsey@denverpost.com
