At the very least, they needed to make sure they didn’t lose their top priority of the offseason for nothing in return.

The Nuggets are sending Watson to Cleveland for a 2031 first-round pick and a 2032 second-rounder, two league sources told The Denver Post on Wednesday, confirming . Watson has agreed to a four-year, $88 million contract with the Cavaliers as part of a multi-team sign-and-trade that won’t be officially completed Wednesday night, as it grows to include other transactions around the league, according to a Nuggets team source.

Cleveland is sending Max Strus to the Clippers and Tre Mann to the Wizards, while Washington sends Cam Whitmore to Cleveland and Julian Reese to Denver, according to Charania. Reese, who was on a two-way contract, will be waived.

Essentially, the Nuggets aren’t getting any players back, leaving them with two open roster spots and a payroll about $2 million over the second apron. The crux of the deal for Denver is the draft compensation, picking up one trade-eligible first-round pick. The 2032 second-round pick acquired in the trade is Sacramento’s.

By not taking any salary back in the trade despite their urgent championship window with Nikola Jokic entering a potential contract year, the Nuggets have signaled their intent is to avoid an astronomical luxury tax bill next season — and possibly to shed even more salary and evade the second apron. Retaining Watson without a subsequent cost-cutting trade would’ve resulted in a record tax bill.

Watson became a restricted free agent on June 30 with the expiration of his four-year, rookie-scale contract, meaning the Nuggets had the ability to retain him by matching any offer sheet he might’ve received from an outside suitor.

That gave them negotiating leverage when no such offer arrived at Watson’s doorstep during the busiest weeks of free agency. It’s rare for lucrative offer sheets to be extended in the NBA, and even rarer for them to go unmatched. When Warriors center Quentin Post joined Memphis last month for three years and $30 million, he became the first restricted free agent to depart his team for an offer sheet since Bogdan Bogdanovic in 2020.

More commonly, sign-and-trades function as a release valve for teams that can’t agree on a salary range with their restricted free agents. Watson’s camp, according to a league source, was seeking well north of $20 million per year, an average annual value that Denver didn’t feel comfortable meeting despite Watson’s breakout fourth season. The 6-foot-8 wing averaged 14.6 points, 4.9 rebounds and 2.1 assists on 49.1% shooting and 41.1% from 3-point range.

Most of his production occurred in a key four-week stretch when the Nuggets were missing Jokic, the central hub of their offense. They were in dire need of shot creation off the dribble, and Watson stepped up, averaging an efficient 22.5 points over 17 games. But shortly after Jokic returned, Watson suffered a hamstring strain on Feb. 4 in New York.

He missed the remainder of the season except for a five-game stint in which he tried to return but was physically limited. He didn’t play in Denver’s playoff series against Minnesota, a six-game defeat.

The Nuggets drafted Watson with the 30th overall pick out of UCLA in 2022. He was a member of their 2023 championship team, though he spent most of that season developing in the G League. Denver chose to prioritize his fellow 2022 draftee, Christian Braun, when both players were eligible for a contract extension last preseason. Braun signed a five-year, $125 million deal. Watson went into a contract year staring down an uncertain future.

“From what I understand, it was just a financial business decision (for the Nuggets). Obviously, with the new CBA and the second apron, things of that nature, they wanted to stay out of that,” Watson told The Denver Post at the time. “As a business, you’ve gotta operate (based on) what����ap best for your business. And when it comes time for me to make my decision next summer, I’ve gotta operate as a business myself. That����ap no diss to the Nuggets. That����ap no diss to the Kroenkes.”

“If he has a great year, he can put himself where he wants to,” Nuggets coach David Adelman said before opening day last October. “That����ap what our league is about. You prove it every day. You prove it every year. … He can set his market, and I think he will.”

Watson’s best pro season coincided with Braun’s worst. As the 23-year-old gradually assumed a larger role, he hired Klutch Sports and superagent Rich Paul to represent him in restricted free agency. The Nuggets signaled to other teams that they were prepared to match any offer sheet for Watson, hoping to scare away a market that was already thin. The Nets, Bulls, Lakers and eventually the Clippers were the only teams with the available cap space to seriously threaten Denver.

None of them came forward in recent weeks. As contract negotiations between Watson and Denver stalled, the Nuggets began to explore the sign-and-trade market, a league source told The Post. They felt comfortable with the possibility of an extended negotiation if no suitable trades materialized. The team already has heavy financial investments in Jokic, Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon. Signing Watson for the contract he received from Cleveland would’ve caused Denver’s 2026-27 roster payroll to spike more than $20 million into second apron territory, where the Kroenkes have never ventured before this offseason.

Watson ends his tenure with the franchise that drafted him having played 225 games. He started 64 of those games and also appeared in 29 playoff contests.

After developing from a late first-round pick into a viable rotation player, the Nuggets have transformed him back into a future first-rounder, plus a second-round footnote — trade assets that could be used much sooner than the 2030s.

Because if this was David Adelman’s idea, the man’s got some serious crown jewels. Nikola Jokic’s coaching staff got a little bit better this week. Although it’s not hrd to imagine that David Adelman’s job security as head coach just got a little bit worse.

, the Nuggets have landed Dave Joerger to be David Adelman’s “coach-in-waiting.” Sorry. To be Adelman’s “co-coach.” Dang it! I meant “lead assistant coach.”

Whatever. If you’ve been pining for a veteran NBA voice with playoff experience to start whispering in Adelman’s ear, Joerger’s your man.

New Dave has served as a head coach or assistant with five NBA franchises since 2007. The 52-year-old Joerger had a fairly successful run as the head man in Memphis from 2013-16 (147-99, three playoff berths) followed by a less successful run right after that in Sacramento (99-148, no playoff appearances), before he hooked onto Doc Rivers’ staffs in Philly and Milwaukee.

Josh Kroenke gave Adelman the dreaded public vote of confidence a few months back after a team built to win it all couldn’t win four games out of seven against a Minnesota roster that was missing Anthony Edwards.

At first blush, hiring Joerger now feels an awful lot like hedging bets with your head coach — and right after a massively disappointing playoff series during which said coach got schooled on about eight different levels by Chris Finch.

The Nuggets will put on their for David and Dave, of course, the same one they wore for years in front of the cameras while Michael Malone and Calvin Booth were snarling at one another behind the scenes.

All is not well when you’re the only NBA franchise swimming in the second apron of the salary cap. Although, on paper, this is the type of tweak that could actually work.

The presumption is that Joerger is boarding the S.S. Kroenke to serve as Adelman’s Vic Fangio, his Vance Joseph. New Dave is regarded as something of a defensive mastermind in hoops circles, although his units’ statistical results over the last decade have been, shall we say, more inconclusive on that assumption.

Joerger’s Grizzlies ranked among the NBA’s top 10 in defensive rating in 2013-14 (103.8 points given up per 100 possessions) and 2014-15 (101.2), only to slip to 20th (107.1) in Year 3, his last in Bluff City. His defenses over three seasons as the head coach in Sacramento checked in at 26th, 27th and 21st, giving up between 110-111 points per 100 possessions.

As an NBA assistant the last three seasons, the defensive variance has largely continued. While working with Rivers, the Bucks ranked No. 12 in defensive rating (112.7) in ’24-25 but dipped to 26th (118.3) this past season.

a fresh set of eyeballs certainly couldn’t hurt. Especially after Minnesota forward Jaden McDaniels so gleefully stuck his fingers in them this past April.

“Go after Jokic, Jamal (Murray), all the bad defenders,” McDaniels infamously offered after his Timberwolves snatched a soul-crushing 119-111 victory at Ball Arena in Game 2 of Denver’s first-round capitulation. “Tim Hardaway (Jr.), Cam Johnson, Aaron Gordon, the whole team. Just go at them. Yeah, they’re all bad defenders.

“They don’t (have) people that can defend the rim. And if (Jokic) is there, we’re still more athletic than them. And (we’ve) just got to be able to finish when we do (get to the rim).”

Did they ever. During a first-round series loss that rattled the Rockies, the Nuggets allowed 29.8 shot attempts in the restricted area — the most of any Western Conference postseason participant, according to NBA.com tracking data. Their 20.5 field goals given up in the restricted area against the Wolves were also rock-bottom in the West bracket.

History says Joerger should help on that front. And help Jokic, Lord willing.

Fun fact: The new Nuggets assistant’s Memphis teams allowed the fewest field-goal tries in the restricted area of any NBA defense (24.9) during the regular season in ’15-16, and ranked second in fewest allowed in ’14-15 (24.4) and ’13-14 (23.9). Joerger’s first two Kings squads as a head coach allowed the fourth-fewest attempts among NBA defenses in the restricted area in ’16-17 (23.9) and the fifth-fewest in ’17-18 (25.1).

Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph then, Jokic and Aaron Gordon now. Hopefully. If New Dave can somehow get Jamal Murray on board with the whole “grit and grind” part of the equation, don’t just give that man an extension. Hand him a Nobel Prize.

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Nuggets restricted free agent Spencer Jones has agreed to a two-year, $12 million offer sheet with the Oklahoma City Thunder, a league source told The Denver Post on Saturday.

The Nuggets will now have 48 hours to match the offer sheet from the time he signed it, a deadline reported as 11:59 p.m. ET per Shams Charania of ESPN. If Denver does not match, the homegrown talent will join a Western Conference rival and one of the biggest threats to Denver’s status as a fringe championship contender.

Denver had previously extended a qualifying offer to Jones back in June for the minimum.

The 3-and-D wing was on a two-way contract with the Nuggets six months ago. Jones, 25, signed with the Nuggets and their G League affiliate as an undrafted free agent out of Stanford in 2024. He assumed a larger role last season due to injuries above him on the depth chart, eventually earning a standard NBA contract and a full-time spot on Denver’s 15-man roster in February.

The Nuggets presented Jones with a multiyear deal at the time, worth about $2 million in average annual value, he told The Post in March. But he turned down more guaranteed money and long-term security, choosing to sign a rest-of-season contract and enter restricted free agency this summer instead. Reflecting on that decision in a recent social media post, he said: “They wanted to lock me into certainty before the market had a chance to price my value. Honestly, I’d do the same thing if I was in their position.”

That bet on himself has paid off with the $12 million offer sheet from Oklahoma City, which is fully guaranteed, the source told The Post. Nuggets co-general manager Jon Wallace said in June that Denver wanted retain the restricted free agent, but the team is facing a steep luxury tax bill that increases exponentially with every dollar added to its roster payroll.

“I think Spencer’s done himself a lot of favors this past year, specifically how he stepped in and defended, made shots. He was just a big part of what we did,” Wallace said at the time. “But we feel confident. He’s a homegrown guy. You want to reward those guys for sticking to the plan and really developing themselves.”

Jones shot 50.4% from the field, 39.6% from 3-point range and 60.8% from the foul line last season. He started 37 of the 64 games he played, usually slotting in at power forward with Aaron Gordon in and out of the lineup due to injuries. Late in the season, Nuggets coach David Adelman also started using Jones as a switchable small-ball five more frequently. He brought a physical defensive approach that bordered on overzealous at times, which appealed to the Nuggets — they felt their roster was otherwise lacking in similar tenacity.

Offensively, Jones has been used almost entirely as an off-ball forward, spacing in the dunker spot or spotting up in the corners. He proved that he can be a high-stakes shot maker in Game 5 of Denver’s playoff series against the Timberwolves, when he helped stave off elimination (for one game, anyway) with a 20-point, 4-for-5 performance beyond the arc.

“What he’s done and what he’s put on tape,” Adelman said in February, “is a professional basketball player that belongs in a rotation.”

Third-year big man DaRon Holmes II has been absent from the sideline in Las Vegas this week, left off the roster. That hasn’t stopped him from hanging out around the team, though. The 2024 first-round pick spent last week practicing with the Summer League Nuggets at their mini camp, and he did make the trip to the desert, where his goal has been to join as many informal pickup runs as he can find.

“My friends always ask me, ‘Why aren’t you playing?’ It wasn’t my decision,” Holmes said. “But at the end of the day, I’m gonna do whatever the coaches ask me to and the front office asks me to. I would love to play, but at the same time, if they’re telling me no, then I’m gonna listen to what they have to say, and I’m gonna get better every day regardless.”

Holmes, who turns 24 next month, has an emotionally complicated history at UNLV’s Cox Pavilion, the site where Denver has played most of its Summer League games in recent years. Two weeks after he was drafted with the 22nd pick, he tore his right Achilles tendon in his Summer League debut, delaying his rookie season and setting back his career in ways that still resonate to this day.

He made a triumphant return to competitive basketball last year in the same gymnasium where he suffered the injury, scoring 15 points in his re-debut. This would have been his second healthy Summer League, a normal step for players at his developmental stage. But Denver’s front office decided he had graduated from the annual showcase for young players.

“He’s been here every day since the season ended,” Nuggets executive vice president of player personnel Jon Wallace said recently. “Working on his shot, working on his conditioning, working on his mobility. He’s a very important factor in terms of his lethal shooting ability. So any time you can do that, you can find a place on the floor. As we continue to develop his game, we’ll see how he fits in with other guys. But we’re very pleased with his development at this point.”

The Nuggets made a point to slow-play his 2025-26 season. They didn’t trust that Holmes could make an immediate impact for a championship contender while coming off such a severe injury, so they sent him down to the G League for large chunks of the year, imploring him to master Denver’s system and spacing. He averaged 20.7 points, 8.3 rebounds and four assists with the Grand Rapids Gold under coach Ryan Bowen, who had previously served as a Nuggets assistant alongside David Adelman.

“Any time you have an injury the way he had it, it goes beyond just the physical,” Wallace said. “So it was in a place where we didn’t want to push him mentally and make sure he trusted his body, felt comfortable, but also (we wanted to) give him the ability to do it as his pace. I think he should be commended for the way he stayed true to it. Because a lot of guys don’t really return to their same form.”

“It used to be an injury where you’re done if you tear your Achilles,” Holmes said. “I think it’s definitely the worst injury you can have playing basketball. But it’s been a full process, and it does take a while. … I’m learning new things about my game. I’m learning how to play without being the most freakish athletic guy. I felt like I was very athletic before. I feel like I still am, but at the same time, I’m learning new things about my game.”

Limiting Holmes’ NBA minutes was a luxury that Denver probably can’t afford again next season. One of the deepest rosters of the Nikola Jokic era has been replaced by the swirling uncertainty of a cap crunch. Assuming Holmes is on the roster in September — if there’s any subtext to his absence from Summer League, it might be the Nuggets’ reluctance to risk damaging anyone’s trade value right now — he’ll be one of the most important players at training camp.

This could be a make-or-break season for his viability in Denver’s rotation, whether as a backup center or power forward. One of his G League missions last year was to learn the dunker spot, he told The Post.

“Maturing, understanding the game a little bit more,” he said. “Knowing where to be, knowing what spots to do. Knowing the plays. But that comes with just being here and getting in the reps.”

And so “being here” remained a priority for Holmes after the season. If he wasn’t going to be on the court at Summer League, he needed to find other ways to prove himself to a front office regime that’s not the same as the one that drafted him. Calvin Booth was his biggest believer in 2024. Now, it’s Wallace, Ben Tenzer and Adelman steering the ship. Holmes also pinpointed his defensive mobility as a top focus this summer.

“I need to be here early. I shouldn’t be going on vacations right now,” he said. “I haven’t proved myself yet. So my goal is to get better every day until I gain trust from my teammates and coaches that I can go out there and compete.

“… When guys come in, especially for Summer League, everybody is trying to earn something. Everybody is trying to get that spot. So everybody is playing hard. For me, that’s what I need to be around, because that’s what I’m trying to do. I’m trying to earn my time on the court. So regardless of wherever anybody’s at in their careers, everybody’s out here busting their tails to get to where they want to be. I think that’s somewhere I need to be around.”

One reason for his confidence: The Nuggets picked up his team option for the 2026-27 season last October, six months after Booth lost his job. The fact that he’s still under contract in Denver was a Wallace and Tenzer decision. Holmes is set to make $3.4 million. He has another team option next summer, before the last year of his rookie-scale deal. If that’s picked up, he’ll carry a $5.5 million cap hit in 2027-28.

In the meantime, he’s still looking for a second glimpse of NBA action. The extent of his real playing time last season was a 10-game stint when Jokic and Jonas Valanciunas were both injured, forcing the Nuggets to call him up and start him.

The most enticing element of that small sample size was Holmes’ confidence as a floor-stretching big. He made 20 of his first 45 career 3-point attempts.

“I like ‘Deuce.’ I wish he was playing (this week), so we could do his pick-and-pop and let him shoot 3s all Summer League,” Nuggets assistant JJ Barea said, laughing. “I told him that in Vegas now, there’s going to be a lot of pickup games, a lot of NBA games randomly. Try to play in all of them so you can get reps in.”

Those reps are the only true remedy for the awkwardness of Holmes’ last two years, he believes.

“After an injury I had like the Achilles, what I had to go through, it’s really no joke,” he said. “Not a lot of people understand that. So I mean, the fact that I’m at where I’m at today, I’m very proud of myself.”

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Whether or not they eventually trade a starter, they have unfinished business. Three roster spots remain open, and Denver needs to fill at least two of them via free agency or trade to meet the NBA’s requirement. Teams must carry a minimum of 14 players on the 15-man roster.

Two of Denver’s spots might be reserved for a pair of incumbent restricted free agents, both of whom remain in unresolved contract negotiations with the team. There’s also LeBron James, who has the entire league on the edge of its seat.

And then there are other unsigned players in the ether, still looking for a home. Who could the Nuggets acquire or retain? It’s time for a free agency reset, starting with a look at Denver’s roster as it currently stands.

Nuggets projected depth chart

�ʳ�:��Jamal Murray, Tyus Jones

����:��Christian Braun, Julian Strawther

����:��Cam Johnson, Alpha Diallo

�ʹ�:��Aaron Gordon, Zeke Nnaji, Trevon Brazile

��:��Nikola Jokic, Marvin Bagley III, DaRon Holmes II

Keep in mind that players without standard contracts, such as KJ Simpson (point guard) and Bryce Hopkins (small forward), are not included here, but they do have a path to regular-season playing time in Denver.

Until further notice, the Nuggets have the same starting lineup that registered a superb 13.5 net rating last season (when everyone was healthy, which wasn’t often).

Their weak spots are predictably on the bench. Despite David Adelman and Jon Wallace’s cries for more ball-handling and creativity, the backcourt looks especially shallow for now. Bringing back assist-to-turnover demon Tyus Jones for the veteran minimum was a sensible move if it’s accompanied by others, but he cannot be the team’s only backup point guard. He seems better suited as a third-string at this stage of his career.

Between him, Murray and Strawther, three of Denver’s four guards are weak defenders. The front office’s attempt to address defense so far has been limited to forward acquisitions (Diallo, Brazile, Hopkins). This roster still needs a perimeter defender who’s proven that he can navigate screens at the NBA level and keep quicker star guards in front.

Strawther has floated in and out of the rotation throughout his first three years in the league. He’s shown flashes of being an excellent scorer at the backup two-guard position, but he needs to establish more consistency if he wants to seize the Tim Hardaway Jr. role next season. This will be a crucial season in his development. He’s extension-eligible until the start of the season. Otherwise, he’ll be a restricted free agent next summer.

As much as ball-handling has been a focus, the Nuggets also appear short on shooting depth. Strawther is currently the most reliable 3-point threat of the seven bench players under contract (36.3% over the last two years). Jones’ efficiency took a massive hit last season. Diallo is more of a slasher than a spacer offensively. Holmes is a promising stretch big on paper, but he’s more likely to do his damage via pick-and-pop than by standing in the corner.

The Nuggets have certainly improved their frontcourt athleticism this summer. But even with those moves, they’re taking fliers on rookies out of the EuroLeague and the second round of the draft. At small forward, power forward and center, Denver’s current bench has 138 combined minutes of career playoff experience.

LeBron James hope?

The Nuggets might not be officially out of the running yet, but ESPN’s Shams Charania reported early this week that Cleveland, Miami and Philadelphia seem to be getting the most attention as feasible destinations for the best free agent on the market. The Nuggets were always going to be an outsider in these sweepstakes, even after Klutch Sports superagent Rich Paul publicly confirmed mutual interest between his client and Denver.

James, on a cheap contract, would obviously plug a lot of holes in Denver. The 21-time All-NBA forward could slot into lineups with Jokic or run the show with certain bench units. But until he indicates otherwise, it’s best to assume LeBron won’t finish his career as a Nugget at this point.

Peyton Watson and Spencer Jones

If the Nuggets re-sign both of their restricted free agents and keep everyone else, they’ll suddenly look a lot more dangerous on paper (like they did last season). They would also be carrying 10 frontcourt players and four guards on their roster — a clear imbalance that would require subsequent moves.

Jones has been working out at the Nuggets’ practice gym during his contract negotiations, he said in a recent social media post, suggesting that any day could be his last at Ball Arena. His qualifying offer was the minimum salary. Denver’s preference would be to keep his average annual value as close to that as possible, likely in exchange for more guaranteed years.

Watson, meanwhile, has remained at an impasse with the team on salary, cracking the door open for potential sign-and-trades out of Denver. But if he and the Nuggets can reach an agreement, his role within the rotation will become one of the most fascinating storylines of training camp in late September. Will Watson move into the everyday starting lineup for the first time in his career? Will Adelman hand him the keys to the non-Jokic offense and see what he can do as a shot creator, now that Murray has been burdened with those thankless minutes for so many years?

Other top remaining NBA free agents

At the buyout deadline last season, the Nuggets were monitoring DeMar DeRozan’s situation in Sacramento and were ready to show interest if he became available, a league source told The Post. He didn’t.

Now that he’s been released from his contract, teams like Denver are lining up to pursue the former Raptors star wing. DeRozan turns 37 next month, but he remains durable and efficient as a scorer. He could chase his first ring as a super-sixth man in Colorado, but other teams closer to home (he’s from Los Angeles) could also be sniffing around. There’s a chance the Nuggets miss out on him, as they already did with Khris Middleton for the second time when he chose Washington earlier this month.

Staying in the semi-washed-up star department, Bradley Beal is available after declining his player option with the Clippers. So is Russell Westbrook, though Denver already burned that bridge last offseason — “the truth is that they didn’t want me back,” as he later told The Post. Gabe Vincent, Brandon Williams and Aaron Holiday are among the other guard options in a thin market.

The Nuggets have already shown their willingness to think outside the box this summer with the signing of Diallo.

Then there’s Bruce Brown, the fan favorite who had an up-and-down reunion with the Nuggets last season. Their trust in him as a secondary ball-handler has noticeably declined since 2023, when he was the championship team’s backup point guard. But he did grow into his smaller role under Adelman, shooting 43.2% from 3-point range in the second half of the season. The fact that the Nuggets haven’t already re-signed him at the minimum is a clear sign that he’s not at the top of their wish list, but they could do a lot worse than Brown if they run out of options and need to fill a roster spot.

Will all 15 spots be used?

The Nuggets went through most of last season with their 15th and final roster spot vacant. By the time they signed Spencer Jones and Tyus Jones to prorated minimum salaries for the rest of the year, they were safe from the luxury tax.

Watch for them to consider a similar strategy in 2026-27 if they’re up against the tax or either of the aprons. They could enter the season with a payroll slightly above one of those thresholds but with only 14 players rostered. It would give them a chance to dump more salary at the trade deadline and replace one or two roster spots with another buyout signing.

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One year after a EuroLeague team tried to lure him away from the NBA, Valanciunas might have a path to return overseas and play closer to home. Other NBA teams in need of frontcourt depth are also reportedly expected to show interest in the Lithuanian big man.

Valanciunas backed up Nikola Jokic during his lone season in Denver, one of the only situations in his 14-year NBA career in which he regularly played off the bench.

If this is the end of that career, Valanciunas will have appeared in 1,002 games, starting 854 of them. Most known for his six years and change in Toronto, he’s averaged 12.8 points and nine rebounds in the NBA. He averaged 8.7 points and 5.1 rebounds per game as a Nugget.

The 34-year-old had a non-guaranteed $10 million salary with the Nuggets next season. Last October, the team amended his contract to guarantee him $2 million of that total in exchange for pushing back the guarantee deadline to July 8.

The Nuggets’ rationale was to give themselves a longer runway into the 2026-27 league year to explore trade options involving Valanciunas. The problem with their efforts to trade him over the last few days was that any team taking on his contract would have had to shoulder the full $10 million.

Valanciunas was acquired by Denver in a trade that sent Dario Saric to Sacramento last offseason. After the trade was completed and while Valanciunas was competing overseas with the Lithuanian national team, the popular Greek club Panathinaikos attempted to pull him away from Denver with a three-year contract offer.

He was unable to sign it while under contract in the NBA, though, and the Nuggets were unwilling to release him from that deal. Teammates and coaches vouched for his professionalism throughout the 2025-26 season as he played the fewest total minutes of his career (871).

Knowing they would need a second-string center behind Jokic yet again, the Nuggets agreed to a one-year deal with Marvin Bagley III last week. Valanciunas was more successful than most backup bigs who’ve passed through Ball Arena, but he faded out of the rotation late in the season as coach David Adelman went to a small-ball look more frequently.

Bagley, DaRon Holmes II and Zeke Nnaji are currently the biggest bench players on the roster. Aaron Gordon and Spencer Jones have also played the five in some of those smaller lineups. Jones is currently negotiating for a new contract with the Nuggets as a restricted free agent. Bagley will be paid the veteran minimum salary, taking up a smaller percentage of Denver’s cap than Valanciunas did.

Waiving Valanciunas leaves Denver about $6 million below the second apron for now, but with five open roster spots. The Nuggets can choose to stretch the $2 million in guaranteed salary across three seasons if they want. That would reduce their dead cap to $666,666 for next season and each of the following two. It was unclear on Wednesday afternoon whether they would choose to do that.

All 5 feet and 10 inches of him.

That’s how some of his new pupils remember the Nuggets assistant coach, anyway. Never mind that in his 14-year playing career. As an NBA 2K videogame character, the dude could soar.

“I’m not gonna lie. JJ was nice in 2K. Like, oh my gosh,” Denver guard KJ Simpson said Tuesday. “Because they gave him a boost on his hops. I don’t know what it was. His 3-point rating was elite, and he could dunk.”

Fact check, anybody?

“I only dunked in warm-ups,” Barea said, laughing. “I never dunked in a game.”

Maybe being misremembered by the younger generation is simply part of growing older when you’re a retired NBA player. Barea doesn’t mind the video game’s flattering mistake, of course. As long as nobody in the Nuggets’ gym challenges him to dunk now. He’s in his mentoring stage, eager to pass along wisdom this week and next as the head coach of Denver’s Summer League squad. After three days of mini-camp at Ball Arena, he’ll lead the Nuggets to Las Vegas, where they tip off Friday (4:40 p.m. MT) against the Rockets.

“It’s just crazy that he’s my coach now for Summer League, and I used to grow up playing with him on 2K,” Nuggets second-round draft pick Trevon Brazille said. “Full circle.”

“Sniper. He was a sniper on 2K,” added Bryce Hopkins, the team’s other second-rounder.

Brazile, Hopkins and the rest of the Nuggets playing in Vegas will be trying to launch their careers the same way Barea did. Before he was an object of their admiration on 2K, he was an undrafted and undersized guard biding time in Puerto Rico, his home. He played for the Cangrejeros de Santurce out of college.

“All I wanted was an invite for Summer League,” he said, “so I told my agent, just get me an invite. I wanted to see for myself if I could play in the NBA or not.”

The Warriors and Mavericks invited him in 2006. He averaged 6.8 points, 1.8 rebounds, 2.8 assists and two steals at his first Summer League, playing 21 minutes per game. “I couldn’t believe I was there,” he said. “I was just like, what is this? It was so fast. I didn’t do good.”

But he made enough of an impression to get signed by Dallas, which became his NBA home. Working his way up through the D League, he appeared in 33 NBA games as a rookie and returned to Summer League with more confidence in 2007. He averaged 16 points and seven assists as a second-timer. He was off and running. Four years later, he was a folk hero in Dallas.

“I’ve been in these kids’ position,” Barea said. “I’m trying to help them out as much as I can in Summer League so they can have a good Summer League, (so) they can get jobs, they can get contracts and they can help the Denver Nuggets out. … I told them don’t take nothing for granted, you know? There’s a million kids in the world that want to be here, that want to play in Summer League, that want to try for the NBA to see them. So take every game, every opportunity and take advantage of it.”

Both 2026 Nuggets draftees are 23 years old. Simpson, who joined the team on a two-way contract last season, turns 24 next month. They were all 8 when Barea’s Mavericks upset Miami to win the 2011 championship. Barea had started only twice that regular season, but Dallas moved him into the starting lineup in Game 4 of the NBA Finals. He started the last three games, all wins, matching up on LeBron James and scoring 17 points in a pivotal Game 5.

“Obviously, I know his history and past in the league,” Simpson said. “To be able to learn from him, he’s been excellent. Great guy and great coach. I pick his brain, ask as many questions as I can.”

“He’s an intense coach, but in a good way,” Brazille said. “He knows the game (like) crazy. He was out there drawing up stuff. … Really good mind. Excited to be around him.”

Barea, who’s 42 now, hopes to learn from the experience as well, as both a leader and play-caller. He collaborates with head coach David Adelman on Denver’s offense as part of his regular job during the season. He’s still taking his first steps as a front-of-bench NBA assistant. He told The Post last year that one of his career ambitions is to be the head coach for the Puerto Rican national team someday.

In the meantime, “I’ve still gotta find that out, what kind of coach I am,” he says.

He has the Nuggets’ ears, regardless of which style he adopts over the next two weeks. They’ll listen to any advice a 2K legend has to impart.

So when it mattered most last season, he trusted Tyus Jones.

The Nuggets are re-signing the veteran point guard to a new one-year deal in NBA free agency, a league source told The Denver Post on Thursday afternoon.

They first acquired Jones off the buyout market in March. He played in only 11 regular season games for Denver, but when the team was facing elimination in the first round of the playoffs, Adelman turned to him for rotation minutes in Games 5 and 6 against Minnesota. Jones, whose claim to fame is his record assist-to-turnover ratio, was able to bring the ball up the floor safely against pressure and set up the Nuggets’ offense in those games.

He was a forgotten bright spot in their season-ending loss, a plus-five in 12 minutes.

“I just felt like we got Tyus for his ball-handling,” Adelman said during the series. “He’s a point guard. And I think in this series, with the pressure, he allowed Jamal (Murray) to get off the ball a little bit more.”

Like the acquisition of Marvin Bagley III, this will be a veteran minimum signing. Jones will carry a $2.45 million cap hit.

This will be his 12th season in the NBA. The Nuggets declined Jalen Pickett’s fourth-year team option earlier this week in a move that signaled where their trust resides on the point guard depth chart. Adelman and Denver’s lead executives have continued to emphasize the importance of adding ball-handlers to the roster this summer.

Jones, they hope, will be a dependable floor general off the bench, whether he ends up slotting in as a second- or third-string point guard.

He ended up in Denver by mistake. After getting traded from Orlando to Charlotte to Dallas in a matter of days before the mid-season trade deadline in February, he recovered from the whiplash and began to settle into a starting role with the Mavericks. They were a lottery team with more playing time available. He was “planning on sticking around and trying to make that work and figure it out,” he eventually told The Post.

Then the Mavericks changed their plans, waiving Jones so they could convert Ryan Nembhard from a two-way contract. That left Jones in search of a playoff contender to join. The Nuggets had been targeting forwards on the buyout market, but Jones’ reputation as a low-mistake, high-IQ ball-handler was appealing to them, according to league sources. His 5.47 assist-to-turnover ratio is the best in league history.

“I wanted to see if I could get somewhere else and try to make a run in the playoffs, try to play some meaningful basketball. … Playoff teams where I felt like I could make an impact and help, whatever area that they need me,” Jones told The Post after he first signed in Denver. “Whether it’s vocal in the locker room, or just being a connector. Whether it’s on the court, setting guys up, making plays, knocking shots down. Whatever the case may be, I’m ready to step into that role. If it changes night to night, I’m cool with that. I just want to help contribute to winning. … Nothing is set in stone. (My job is) just being a pro. Being ready to go on a night to night basis. Some nights your name’s gonna be called. Some nights, it’s not.”

Don’t get me wrong. Dream big or go home, right? King James and Nikola Jokic would destroy at least 60 rims during the regular season and break the Internet roughly 50 times a night. They could serve as the second and third estates to check/balance David Adelman’s executive branch. They’d eat up the first 17 minutes of any given “SportsCenter,” all by themselves. They’d be the best thing for Denver hoops and the worst thing for America’s “caps lock” buttons.

There’s just one problem with the idea of free agent LeBron James, one of the best three or four players ever, calling the Mile High City home at age 41.

The Nuggets probably can’t afford him.

They reportedly hit July sitting at about $12 million above the NBA’s first cap apron Which means if the King wants to sign a veteran minimum deal in order to play with Jokic, welcome aboard.

Frankly, it’s hard to see Nuggets boss Josh Kroenke pulling that kind of sales job off in this economy. For one thing, pegs LeBron to be If James plays more than 72 games, that estimate creeps into the $30-million-per-year ballpark.

That’s Peyton Watson-level money, allegedly. Which we’ll circle back to in a second.

The Russell Westbrook Experience was fun, or maddening, depending on which fan you ask. But Beastbrook agreed to a two-year contract worth an average of $3.39 million to live the Hard Nuggs Life. Hardaway Jr. took a $2.296 million flyer last summer on a one-year, here-for-the-ring fling.

Miami on Tuesday night basically tripled that number ($6.5 million), and the Nuggets let Tim and his career-high 224 3-pointers from last season walk out the door. Just like that. Meanwhile, Zeke Naji is slated to carry a $7.47-million cap hit next season. No wonder Nuggets faithful so often feel like walking to the nearest brick wall and bashing their foreheads against it for fun.

Nobody deserves those kinds of headaches, time and again. You’d hope Hardaway’s exit is the first sign that the Nuggets’ front office is ready to dig deep to match any offer for Denver’s restricted free agent wing, Peyton Watson, whose January scoring raised his market price and whose April absence raised some eyebrows.

Given Watson’s Los Angeles roots (Long Beach Polytechnic High School, then UCLA), it wasn’t a coincidence that SoCal’s two NBA franchises were the ones who kicked off the first few hours of free agency Tuesday by opening up oodles of cap space to shop with. The Clippers swapped Kawhi Leonard and his $50.3-million cap number to Toronto, while James announced that he was leaving the Lakers, reportedly opening up $51-52 million of cap room for the latter.

Watson can chase the highest bidder, but the Nuggets can match any offer. Is Watson worth $25 million per season if Christian Braun, who landed the extension last summer that P-Swat wanted, is worth $21.55 million to the Kroenkes? Sure. Is Watson worth $30 million, which puts him closer to Aaron Gordon’s ballpark ($31.97 million)? Probably not.

KSE’s first priority should be retaining Watson, who’s young, long, athletic, a rangy defender whose offensive game is finally matching the rest of his skill set. But should that fail, or the competing offers get absurd, then the second goal has to be making sure that Watson doesn’t walk out the door for nothing. The sign-and-trade option shouldn’t be a first resort, but it has to be somewhere within arm’s reach. The Clippers, however, reportedly own five over that same span.

Run it back and you’re The ill-fated Nuggets-Timberwolves series taught us that the franchise still had at least four more things under the hood that needed fixing:

• To get younger and more athletic.
• To get tougher. To find someone else to go after Jaden McDaniels.
• To play better defense.
• To have more adults on the bench who can counsel Adelman in the postseason.

King James ticks three of those four boxes, even as the legend’s 42nd birthday looms in December. Mind you, Gordon largely checks off the same ones, and he’s already on the payroll. For now.

Former Nuggets general manager Calvin Booth drafted Pickett with the 32nd overall pick in 2023. The 6-foot-2 reserve combo guard has struggled to break into Denver’s everyday rotation throughout his first three years in the league.

His $2.41 million salary next season would’ve offered the Nuggets a sliver of cap relief, but they chose instead to move on from the former Penn State star, seeking a fresh slate of point guard depth. Monday was the deadline to make a decision on his option.

Pickett, 26, will be a free agent for the first time in his career. He averaged 5.2 points, 2.3 rebounds and 2.3 assists in 16.1 minutes per game last season. He appeared in 50 games, highlighted by a career-high 29-point, seven-assist performance in January to lead the Nuggets in an upset over Philadelphia without their entire starting lineup.

Pickett is shooting 38.7% from 3-point range on two attempts per game in his first three years. He also boasts a sturdy 3.63 career assist-to-turnover ratio.

But he’s remained a deep bench option under two different head coaches in Denver, from Michael Malone to David Adelman. Booth was fired in April 2025. Then, new co-general managers Jon Wallace and Ben Tenzer signed veteran point guard Tyus Jones off the buyout market late last season when the Nuggets wanted ball-handling depth. Jones received playoff minutes over Pickett during their first-round series against the Timberwolves.

Qualifying offers

The Nuggets extended qualifying offers to Peyton Watson and Spencer Jones on Monday — a formality that ensures they’ll become restricted free agents on Tuesday.

Watson’s qualifying offer was $6.5 million. Jones’ offer was the minimum. Wallace and Tenzer have indicated that Denver is hopeful it can retain both players. The incumbent team will have the right to match any offer sheet a restricted free agent receives from an outside team.

Watson is regarded as one of the top free agents on the market, restricted or otherwise. The Lakers, Bulls and Nets were projected to be the three main cap space teams with the ability to throw a big offer at Watson coming into the offseason, but the Clippers have emerged now as another potential suitor. They’ve been shedding salary in recent days and clearing out cap space, including $16 million Monday when they declined Bogdan Bogdanovic’s team option. Bogdanovic, according to a league source, will be a Nuggets target in unrestricted free agency.