As the Nuggets’ Michael Porter Jr. is well aware, the trade deadline is part of the business in the NBA.
“As long as I’m here, I’m going to be here and I’m going to be happy, and I’m going to play hard and try to be available and try to help win games,” Porter said Monday.
Wednesday night, on the eve of the deadline, Porter got down to business and showed again just how valuable he can be.
He tied a career-high with 39 points on 16 of 23 shooting, hauled in 12 rebounds and dished four assists in Denver’s 144-119 rout of New Orleans. It was the Nuggets’ fourth consecutive win.
“A trade is not something you can control, so I don’t get stressed about that, but it is nice to be somewhere where you’re are wanted,” Porter said. “To know that our coach (Michael Malone) and our GM (Calvin Booth) is saying that … I know that things can change quickly in this league but it’s nice to know that you are wanted.”
Malone is thrilled with Porter’s recent performance.
“It’s just so great seeing him play at such a high level … heading into the All-Star break,” coach Michael Malone said. “The thing is (when he plays well), is just the aggression, not easing (his) way into the game.
“There are times when I can help with that and make sure the ball is finding him. But if you chart the 39 points tonight, yes, we ran a lot of plays for him tonight, but a lot of it was him — running, passing, moving cutting.
“I thought he had a lot of good passes tonight — four assists — and he had a really complete game tonight.”
Porter’s performance came after he scored 36 points on Monday night in Denver’s 125-113 victory over the Pelicans.
Little wonder Malone, when asked on Monday about a possible trade, had said: “Michael is a really important piece. Michael helped us win a championship. So we’ll see what happens going into this coming Thursday, but to my knowledge, there have been no (trade) conversations.”
With Nikola Jokic scoring 38 points and a hustling Christian Braun adding 23, the Nuggets seemed capable of swamping New Orleans anytime Monday night.
They did early in the third quarter, hitting the Pelicans like a tidal wave. New Orleans led 72-70, but Denver went on a 9-0 run, and when Braun buried a baseline 3-pointer off a fastbreak assist by Porter, Denver led 81-72 with 9:35 left in the third and finished the quarter with 45 points.
From that point on, the Nuggets were in total command, and they ran the Pelicans out of a raucous Ball Arena. The Nuggets dished out 40 assists, led by Aaron Gordon, who tied a career-high with 12. Their ball movement was dazzling in the second half.
“If you are a fan of this game, how can you not love watching the Nuggets play,” Malone said. “The ball movement, the body movement, the unselfishness. The ball doesn’t stick. The number of wide-open shots we generated with our ball movement was fun to watch.”
With the game well in hand, the fans even started doing The Wave in the fourth quarter as they waited to see if Porter could finally reach the magical 40-point plateau. He was aware that he was on the cusp of a personal best.
Porter’s tip-in bucket with 3:16 left to play gave him 39 points, but he missed an open 3-pointer that would have given him his 40.
“Coach called a play for me to try to get 40, but I just missed it,” Porter said.
When Malone took him out about the two-minute mark, the fans gave Porter a standing ovation. Porter and Jamal Murray were yucking it up as they came to the bench.
“They were giving me a hard time about me not getting 40,” Porter said with a smile.
The Nuggets improved to 15-2 all-time when Porter scores 30 or more points.
The Nuggets came out of the gate sluggish, and the first quarter was a 36-36 stalemate. The Pelicans spread the wealth while Porter and Jokic went off for Denver. Porter scored 13 points on 4 of 5 shooting, including 3 of 4 on 3-pointers. Jokic, despite an airball on a wide-open 3-pointer from the top of the key, scored 12 and dished out three assists.
The 3-point disparity, something that has stung Denver much of the season, enabled the Pelicans to hang around throughout a first half that ended with the score knotted 68-68.
While the Nuggets chucked up 25 first-half 3’s, they made just seven (28%), with Jokic going 2 for 8. Meanwhile, New Orleans was 7 of 15 (46.7%) from behind the arc.
Jokic, who has an NBA-best 23 triple-doubles, added 10 assists but only eight rebounds, just missing his 10th triple-double in his last 12 games. Entering Wednesday’s game, Jokic had posted a triple-double in seven straight games against the Pelicans.
