But Johnson knows himself well. He knows that indulging his curiosity helps him find peace. So he indulged.

Today’s topic was time dilation.

“So gravity, time and speed, they work together,” he explained a few hours later, wiping the sweat from his forehead after the Nuggets finished practice. “So the faster an object goes, the slower time is perceived. To my little extent of knowledge, there’s like a meter. And at the speed of light, at the top of the meter, there’s no space for time in there. Time basically comes to a stop. So a particle of light that����ap traveling at the speed of light, it doesn’t really feel time. If light takes eight minutes to get from the sun to us, that����ap from our perspective. Everything’s about perspective. For that particle of light, it����ap instantaneous because of its speed.”

Johnson was off and running. He referenced the 2014 science fiction movie “Interstellar,” in which Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway age 7 years for every hour that passes on a different planet. He tied it to a more microscopic real-life example — that “an astronaut who worked in the International Space Station for X amount of time might age a couple of milliseconds slower than a human on Earth.” He marveled at the brilliance and imagination of Albert Einstein and other early 20th-century physicists who studied relativity before it was accepted as a theory. “You’re thinking, how did they figure that out?” he said.

The 30-year-old Nuggets wing is a half-decade removed from an NBA Finals run with Phoenix. He hasn’t had a taste of the playoffs since 2023, when his Brooklyn Nets were swept in the first round. As Denver’s starting small forward alongside the star duo of Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, he’ll be an X-factor for a team with championship ambitions this year. He’s widely regarded as one of the smartest players in the NBA, an avid student and teacher of the game whose comprehension of the chessboard made him seem like a perfect match for Jokic when Denver traded for him last summer. His mind is one of his greatest strengths — and sometimes his adversary. “I’m probably an overthinker on a lot of things,” he told The Denver Post.

The Nuggets sacrificed a first-round pick and a longtime staple of their starting lineup, Michael Porter Jr., to acquire Johnson in a transaction that also enabled other additions. It was their most significant roster move in four years, a clear signal from Denver’s new front office that change was needed to return to championship form. The old core wasn’t working anymore.

Nine months later, the trade has aged better for the Nuggets in the abstract than it has on the stat sheet. They anticipated that. Porter and Johnson flipped roles. Porter’s expanded. Johnson’s contracted. His season has been a rollercoaster at times, interrupted by injuries and shooting slumps and the overall adjustment process to playing in Jokic’s orbit. His teammates and coaches have implored him to be aggressive, not to scale back too much.

“Cam is a really cerebral player,” coach David Adelman said. “And I think cerebral people sometimes can get in their own way. … It’s my job to make sure he’s getting touches, that he’s part of what we’re trying to accomplish. And it’s his job to just play. Let it happen. He’s too good of a basketball player not to.”

Johnson nonetheless finished the year a career-best 43% from 3-point range, ranking eighth in the league. He’s coming in hot to the playoffs, where Porter struggled in recent years. The coming weeks will provide the real verdict on Denver’s 2025 offseason moves. Johnson is no stranger to the environment and the pressure. He has his own way of navigating it all, of harnessing his tendency to overthink as a recalibration method. A reset button.

When he needs space away from basketball, he puts his mind to work on another subject that brings him as much joy and wonderment. He goes to space.

“I just try to learn things and learn about the world around me,” he said. “When we talk about astronomy and physics in general, as an overthinker, it kind of gets you outside of yourself. You get caught up in your own problems sometimes and the world feels like it����ap this big and everything feels so heavy, and then you go and you learn about some things, and you’re like man, we are really just on a little tiny rock in a very vast abyss.”

Johnson is entranced by physics. By history. By the history of physics. He takes books on the road with him — postgame reading for the tireless hours the Nuggets spend airborne, traveling from NBA city to city.

It has served him well throughout this season and his seven-year NBA career. It will continue to offer him a form of respite during the playoffs, which begin Saturday (1:30 p.m. MT) when Denver hosts the Timberwolves in Game 1.

“My whole world sometimes revolves around what happens in this rectangle,” he said. “So I need the opposite.”

One of the brightest minds in the basketball universe

It doesn’t always show, but Johnson is driven by a competitiveness that matches his intellect. Growing up outside of Pittsburgh, he watched his older brother become a high school valedictorian.

“He always said that he was gonna catch Aaron,” his dad, Gil Johnson, said. That made life simple: Cam got good grades because he had no other choice.

He also applied his smarts to every sport he played. As a quarterback in football, he didn’t need to wear a wrist sleeve with plays listed, Gil said. He had a knack for knowing where his receivers were going, where he needed to place the ball. As a baseball player, he once pitched a strong game for his seventh-grade team, then surprised his dad by explaining exactly how he did it. He didn’t have an elite arsenal of pitches — he was a middle schooler, after all — but he figured out which areas of the strike zone were weaknesses for each hitter throughout the game. “I had no idea that he thought baseball like that,” Gil said.

And as a hooper, Johnson was always trying to identify the next pass his teammates could make, after he passed it to them.

“You saw the leadership. You saw him telling guys where to be,” said Nick Luchini, one of his high school friends and teammates. “You could tell that guys were feeding off how smart he was.”

In a parallel universe, Johnson might’ve been an engineer. He might’ve studied astronomy, or history, or law. But he decided when he was young that he would make it to the NBA. While playing up a couple of years in second grade, he impressed an opponent once and earned a postgame compliment: “You might be a professional basketball player someday.”

Johnson didn’t take it that way.

“He came over with a scowl on his face,” Gil said. Cam was offended by the “might be” part of the comment.

“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Cam said. “… I feel like a lot of kids think that, you know? And it didn’t always work out for me. You say that to me in ninth grade, I’m like, ‘Yeah, we’ll see.’ Of course, I have confidence in myself, but as a 5-8 freshman, it����ap like, I’m also studying. I’m into books too. … By the time high school got to late junior, early senior years, I unloaded some of my APs intentionally. And kind of spent just a little bit more time in the gym, took a little bit of that (schoolwork) off my plate. So that was probably the first time I made a decision where school was a little bit more on the back burner.”

After all, Cam had already lost the battle to his brother. He would end up a measly salutatorian.

“He got me,” Cam said. “His GPA was higher than mine. He took more APs. He did better on AP tests. He did better on the ACT. He did better on the SAT. I couldn’t catch him. He’s too smart. … He’s just smarter than me, point blank. Period.”

By the time he hit a growth spurt and became a recruiting target for Division I college basketball programs, Johnson was already explaining physics terminology to his high school friends to help them understand a challenging class.

“If I’m being honest, Cam taught me a lot,” his friend Santino Platt said, “dumbing it down for me.”

But Johnson said it wasn’t until a sophomore astronomy course at the University of Pittsburgh that he developed an insatiable curiosity about the mysteries of the universe. And the miracles of scientific discovery within that universe. Amateur astronomy became a hobby as he was drafted into the NBA.

“We have such a mathematical approach to solving so much of what we cannot see,” Johnson said. “It����ap really cool how we use these equations and constants to deduce how far a planet is from a star that����ap 50 light years away, you know what I mean? We can’t see it for nothing. But by measuring how much light it takes away from a star and how big that star is, we can figure out a lot. When you read about the history of it and how long we’ve been around as humans in the past thousands of years, and how rapidly it����ap changing, it makes you think, ‘Well, what do we have wrong now?’ So I just like reading. Reading what people have thought in the past, reading what people think now. We have some really smart scientists in the world, and some are really really good at explaining.”

He came face to face with one of them in 2023, when the Nets helped arrange for him to meet astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. After a long conversation, Johnson and Tyson recorded in which they took turns selecting celestial concepts and events. Johnson’s “team” included the carbonate-silicate cycle, Pluto and a neutron star with the first overall pick. “That����ap a good pick,” he told The Post, doubling down.

He beamed at the display of public interest in NASA’s recent mission to the moon. He wondered to himself if the miracles of science are taken for granted by most people as he watched, in awe of the flight path’s precision. (“We go around the earth, loop to catch the moon, loop the moon, come back to the immediate, right where we want to be, drop them right in the ocean right where we thought they would end up. That����ap what math can do for us. … Not a stationary earth. Not a stationary moon.”)

His favorite reads over the years have included “A Short History of Nearly Everything” by Bill Bryson and “The Planet Factory: Exoplanets and the Search for a Second Earth” by Elizabeth J. Tasker. Recently after some Nuggets games, he’s been working his way through “The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality” by Brian Greene, which dives into the weeds of theoretical physics.

“It����ap sometimes a little heavy to read after a game,” Johnson said. “Like, you’ve gotta really sit there and think on a couple pages. It����ap not, like, a light read. But that����ap the whole point. Sitting there and thinking. It����ap pretty cool if you ask me.”

He has his other ways of unwinding from basketball, too, of course. He’s an avid golfer. He’s a lifelong sneakerhead, his dad says. And he’s a practicing Christian — but he doesn’t view his religious and scientific convictions as being at odds with each other.

“I think we choose as humans to put them in opposition to each other,” he said. “… If everybody always thought, like, ‘God is in control of everything, I don’t need to worry about it,’ I don’t think we would have as much scientific (discovery). You can look throughout time, and history tells us this. … I really think the two can mesh. And that����ap the perspective I look at it from. I just look at it as creation and the laws of nature are God’s language, and we are slowly trying to uncover it in a way that we can understand. It����ap like translating languages.”

While seeking out texts that make the complex feel digestible, Johnson has simultaneously established himself as a purveyor of intricate concepts. He hosts “The Old Man and the Three,” a prominent basketball podcast that was originally hosted by JJ Redick. Redick left the show when he took over as head coach of the Lakers. Johnson has been his successor, having various Nuggets teammates join him for episodes throughout this season.

The conversation doesn’t usually get around to astronomy. Johnson is wary of boring his friends to death with it — though he has found at least one space friend with the Nuggets in team doctor Steve Short.

“I’ll sit here and explain it, and some of my friends have no interest in it. And they’re nodding their head, nodding their head. I’m rambling. And then — eye-roll,” Johnson said, laughing. “… I’ll get a lot of eye-rolls for sure, like, ‘Here he goes. He don’t even know what he’s talking about.’ … I wonder how many other NBA players think about this stuff.”

Finding his mojo in Denver

Johnson got off to a rocky start in Denver.

He began the season in a nasty slump. A 39% career 3-point shooter, he was 21% after 11 games, good for only 7.2 points per night. Not ideal for a player who had averaged an efficient 18.8 the previous year in Brooklyn.

But the Nuggets were winning. Johnson’s struggles didn’t get in the way of their overall offensive success. Adelman urged patience from fans and media as Johnson navigated his new solar system, one in which Jokic is the sun. The first-year coach defended Johnson again during another rut in early March, after he missed a potential game-winning 3-pointer in Oklahoma City. It weighed heavily on him.

“He puts a lot of pressure on himself — not sometimes, but all the time,” Gil said. “He holds himself up to a high standard.”

But for most of the season, Johnson has been a quietly effective role player, defending better than Porter and keeping defenses honest with his floor-spacing, even when he hasn’t scored. He found his mojo again over the last few weeks, highlighted by a barrage of clutch 3s in a statement win over San Antonio. Johnson rarely celebrates or gets animated on the court, but that day, he shared a cathartic moment with sharpshooting teammate Tim Hardaway Jr. after draining a big shot in overtime. It was the emotional apex of a 12-game win streak to finish the regular season.

Since those first 11 games, Johnson is 46.8% from deep. The Nuggets have a 9.5 net rating with him on the floor.

“We’re all telling him to shoot,” Hardaway said this week. “It would be different if we were telling him to pass, right? So we’re telling him to do what he does best, man. Be that Brooklyn Net Cam that you were out there, averaging 17, 18 a game. Playing freely, playing fun. That����ap what you were brought here to do. Knock down your shots when open and be confident. Don’t be passive.”

The ball will find him in high-stakes situations over the coming weeks. The gravitational pull of the Jokic-Murray two-man game is too intense, like a planet where time is dilated. Defenders will be sucked in from the perimeter. Johnson will get open shots.

When he’s in those moments, nothing else matters to him — no other galaxy or solar system or planet. His universe contracts into an 18-inch cylinder.

“Basketball is a beautiful game,” he said, “in terms of just the creativity and expression of competition. … On the court, I like to just be in that moment and respect it as that.”

Only when the moment is over does the universe expand again, waiting for Johnson’s imagination to explore it. To him, there’s something profound about being able to appreciate the scale of both things: the basket and the abyss.

“It changes my mental state,” he said. “You’re in an environment of high competition and the pressure of competition, where you feel like every shot is so important. I’m shooting a ball into a hole, you know what I mean? It����ap a floating circle, and I’m trying to get a ball into it. I just like to kind of minimize those things when I step off the court, give my mind something else to focus on.”

If the Nuggets were trying to steer clear of Anthony Edwards and the Timberwolves in the NBA Playoffs, they’d have pulled Nikola Jokic out of the Spurs game Sunday after about 40 seconds instead of the half.

Load management in April should apply to Timberwolves faithful, too.

Especially when it’s a load of complete and utter crapola.

“You can’t duck opponents and (the Spurs) didn’t want to duck us,” Denver coach David Adelman said after the Nuggets won in San Antonio with a little Joker and a lot of bench mob minutes to clinch the 3 seed in the West. “We’re not ducking anybody.”

And why should they?

This ain’t 2024 anymore. The Nuggets took three of four from Minnesota, their first-round playoff opponent, during the regular season. Denver scored at least 108 points against the T-Wolves in all four of those meetings, something they haven’t done against their conference rivals since the 2020-21 season.

We’ve heard plenty of yapping about how Tim Connelly, Minnesota’s president of basketball operations, built the Nuggets into a championship club, then went north to build a beast that could nullify their strengths.

Only that pipeline works both ways now, boys and girls. The Kroenkes last June hired Jon Wallace to be Denver’s new executive vice president of player personnel, snapping him up from … Minnesota, where Wallace worked in the Twin Cities under Connelly, his old Nuggets boss, for three seasons.

You usually don’t land good free agents without some stellar work by various double agents first. Which is why it’s probably not a coincidence that one of the first things Wallace and front-office partner Ben Tenzer did once they got the keys was sign a player who drove Minnesota defenders up the Berlin Wall.

The Nuggets that Minnesotans have labeled an easy mark didn’t have this version of Peyton Watson two years ago. Or this version of Julian Strawther. Or Bruce Brown. Or Cam Johnson. Or Jonas Valanciunas. Or Tim Hardaway Jr.

Hardaway fit Adelman’s system like a glove. He settled in as the perfect shooting complement to Jokic, Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon. And Wallace had remembered how No. 10 used to light up the T-Wolves like it was Christmas in Times Square.

Hardaway, the Nuggets’ veteran sixth man, heads into the series averaging 16.6 points per game against Minnesota during the regular season over a 12-year NBA career. He’s averaged 2.7 treys against the T-Wolves lifetime. Hardaway was good for 3.8 3-pointers and 19.6 points per game against Minnesota this year. The 6-foot-5 wing knocked down second-most treys ever (224) in a season by a Nugget who wasn’t Murray (245). He passed Michael Porter Jr. (220) for second place on that list next week, and isn’t getting nearly enough love nationally for NBA Sixth Man of the Year honors.

“I don’t know how he’s not (getting more),” Murray noted recently. “He’s scoring in bunches. He’s not just coming in and just making shots. He’s doing a lot. He’s talking. He’s into the ball. He’s engaged in every shot. He’s engaged in every opportunity he has. He’s a starter out there.”

More importantly for this matchup, he’s a starter who’ll play a lot in those non-Jokic minutes where the Timberwolves used to feast. Two years ago against Minnesota in the conference semis, the Nuggets’ bench was outscored by the Wolves’ bench by an average of 24-17 per tilt during the series. Over the seven games, only once (Game 5) did Denver’s reserves outscore Minnesota’s (16-15). Take out Game 5, and the Nuggets’ bench got boat-raced by almost 10 points per contest (26-17).

Hardaway changes that math.

Gordon’s hamstring notwithstanding, No. 10 might be the most important Nugget — or “swing” Nugget — in the entire series.

Since the fall of 2019, Hardaway’s teams are 8-4 in the regular season against Minnesota whenever he’s scored 19 points or more. The Nuggets were 14-6 (.700) during the ’25-26 regular season when he put up at least 19 points. When he made at least four treys in a game, Denver went 20-8 (.714).

In their last four playoff games vs. Minnesota two springs ago, the Nuggets got seven 3-point makes, total, from their bench. In his four appearances against the Wolves with Denver this season, Hardaway drained 15 treys. All by himself.

This ain’t 2024 anymore. Hardaway Jr. has won 10 of his last 18 visits to Minneapolis and sports a 2-0 career mark there during the NBA postseason. He’s averaged 15.5 points in the Twin Cities as a pro and put up 21.5 per game against the Minnesota Gophers while at Michigan.

“He knows how to affect the game in his own way and just be super aggressive,” Murray said of Hardaway after he helped topple Denver outlast the Timberpups this past December. “He understands the game — time of the game, flow of the game, where to find shots, (and how to) just be a winner. He cares about playing hard.

“Whether he’s missing or making shots, he keeps that same energy, that same aggressiveness. That’s all you can ask for. He has been a true veteran for us.”

This ain’t 2024 anymore. These Nuggets have got their ducks in a row. And watching the Timberwolves goofs who’ve barked on social media eat their words is going to be absolutely quacktacular.

Adelman said that’s not even necessary in Jamal Murray’s case.

“I really hope All-NBA is something that is obvious and not an argument,” the first-year Nuggets coach said recently.

Murray set his sights on one of the 15 All-NBA spots this February, immediately after he was named an All-Star for the first time in his career. He seems to be closing in on accomplishing that goal, especially as other candidates have lost their eligibility late in the season. Murray has already secured his place on the ballot by appearing in 65 games. He ranked seventh in the league in total minutes played, with 400 more than his next-closest teammate as of Friday, before Denver (52-28) hosted Oklahoma City.

In addition to buoying the Nuggets through months of injuries, Murray has played in eight overtime games. He logged 38 or more minutes for the 23rd time on Monday in a comeback win over Portland.

“His game has kind of spoken for itself,” Christian Braun said. “His approach every night has been amazing. … He’s been amazing for us. He’s been available for us. Seems like every night, he’s on the court. He’s a killer. That’s just who he is. I don’t think there’s any debate that he’s an All-NBA player this year.”

Braun described it as Murray’s best individual year. The numbers continue to agree. He’s averaging career highs in points (25.4), rebounds (4.4) and assists (7.1) as the regular season winds down. He’s one of nine players with five 40-point games. The Nuggets have won every one of them.

He reached another milestone in a recent win over Utah. With 1:15 to play, the 29-year-old guard broke Denver’s franchise record for 3-pointers in a single season, previously held by Michael Porter Jr. (220). It gave the Nuggets a 129-126 lead over the Jazz and inspired Murray to break out his “Blue Arrow” celebration for just the second time this season. When asked if he knew about the record, Murray said that Altitude’s Katy Winge had informed him he was close to passing Porter during a halftime interview.

Make no mistake, though, he added: The celebration was for a go-ahead shot, not a record-breaking shot.

“I just wanted to win,” he explained. “We were down. I wasn’t even (thinking about the record). We had a lot of season to break that.”

Murray and Hornets rookie Kon Knueppel have been way ahead of the pack as the NBA’s two best volume 3-point shooters, locked in a race for the most efficient season. Among the 71 players who had taken 350 or more 3s as of Friday, Murray’s 43.5% clip was the best in the league, on 563 attempts. Knueppel was second at 42.9% on 624 attempts.

“I’m just chucking them,” Murray said, smirking, when asked what’s gone right.

“The work he’s put in, the ability to step back off both hands and make 3s is such a big deal,” Adelman said. “Certain guys can do it with one hand. They have to manipulate the play to get to their left or their right. And he’s gotten to the point where it doesn’t matter which side he goes to. Not to mention the transition 3s. The off-the-bounce stuff is just unbelievable.

“… Such a weapon to have a guy who can make 3s in all situations, not just a specialist that can make it in certain situations.”

All-NBA selections became position-less in 2024 after a new collective bargaining agreement went into effect, meaning Murray won’t be inhibited by the disproportionate number of guards to bigs among the candidates. Under the current rules, All-NBA basically celebrates the 15 best players in a given season, as long as they’ve played at least 65 games.

All-Stars such as Cade Cunningham and Anthony Edwards have been out recently, eliminating their chances of making the threshold. Nuggets center Nikola Jokic has been on the edge of eligibility since he returned from a knee injury at the end of January.

Lakers star Luka Doncic is asking the league to grant him an exception after falling one game short of the minimum, his agent announced recently. An “extraordinary circumstances” clause in the CBA permits arbitration in certain cases; Doncic argues that the two games he missed due to the birth of his child in Slovenia shouldn’t count against him. However, he was also suspended recently for what would have been his 65th game after picking up his 16th technical foul of the year.

Meanwhile, Murray has avoided the drama of rulebook semantics. He has entered another red-hot stretch in April — 44 of 86 from 3-point range (51%) in his last nine games.

“When he gets in a rhythm and he lets that kind of take over his flow, there’s certain things that he does as a shooter that lends really well to being able to recreate the environments of shooting that he wants,” Nuggets sharpshooter Cam Johnson marveled. “He’s able to get under the ball. Get arc on it. So there’s a lot less variance with his shots. It’s very repeatable. Which just means he’s a very good shooter. He’s been that way his whole career. He’s very comfortable here, in this building, and he’s been doing it a long time.”

Which is a shame, really, because Adelman’s done a better job in his first season as Nuggets coach than social media would ever let on.

We’ve devoted a lot of bandwidth to the games Adelman has let slip away this regular season.

Yet ask yourself this: What would’ve happened in those 17 tilts the Nuggets played earlier this season without Nikola Jokic if Michael Malone was still coaching this team?

They wouldn’t have gone 11-6. I’ll promise you that.

Adelman won 11 of the 17 games he coached this season when the Joker was inactive or didn’t dress. Context: Malone went 11-16 from 2022-2025 in non-Jokic games. More context: Malone was 2-6 in the eight non-Joker games prior to that.

Say what you will about DA, the motivational speaker, DA the wordsmith, DA in the locker room, or DA at the postgame podium. The man can coach.

We mention this because of the calendar. The Great Nuggets Purge celebrates its first birthday on Wednesday. On April 8, 2025, Josh Kroenke dismissed Malone as coach and Calvin Booth as general manager, ending years of awkward, often conflicting news conferences and months of behind-the-curtain tensions.

Yes, Malone, the winningest coach in franchise history, was done dirty in the deal. But the move hasn’t exactly aged poorly so far, has it?

On Tuesday, Malone was officially introduced as the new men’s hoops coach at North Carolina. Tar Heels brass celebrated Purge Day by handing Malone a $50-million gift card. Pretty nice parachute, if you can get it.

The Nuggets (51-28), meanwhile, entertain the Memphis Grizzlies on Wednesday night at Ball Arena, having won nine in a row and vaulted the LOLakers into the third spot of the Western Conference playoff bracket in the process.

The Grizz (25-54) are the last team to beat Denver, notching a 125-118 stunner in Bluff City on March 18 in the second half of a Nuggets back-to-back.

On this day last April, the Nuggets’ record was 47-32. They’d gone 3-7 since St. Patrick’s Day, had lost four straight, and were fading fast. They were 17.5 games back of conference-leading Oklahoma City.

On Tuesday, after a wild OT win over Portland, the Nuggets had won 51 games and were 11.5 games back of OKC. They’re 9-0 since March 19.

So: Did Josh make the right call?

From a chemistry standpoint, there’s no doubt. The organizational “vibe” is better, by all accounts. And, sure, Adelman has a deeper, better, more modular, and more veteran roster than Malone got in either of the previous two campaigns.

Would Booth have gotten the green light to trade Michael Porter Jr.? It’s tough to say. But what his replacements, Jon Wallace and Ben Tenzer, pulled off by swapping MPJ to the Nets opened up desperately-needed cap space. Which, in turn, allowed the Nuggets to turn one very good player (Porter) into four pretty good veteran ones (Cam Johnson, Bruce Brown, Tim Hardaway Jr. and Jonas Valanciunas). Which, in hindsight, helped Denver to weather its non-Jokic month, too.

But be careful with revisionist history.

DA Ball at Ball can be an acquired taste. The defense continues to go as far as Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson can carry it, and the two have rarely played together since Christmas. Denver rallied Monday night against Portland, but gave up a whopping 25 3-pointers along the way. It feels as if at least 15 different players have put up career shooting nights against this bunch.

But if the Nuggets win Wednesday, it’ll be 10 straight victories — something no Denver team has done in the Jokic Era.

Shouldn’t Adelman be getting some flowers for that, at least? His 51 wins are the most ever by a first-year Nuggets coach in the NBA era during a full initial season. Larry Brown still holds the first-year record overall, with a 65-19 ABA mark in 1974-75.

Elsewhere, the world keeps turning. Malone held his inaugural UNC news conference on Tuesday. His first collegiate head-coaching job is one of the bluest of blue bloods — and hottest seats in the sport. Since Dean Smith hung up his gilded whistle in 1997, the three coaches who’ve followed (Bill Gutheridge, Matt Doherty, Hubert Davis) who weren’t Roy Williams averaged just 3.7 seasons each at the helm.

Note to Triangle media: Michael can be as cuddly as a New York cabbie, with the patience and vocabulary to match. He suffers fools ungladly, although often with humor. To wit, when a reporter on Tuesday mentioned the coach’s “tenacious” defense with the Nuggets, Malone replied, “It wasn’t always tenacious.”

Laughed at that one.

Still, deep down, Michael’s a family guy. Malone’s daughter, Bridget, is in her second season with the UNC volleyball team after a stellar run at Mountain Vista High School. Chapel Hill is one of the premier college towns in America. Wish him well. Wish him luck. With that fan base, he’ll need it.

“He belongs in coaching,” Adelman said of Malone on Monday. “And that’s what he should be doing.”

A month earlier, funny enough, Booth also went the college route. . The Lions finished 12-20 a year ago and have reached the Big Dance just once since 2010. Happy Valley is gorgeous (significantly less so in the winter), but it’s also a wrestling school the way DU is a hockey one. Wish him luck, too.

Ain’t it funny how time flies when everybody’s pulling in the same direction? A year after Purge Day, Malone’s a Tar Heel. Booth’s a Nittany Lion. And the Nuggets, in spite of themselves, might be better off.

And Draymond Green may be a lot of things. But the man’s no fool.

“What we’ve seen now is the tip of the iceberg (for Watson). He ain’t even scratched the surface yet,” “Peyton Watson is going to be an elite NBA player … so, y’all keep an eye out for Peyton Watson. That kid is going to be an All-Star. No questions asked.”

Exactly. And yet, because it’s April, because it’s “Where Will LeBron Play Next Year” season, silly questions give way to even sillier suggestions.

On Tuesday, longtime ESPN scribes Dave McMenamin and Tim Bontemps authored a piece for Worldwide Leader’s website — including one that featured the Nuggets. In it, they speculated that Denver and Los Angeles could work out a sign-and-trade that would see the Lakers land Peyton Watson (a former UCLA star and Long Beach native) or Cam Johnson for the King. This was backed by an unnamed source, a “West executive,” who suggested:

“Who is the only guy on (James’) level from a basketball IQ standpoint in the league? Go there and team up with that guy.”

‘There’ would be the Front Range. The ‘only guy’ would be Nikola Jokic. Fun? Sure. Flattering? No doubt. But for Watson? Who ships a 23-year-old player coming into their prime for a soon-to-be 42-year-old? Even if that middle-aged wonder is one of the best five guys to ever play the game?

Yes, Tom Brady won a Super Bowl at age 42. Barry Bonds, at the same age, led the National League in walks (132). Some 44 years earlier, a 42-year-old Warren Spahn led the National League in wins (23). Age is just a number.

Although the numbers in this scenario are bonkers. Especially when you consider that, odds are, James is staying put with the Lakers, popping back to the Cavaliers, or hanging it up. Of the ESPN.com hypotheticals, Denver was fifth on the list — and it’s hard to believe King James’ camp, once push comes to shove, would even have to dig that deep.

But let’s humor the concept for a second.

There’s the cost, for one thing. Watson is a restricted free agent after the season who’s made the Nuggets look bad for not giving him an extension earlier — putting up, as of Tuesday evening, career highs in points (14.9 per game) and rebounds. A show-stopping leaper and defender over his first three seasons on Chopper Circle, at age 23, he’s evolved into a foundational, two-way wing whose jumper now complements years of sky-walking athleticism. He’s also currently sporting a team-friendly $4.36 million cap number. That’s about to be tripled, or quadrupled, by somebody.

King James is slated to hit the open market as an unrestricted free agent coming off a $52.6 million cap hit this season following a $48.7 million hit in ’24-25. If he’s going to give any franchise a “hometown” discount, it’s more likely to be given to his actual hometown — Cleveland — than to the Nuggets. If the Kroenkes can’t afford Watson, how would they turn around and justify stretching the cap that much more for James?

There are the realities of the East vs. the West. If the King wants at least one more ring, more power to him. Oklahoma City’s core is young enough that they’re not going anywhere, and the Spurs with Victor Wembanyama are right behind them. The road back to the Finals in the East through Detroit, Boston and New York is far easier than the brutal hellscape of the current West bracket.

There’s the fit. Remember The Russell Westbrook Experience? Now picture that vibe, times about 50. As part of Team ‘Bron, the Joker might start seeing kinder foul calls come his way more consistently. But when you get The King, you get his demands, his parameters, his show. And maybe his family members, too. In some ways, it wouldn’t be all that unlike The Prime Effect at CU. And yet, this situation is markedly different than Boulder four years ago. The Buffs, at the time, needed an identity besides irrelevance and bad football. The Nuggets don’t.

On the court, James is an alpha who can play with anybody. If you squint hard enough, you can even see LeBron doing for the Nuggets next year what Aaron Gordon, whose health has become a daily concern, does now. Although so could Watson, at a price close to or less than James’ likely asking price.

The genius in building this Nuggets core was not just in finding Jokic and grooming him into a generational big man. It was also in finding pieces that accented Joker’s ridiculous, prodigious strengths (hands, feet, vision, touch, IQ, passing, shooting, ball-handling, strength, physicality, dexterity, anticipation, etc., etc.) while simultaneously lessening the impact of his few on-court weaknesses (rim protection, straight-line speed).

Jokic could find the open man in the middle of a crowded supermarket, so you surround him with excellent spot-up shooters (Jamal Murray, Michael Porter Jr., Tim Hardaway Jr., Aaron Gordon, etc., etc.) and let him pick from several poisons. He can hit an earwig in stride from 80 yards away, so you give him superlative sprinters and finishers on runouts (Also Gordon, Christian Braun, Peyton Watson, Bruce Brown, etc., etc.). He’ll contest shots, but probably won’t swat many into the second row — so you pair him with defenders who can cut off the supply chain of drivers at the head (Also AG, also Watson, also Braun, also Brown, etc., etc.).

Even at age 41, King James is still an elite scoring machine (20.7 points per game as of Wednesday). That long-distance shooting, though, has been slipping — James’ 41% conversion rate on 3-pointers in ’23-24 dropped to 37.6% last season and was at 31.4% as of Wednesday, a dip of 10% over about three years.

Watson, meanwhile, is trending in the exact opposite direction on his treys. Two seasons ago? 29.6%. A year ago? 35.3%. This season, before Wednesday? 41.5%.

And then there’s the defense. , James went into Wednesday evening with a Defensive Rating (DR) of 116 opponent points allowed per 100 possessions (lower is better), and that number has been trending the wrong way, too. Last season, LeBron’s DR was 114, the same as the season before that. In ’22-23, that DR was 113. In ’21-22, it was 111. Career blocks per 100 possessions: 1.0 — 0.9 this season, 0.8 two years prior.

While Watson’s DR, per Basketball-Reference, Even in a “down” defensive year for P-Swat, he was blocking 1.9 shots per 100 possessions this season before the midweek Utah trip, after 2.7 stuffs per 100 possessions in ’24-25 and 2.9 per 100 in ’23-24.

“Peyton Watson has gotten so much better,” Green continued. “He clearly has a high-level processor. When you have a high-level processor in this league, it’s an advantage. It’s very understated, but a very big advantage.”

Why give that one up so soon? When it comes to the question of an old King or a young Watson for the Nuggets next season,

Full disclosure: The basketball wonks in the Grading The Week (GTW) offices were fans of the Michael Porter Jr.-for-Cam trade last summer. Again, not because it was a fair swap of talents. It wasn’t — the Nets got the guy with the bigger frame and far sexier upside. It was a “win” because it got MPJ’s bloated contract off the books and enabled the Nuggets to grab the cap space to land three more veteran players (Bruce Brown, Tim Hardaway Jr., Jonas Valanciunas) in the process.

But what’s often said about Christian Braun applies to Johnson, too — he’s got to show up offensively within the flow of the offense, not get down when the shots aren’t falling, and find ways to contribute when the moment finds him. Because it inevitably will.

Cam Johnson’s rebound — B

From last Saturday through Friday, the up-and-down In three games prior to the Nuggets’ visit to the Lakers on Saturday night, Cam was averaging 12.7 points, 3.3 rebounds, 2.0 assists and 1.7 3-point makes per contest. He put up 17 points and three treys in a rout of Houston and added another 15 points in a huge win at San Antonio late Thursday night.

Here’s why that matters, and why coach David Adelman has remained in Johnson’s corner through thick and thin this season: The Nuggets look like a title contender when Johnson contributes offensively — and are more of a play-in level team when he doesn’t.

Heading into Friday night, when Johnson scored at least 11 points in a game, the Nuggets were 15-4 (78.9% win percentage), and 26-22 when Cam was 10 points or less.

When Johnson made at least five field goals in a game, the Nuggets were 13-4 (76.4% win percentage), 28-24 when it was four makes or fewer.

When Johnson drained at least two treys, they were 13-6 (68.4% win percentage), 28-20 otherwise.

“It����ap been a tough year for the Nuggets in the clutch, which is something that we’re not used to seeing.” former Nuggets coach Michael Malone, now an ESPN analyst, offered up on the “NBA On ESPN” halftime show Wednesday. “And they’ve got 17 games to go to try to figure it out.”

They figured it out in San Antonio. If they can get Johnson figured out for the stretch run and the postseason that follows, hold on tight.

Broncos’ free agency start — D

Oh, we’ve heard all the caveats by now. There’s time. You just went 14-3. The selection wasn’t that great. The locker room is full of good players and good guys who get what Sean Payton, Davis Webb, Vance Joseph and Darren Rizzi are all trying to do. And we get all that. And we get that, as of last Friday afternoon, per OverTheCap.com, the Broncos still had $22.3 million cap room for ’26 to play with — even after bringing almost everybody back.

Yet there are good reasons why ����apountry was more than a little alarmed at the alacrity with which GM George Paton and coach Sean Payton seemed to sit on their respective hands during the opening  days of the NFL’s free-agent signing period.

Why? Two words: Rookie contract.

QB Bo Nix has a cap hit of $5.1 million in ’26 and $5.9 million slated for ’27. That’s going to change. Joe Burrow had a $9.87-million cap hit in 2022, the third of his four-year rookie deal. On Burrow’s second deal, If Nix continues to trend upward, and health permitting, he should, the Broncos are going to have another Russell Wilson-sized cap number to deal with in a few years.

Which is why they may regret not spending while they were in a period of flexibility “between” big-time/franchise-level QB cap numbers. Especially when you’ve got a Super-Bowl-worthy roster that’s, quite literally, only one or two playmakers away from winning it all — and only one or two offensive playmakers in particular. But, hey, we can get admittedly panicky in the GTW offices, so maybe that’s just us. Although based on our emails and social media exchanges since Monday night, it’s definitely not just us. At all.

Johnson sat at his locker and stared into space as the minutes passed, as his teammates got dressed and filtered out. He knew the game had been on his fingertips, and there was nothing that could be said to console him in the immediate aftermath of a bitter loss. Nikola Jokic had located him for an open corner 3-pointer in the last 10 seconds of regulation. The overused adage about a make-or-miss league was accurate in this case. Johnson missed, and Denver fell short in OT.

For that to be his moment of maximum national exposure since joining the Nuggets might have exacerbated the notion that he’s been a failed experiment. The full body of work as a shooter says otherwise: Johnson is 40.9% from 3-point range on 4.4 attempts per game, with percentages of 40 or higher from both corners and above the break. He’s a plus-9.8 per 100 possessions when sharing the court with Jokic, a plus-0.5 without him and a plus-2.5 without Jokic or Murray at his side. The Nuggets are 25-15 when he plays, a better win percentage than when he doesn’t.

Yet an undeniable feeling has lingered — for both Johnson and outside observers — that his fit in Denver has been awkward, his involvement in the offense inconsistent, his confidence elusive. At least to the extent that his role remains a work in progress with one month to go in the regular season.

“There’s definitely still an element of figuring it out, and it kind of changes on me a little bit from here to there, just based on how we’re playing and who’s playing,” he said. “But everybody keeps telling me at the end of the day, just be myself. … At the end of the day, just go out there and hoop and have fun. That’s easy to lose sight of in the long term and in the short term. But when you kind of reel it back to that and focus on just having fun, playing hard, trusting your teammates and vice versa, you’re setting yourself up for good things to happen.”

Trying to be more decisive

The box score and eye test Wednesday indicated that Johnson accomplished that goal in a 129-93 rout of the Rockets. Denver’s small forward went for 17 points, two rebounds, four assists, two blocks and two steals. His bounce-back performance included a 3-for-5 outside shooting clip. It was his first game with more than 11 points since Feb. 20 and only his third exceeding that number (his season average) since the knee injury he suffered Dec. 23.

The Nuggets improved to 14-6 when he shoots nine or more times from the field.

What’s been challenging — and ambiguous — for them to parse is how infrequently he’s taken that many shots. His predecessor and trade counterpart, Michael Porter Jr., attempted nine or more in 72 of his 77 games last year.

As that discrepancy crystallized early this season, David Adelman insisted that it wasn’t a bad thing. Johnson’s impact was subtler, less forceful. More intellectual. His feel for relocation and how it could benefit Denver’s spacing. His judgment as a connector. Even after another mini-slump, Denver has a better offensive rating with Johnson on the floor than with Porter last season. A larger share of the pie has belonged to Jamal Murray, who made his first All-Star team.

It����ap been clear for some time now: The Nuggets don’t need Johnson to be MPJ. They don’t need him to replicate the raw numbers.

They do need him to fulfill what Adelman described last offseason as a “premium on timely shooting,” however, because basketball at its core is often a game of the id. Jokic and Murray will be swarmed by playoff defenses. The ball will be reversed to Johnson in nerve-racking moments. The Nuggets will need him to be a willing aggressor when those moments arrive.

“I think I’ve found myself being way too indecisive for too long in the season,” he said. “And just trying to figure out where plays are and coverages are and actions are and the spacing of teammates. … It’s just a little bit of being more decisive.”

“I think sometimes, he’s trying to make perfect plays, instead of just making the play that is right there in front of you (that) is the right decision,” Adelman said. “… These guys have to find their rhythm. They come back. As he finds his rhythm and then new people come back, and the rotation changes, and it feels different, everyone’s trying to do the right thing for the guy next to him. Sometimes, it stunts flow.”

Johnson first hit his stride in November, as other Nuggets were dropping like flies. He never quite found his footing during the 10-game stretch before that, when Denver was fully healthy and fully operational to start the season. Now he’s had four months to reflect on those 10 games while waiting for his next chance to play with that lineup again, as originally conceived. The reunited Nuggets were three games in after their win over Houston.

“I see just what I was trying to figure out then,” Johnson said, looking back. “It’s just a work in progress. We still have to get P-Wat back, too. That’s another element that adds a really crucial dimension to our team. But I think everybody as a team is going through the same thing. Everybody’s going through the same thing. Where can I be most effective in my contributions for the team?”

“… It becomes a personal responsibility of understanding how to be most efficient and be most, when I say efficient, just efficient in my impact on the game. That’s what I’ve been trying to navigate. Just today, take a step. Tomorrow, take a step. And keep on taking steps. Our goals are a lot bigger than tonight. Our goals are to keep playing deep into the spring and into early summer.”

As the numbers continue to back up his ability, the next step is to showcase it consistently in high-stakes games. Johnson hasn’t been part of a playoff win since 2022, and Denver will need him ready for heightened physicality in April. He struggled to leave a mark in both of Denver’s recent visits to Oklahoma City, combining for 13 points, 11 rebounds, two assists and three turnovers across 62 minutes. The understated nature of his role felt louder, more troubling. A missed shot left him dejected.

Whatever trance he was in that night in the locker room, he appeared to have snapped out of it Wednesday.

“I think Cam is naturally just hard on himself,” Christian Braun said. “And that’s good. He’s a guy that you love to have in the locker room. He’s such a great teammate. … He’s gonna be so big for us down the stretch. He’s gonna hit big shots. He’s gonna make big plays on both ends. And I think on defense, he’s been really good. So I don’t know that it’s been a tough year. Obviously, he had the injury and whatnot. But he’s playing well. He’s shooting the ball well. When he plays like he does tonight, we’re really tough to beat.”

The Nuggets somehow, someway, boast a 35-20 record at the All-Star break. Despite a training room that triggers claustrophobia. Despite missing three-time MVP Nikola Jokic for four weeks. Despite Aaron Gordon playing in 23 games. Despite Christian Braun and Cam Johnson being sidelined for half the season.

What a ride.

What a waste.

The time away offers the Nuggets a chance to exhale. But when they return, their season will be summed up with a sigh without significant improvement.

Hate to break it to you, but the Nuggets are once again bad on defense.

With first-year coach David Adelman pulling the right levers, the Nuggets went 10-6 without Jokic. They sit third in the Western Conference.

They delivered inspiring wins at Boston and Philadelphia.

But it will not work in the playoffs.

They have 20 road wins, tied for the most in the NBA.

But they can’t beat the Cavaliers and Lakers at home?

Through 55 games, the Nuggets have raised the floor, but the ceiling threatens to remain the same.

What gives? Why the pessimism?

The Nuggets rank 24th in overall defensive rating, 29th in the clutch and they don’t force turnovers.

And you thought the Broncos were the only team that struggled to get takeaways? The Thunder have already lost as many games this season (14) as they did a year ago. Nobody in the East creates fear.

What an opportunity. What a miss.

For everything that has gone right — Jamal Murray turning into Jamall-star, the blossoming of Peyton Watson, the improvement of Jalen Pickett and Julian Strawther — there is a reason to wince.

The Nuggets have the best offense, and struggle to get stops. The NBA marveled as Denver held it together with chicken wire and duct tape without as many as four starters.

Meanwhile, those of us who predicted them to win the NBA championship — my hand is raised — wonder if another Jokic-in-his-prime season will end in disappointment.

Even the recently out-of-sync Jokic — he is averaging 4.4 turnovers per game since he returned, and has 19 over this past three games — remains inevitable offensively. And Murray has found consistency from the first bell.

But for the Nuggets to contend for another title, they must lock up opponents.

Where’s Pat Surtain II when you need him?

For all the hand-wringing over the urgency to win with the best player in the world, the Nuggets’ fate will be determined by Gordon, Watson, Braun, Bruce Brown and Spencer Jones.

Gordon is the piece that makes the puzzle fit. He can guard forwards and centers, versatility that becomes critical as half-court possessions become more central to playoff outcomes. Whether he can remain in the lineup for 16 postseason wins is a concern given his litany of calf and hamstring issues. His resume is so thick, however, that he deserves the benefit of the doubt.

Watson is young. His hamstring will be fine. The Nuggets need his length on the perimeter. It does not require squinting to see Denver falling in seven games in the second round again if they don’t defend 3-pointers better. Watson is part of that solution.

Braun is critical. When the Nuggets won it all in 2023, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope was a menace capable of clinging to a top shooting guard like lint. Braun has shown the ability to be a strong on-ball defender, but can he trust his ankle this spring?

Early returns screamed no. The last three games suggest the arrow is pointing up.

Brown and Jones are reliable. Brown will dig in against the best and let the world know about it. Jones provides energy and effort that jump off the screen. The Nuggets are slow-playing converting Jones from a two-way to a standard contract because of the All-Star break and the player working his way through a concussion.

The idea that the Nuggets’ title bid hinges on Jones sounds absurd. It is not. He does not have to be a factor every night. But he will likely have to steal a game with a steal or two.

If the Nuggets don’t at least reach the NBA Finals, it would represent a bigger missed opportunity than the Broncos falling to the Patriots in the AFC Championship. At least the Broncos had an excuse. No Bo Nix and a coach who forgot to kick.

The Nuggets have leaned on injuries to provide cover for all flaws and mistakes. Just wait until everyone returns. But that misses the point.

It is not about getting the band back together. It is about playing with purpose on both ends of the floor. The Nuggets were a mess defensively last season, leaving former coach Michael Malone to rip them so viciously after a loss at Portland that I figured the coach knew he was going to be fired or wanted to be.

Compromised rotations or not, the Nuggets are not any better this season.

We can all come up with reasons why the Nuggets have not returned to their 2023 heights — too tired, too much drama, too few bench players.

The mitigation needs to stop. This team was built to win big.

Adelman, an offensive genius, needs his team to play defense like it means it. Like it matters.

You see where this is going, right? With Jokic back, the other guys have to have his back. They need to play like they did without him, by getting in front of guys, switching and producing turnovers.

Because one thing is becoming clear. If the Nuggets don’t reach their goals, there will be no defending them.

“This is a tough loss,” coach David Adelman told reporters after Cleveland escaped with a soul-crushing 119-117 win at Ball Arena late Monday.

“It’s one of those losses you’ll remember at the end of the year. (We) had control of the game. This happens in the NBA. I told them (in the locker room), ‘This stuff happens.’ We’ve won some games like this, where the other team’s looking back, going, ‘How did we lose that game?’ We found a way to not execute the last three minutes. And we have to be better.”

Especially in their backyard. Adelman’s crew is 14-11 at home with one game to go before a much-needed All-Star break. The Nuggets, who host Memphis on Wednesday night, have dropped six of their last 10 at Chopper Circle dating back to January 9. They’re on a pace for a 23-18 home record, which would be the franchise’s worst mark at Ball since 2021-22.

Remember the spring of ’22? Ah, yes. The tail end of an up-and-down season marked by key injuries to foundational players — kinda like this one, now that you mention it. Jamal Murray missed the entire campaign rehabbing his knee; Michael Porter Jr. played nine games, got hurt, and was shelved for the next five months. By the time the postseason rolled around, it was Nikola Jokic, Aaron Gordon and Boogie Cousins up front, and the last gasps of Will Barton and Monte Morris wearing Nuggets blue.

Denver limped into the playoffs as a 6 seed and was summarily dispatched by Steph Curry and Golden State, the eventual champs, over five games in the first round. It would get better. A lot better. But not until the Nuggets’ “Core Four” of Joker, Gordon, Murray and MPJ were finally reunited.

It’s too early to be panicked by the Nuggets losing their clutch gene at home. But history also tells us that, if they don’t pick it up after the break, it’s definitely not too early to be worried.

If 11 home losses by early February feels like an awful lot for a title contender, you’re absolutely right. Since 2005-06, only five of the last 20 Western Conference champions lost more than 10 home games during the regular season.

And only one of those — the 2023-24 Mavericks — lost more than 12 (25-16). The last NBA champ with 11 or more home defeats during the regular season was Golden State in ’17-18 (12 losses).

The Nuggets lost 15 at home during the entire ’24-25 regular season. They were 33-8 in ’23-24. They went 34-7 in ’22-23 as a prelude to that title run. Over Denver’s NBA history, only one Nuggets team that lost 13 or more home games during the regular season eventually got past the first round of the NBA playoffs — Dan Issel’s legendary ’93-94 No. 8 seed (28-13).

These Nuggets could sure use a stopper in the mold of the late, great Dikembe Mutombo. Jokic is the NBA MVP, the best pure hoopster on the planet. But Gordon is looking more and more like the most pivotal piece to the Nuggets’ title puzzle, especially on defense.

Over the last seven years or so, no duo in The Association has closed out tight games the way Joker and Murray could in crunch time. Yet according to NBA.com’s advanced statistics, that magic has been gone, baby gone of late.

In home games decided by five points or fewer, the Nuggets have a Net Rating of minus-5.1 points per 100 possessions. They’re scoring an NBA-best 138.2 points per 100 in those final three minutes. They’re also giving up a league-worst 143.8 points per 100 over those 180 seconds. Any stop.

Context: A year ago, the Nuggets were a plus-3.1 in those last three minutes of close home games, with a 116.7 Offensive Rating and a 113.6 Defensive Rating. In ’22-23, the eventual champs over the final three minutes of tight games put up a Net Rating of plus-31.6, an Offensive Rating of 118.4 and a Defensive Rating of 86.8.

The Nuggets of three seasons ago finished guests off without a shred of mercy. The current crop, by contrast, has been begging visitors to crawl back into the light.

Charlotte won here for the first time in December 2021. Atlanta won here for the first time since November 2019. Detroit won at Ball for just the third time in 14 years. Is this just the usual lurch into the All-Star Break, a comical stretch of lousy basketball karma … or something else?

“I don’t know. I think we lost a couple close ones at home …” Jokic told reporters Monday night. “But belief we can win a game? I don’t know. I don’t know what’s the answer.”

He’s got time. So does Adelman. But those who don’t learn from history are too often doomed to repeat it.

I found it impossible to repress the thought, as Giannis Antetokounmpo suddenly limped toward his locker room with 30 seconds remaining in a rock-bottom Bucks loss, that I might’ve just witnessed the Greek Freak’s last game in a Milwaukee uniform. Openly frustrated by his directionless team, yet stubbornly reluctant to divorce the city he loves by applying the blunt force of a trade demand, Antetokounmpo has been both the unstoppable force ���Ի���immovable object that defines this NBA trade season. Practically every buyer on the market was waiting for clarity in his saga before proceeding with other transactions.

Was it possible that Julian Strawther and the bottom half of Denver’s roster had pushed this to a symbolic breaking point? After procrastinating for more than three quarters, Antetokounmpo was trying to undo another listless Bucks performance in a game they couldn’t afford to lose when he reaggravated a calf strain.

My focus as a beat writer was on a different injury suffered earlier that night by Aaron Gordon. But as a chronicler and fan of this sport, I couldn’t help but wonder about the historical gravitas of the moment I was on hand to watch unfold. Tensions were already as icy as the minus-30 wind chill in Milwaukee, where Giannis is beloved but the team has heard boos recently. Now, Antetokounmpo was self-diagnosing a potential six-week absence in the home locker room. Fans were sent off into the bitter cold with more uncertainty to chew on, while the Nuggets celebrated another unlikely win without their own European superstar. The moods of the two franchises could not have been more different.

Like Milwaukee, Denver has won a championship this decade and fallen short of a second while trying to build around an all-time great big man. Unlike Milwaukee, Denver has not faded from the mix of contenders at any point in this unprecedented era of NBA parity. The Bucks have floundered when Antetokounmpo has been out of the lineup this season. The Nuggets have persevered for a month without Nikola Jokic. The Bucks seem destined for a lottery pick in the draft, whether they trade Antetokounmpo in the next week or wait for the offseason. The Nuggets are on pace for a fourth consecutive 50-win season.

Those juxtapositions feel resonant this week as Milwaukee’s front office finds itself backed into a corner it has desperately tried to avoid for years. Five days after the Nuggets and I were in town, ESPN’s Shams Charania reported the Bucks were open for business — even if a Giannis blockbuster doesn’t necessarily materialize until summer. Meanwhile, scuttlebutt around the league remains that Denver is almost definitely going to complete a trade before the Feb. 5 deadline. Just on an exponentially smaller scale.

The team’s aim, as I’ve reported in recent weeks, will be to duck the luxury tax with a minor deal and convert Spencer Jones to a standard contract so he can continue playing, as long as his money aligns with the Kroenkes’ end goal. The Nuggets would be able to treat Jones as an upgrade to their power forward depth for the stretch run and the playoffs. Aaron Gordon’s ongoing injury woes have increased the sense of urgency at that position. If Denver can manage to acquire another playable guy in the trade that����ap percolating this week, consider that a bonus.

The Nuggets have paid the luxury tax three consecutive years, meaning if they finish either of the next two seasons with a payroll that exceeds that threshold, they’ll trigger the repeater tax. This is basically a more dramatic tax penalty imposed on teams based on four-year windows, incentivizing owners not to spend excessively over the salary cap for prolonged periods of time. It’ll be far more difficult for Denver to evade the tax next season, when Gordon and Christian Braun are already owed significant raises and the Kroenkes’ willingness to spend will be tested on Peyton Watson. But for now, penny-pinching can be accomplished with relatively inconsequential basketball moves.

Not exactly thrilling stuff for fans, but nothing detrimental to the Nuggets’ championship hopes, either, as long as they do responsible business. Team officials view this roster as fully capable of challenging the first-place Oklahoma City Thunder in a playoff series, and coach David Adelman didn’t shy away on Sunday from the fact that he wants to use regular-season matchups with OKC to assemble data points and film for potential preparation.

It’s no secret around the league that Denver’s preferred candidate to offload is Zeke Nnaji, whose 2025-26 cap hit is about $8.2 million. Nnaji was a solid contributor in January, averaging 8.4 points and 5.1 rebounds in 22 minutes as an emergency center. He’s closed out multiple wins on account of his switchable defensive acumen. He was a two-way star in Denver’s memorable upset of the 76ers. He was responsible for guarding Antetokounmpo in the second half last Friday in Milwaukee.

The problem that has made him especially difficult to move — including last February when former general manager Calvin Booth tried — is the remaining time on his contract. Future cap space is valued at a premium these days. Nnaji has another two years on his deal after this season. For a player who’s usually out of the rotation on his incumbent team, that’s considered a lot to absorb. Maybe the perception would be different if his salary was expiring, but the reality remains that rival teams have long seen Nnaji as a negative-value contract. The Nuggets will likely have to attach second-round draft capital and/or another player if they want to salary-dump him in exchange for another reserve with a smaller cap hit.

Teams that are both willing and able to take on more salary than they send out can be difficult to find in today’s NBA, especially when the incoming player isn’t a proven commodity. There are more teams in financial situations that resemble Denver’s.

Take the Orlando Magic: $5.6 million over the tax, with salaries that team ownership might want off the books in Goga Bitadze ($8.3 million) or Tyus Jones ($7 million). Nnaji and picks for Jones might sound like a nice framework to Denver fans, but basketball reasons aside, why would the Magic agree to that when it means an increased payroll commitment this year and the next two? Same goes for the Cleveland Cavaliers, who already made cost-cutting progress last weekend and may still want to discard Lonzo Ball. Someone would have to get involved and play the middle man role, a team with less incentive to win this year and more incentive to absorb “bad salary” and stockpile draft picks.

This is all to say that whether Denver finds a two-, three- or 10-team deal, there probably needs to be a certain type of team involved. It’s noteworthy that first-year executives Ben Tenzer and Jon Wallace have already done business with Brooklyn for these exact reasons. Turning Michael Porter Jr. into Cam Johnson saved $17 million last summer and created room for depth. It cost Denver its only tradable first-round pick. Can that partnership be revisited?

If there isn’t a deal to be done involving Nnaji, Denver’s next two highest cap hits — excluding typical rotation players — are DaRon Holmes II at $3.2 million and Strawther at $2.7 million. Other options toward the bottom of the cap sheet are Jalen Pickett and Hunter Tyson. Pickett ($2.2 million) might be the most enticing of the bunch right now in terms of talent. He’s been a legitimately effective combo guard this month, often starting alongside Jamal Murray and shooting 39% from three. Strawther is the closest thing to a playoff-proven contributor of the candidates, though, based on a memorable performance he had in an elimination game last year vs. OKC.

Watson ($4.4 million), for what it’s worth, is highly unlikely to be moved at this point despite his status as a pending restricted free agent, from what I’ve heard. His breakout has been too meteoric, too enticing, for the Nuggets to sell high on him in the middle of a championship push, even at the risk of losing him in the summer. Even then, they’ll have matching rights on any contract offer Watson receives.

I would also be surprised if they part with one of their veteran role players this week like Johnson or Jonas Valanciunas, both of whom could feasibly be turned into cheaper replacements if we’re really thinking through every option. The new rule of thumb when prognosticating about the NBA trade deadline is to never say never — Luka Doncic is a Los Angeles Laker now — but the Nuggets are just too good to mess around with their possible playoff rotation over a tax bill. It would be a bad look. (That said, the extent to which they feel a need to scale back Valanciunas’s role in the playoffs could be an interesting variable.)

However the Nuggets end up maneuvering, their trade activity probably won’t appear on any national debate shows. It’ll probably be discussed less than certain trades that don’t even happen. Some front offices that recently had dreams of contending for a title are confronted by sobering, franchise-altering decisions. Who to keep, who to move on from. Memphis with Ja Morant and Jaren Jackson Jr. Dallas with Anthony Davis. Sacramento with Domantas Sabonis and Zach LaVine.

Milwaukee with Giannis. He’s the tipping point for the entire market. The reason it has mostly stalled so far. As he watched Kyle Kuzma’s final heave graze the rim last Friday from the bench, he could see as clearly as anybody in the building that he was part of a broken team.

The Nuggets are more fortunate. They can approach the next week from a stable position. With book-keeping margin moves in mind that shouldn’t jeopardize the basketball product they’re putting out. For half a decade, they’ve been one of the NBA’s most privileged organizations.

That usually means boring trade deadlines. Summertime is when that privilege will truly be under the microscope.