How Denver Nuggets Have Officially Killed Nikola Jokic’s NBA Title Chances

The Denver Nuggets and star point guard Jamal Murray agreed to a four-year max contract extension worth $208 million. On the surface, it’s a good deal for Denver and Murray.

But when digging deeper, it becomes apparent that it’s backed the Nuggets into a corner they may not be able to escape.

Denver won the 2023 NBA Championship, the only title in franchise history, behind three-time MVP Nikola Jokic and a core group of starters in Murray, Michael Porter Jr. and Aaron Gordon.

The Nuggets will hang near the top of the West as long as their Serbian star plays in The Mile High City, but with Murray’s money now on the books, Denver’s salary-cap situation moving forward becomes tricky and, in all likelihood, will prevent Jokic from winning another NBA championship.

The Nuggets Signed Jamal Murray to a Max Extension

Murray has been an ideal partner for Jokic since the 2017-18 season when the two began their superstar rises, individually and as a pair.

In 2018-19, Jokic averaged a double-double for the first time, Murray averaged career-highs in points, assists and rebounds and Denver finished second in the Western Conference.

In 2020-21, Porter Jr. and Gordon joined the party, and two years after that, the team broke through and beat the Miami Heat in five games to win the 2023 title.

It was a slow and steady climb filled with injuries and setbacks, but Jokic and Murray dominated during that postseason run and showed what they could do at peak form. However, as steadily as things rose early in the decade, they’ve declined just as steadily in the two years since.

The Nuggets Have Been Fiscally Irresponsible

The year the Nuggets won the title, Bruce Brown appeared in 80 regular-season games, which led the team.

His 11.5 points, 4.1 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 1.1 steals per game don’t jump off the page, but he was one of the best glue guys in the NBA — as evidenced by the two-year, $45 million deal he signed that summer with the Indiana Pacers.

The Nuggets had lost the best player on their bench, which put a serious dent in their chances of repeating.

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope was a regular starter for Denver in that title-winning season, as well as last year, as the team tried to return to the mountaintop. As one of the league’s premier 3-and-D players, Caldwell-Pope was critical to head coach Michael Malone’s plans.

Just as Brown left the previous offseason, Caldwell-Pope moved on and signed with the Orlando Magic as a free agent, agreeing to a three-year, $66 million contract to bring his championship experience to a rising team in the East.

Two crucial pieces to Denver’s 2023 team had left in consecutive offseasons. Ownership could have shelled out the cash to keep Caldwell-Pope this summer, but the move would have put the franchise past the second apron, meaning a heavier luxury tax penalty and more limited roster moves.

It would also have meant the starting five that won a championship together would have remained intact.

The most significant question raised in any conversation about the Nuggets’ salary issues is what the franchise decided to do with Porter Jr.

Coming off a breakout season in which he averaged 19.0 points on 54/45/79 shooting splits, Denver signed the then-22-year-old to a five-year max deal.

Some in the NBA felt the Nuggets jumped the gun, giving a player with injury issues — he missed his entire rookie season recovering from a back injury — such a large contract after playing well for just one season.

The 6-foot-10 forward has averaged 16.6 points and 6.3 rebounds over the ensuing three seasons as he proves to be an efficient scorer next to Murray and Jokic. But is that worth $180 million over five years?

Locking up Jokic long-term was a no-brainer, and now Murray is also in the fold as the Nuggets’ third max player. Maybe if the team hadn’t gone all-in on Porter at the first chance and compromised on a more reasonable contract, keeping Brown and/or Caldwell-Pope would’ve been an easier pill to swallow.

Instead, those three are locked into max contracts through the 2026-27 season, per Spotrac.

Additionally, having already lost Brown and Caldwell-Pope, Gordon has a $23 million player option for next season that he’ll almost certainly opt out of to find a bigger deal.

Does ownership decide Gordon is worth the money when it was willing to pass on Brown and Caldwell-Pope?

A recent report from ESPN‘s Zach Lowe on The Lowe Post Podcast (h/t Bleacher Report) stated that Malone and Denver’s front office “aren’t exactly seeing eye to eye.”

May that have anything to do with the coach’s key veterans exiting one by one, leaving him with a young, inexperienced bench?

Porter Jr.’s questionable extension and now Murray’s max deal, which Denver essentially had to offer despite the 27-year-old’s growing injury history, have shoved the Nuggets into a financial corner.

With rising stars like Anthony Edwards (whose Minnesota Timberwolves beat Denver in last year’s playoffs) and the Oklahoma City Thunder at the top of the West, Jokic and the Nuggets may not be able to fight their way out of that corner.