MINNEAPOLIS — With a resounding thud, a season of promise for the Denver Nuggets came crashing down Thursday when the No. 6 Minnesota Timberwolves eliminated the Nuggets in the first round of the playoffs.
If the Nuggets thought the 4-2 series result was painful, the summer ahead promises to be just as agonizing. Tough decisions loom, not only for the front-office duo of Ben Tenzer and Jon Wallace, but for Josh Kroenke, the team president and governor who holds the franchise’s purse strings.
At the top of their to-do list is determining whether this season-ending thud was merely a circumstantial collapse because of a bad matchup, or the slamming of a championship window.
Either way, Kroenke is facing a hefty tax bill. How steep will be determined by the direction the braintrust takes.
Even before filling out next season’s roster, the Nuggets are over the projected $201.5 million luxury tax threshold, with $204.5 million in guaranteed contracts owed to eight players, including the 26th overall pick in the June draft. That bill does not include the highly coveted Peyton Watson, who will be a restricted free agent, or current rotation players Tim Hardaway Jr., Bruce Brown, Spencer Jones and Jonas Valančiūnas.
The foundation on which the Nuggets’ championship hopes are built remains Nikola Jokić (age 31), Jamal Murray (29) and Aaron Gordon. Gordon turns 31 next season, and his health is a major concern — hamstring and calf injuries limited him to 36 games this year, which comes after he played only 51 games last season. His value as the heart-and-soul of the team goes only so far when he is in street clothes.
Gauging how to return to contention figures to be an excruciating exercise. Do the Nuggets exercise patience and run in back with the same group and go deep into the luxury tax? Or do they pivot and re-image, dangling assets like Gordon ($32 million next season), Cam Johnson ($23 million on expiring contract) or the up-and-coming Julian Strawther ($4.8 million) to upgrade the supporting cast?
It’s a difficult question because the Nuggets thought they had it all this season: depth, experience and a blend of rising youth to go with their vaunted trio. And for much of the season, their intuition was backed up with championship-level play even as the team was beset by extended injuries to Jokić, Gordon, Braun and Watson. Denver finished with 54 wins, the NBA’s No. 1 offense, the third seed in the Western Conference and a 12-game winning streak heading into the playoffs.
Everything was going as planned: Jokić became the first player to lead the league in rebounding and assists per game. A healthy Murray had the best of his nine NBA seasons, breaking the franchise record for 3-pointers and earning his first All-Star appearance and a likely spot on an All-NBA team. Hardaway shot a career-high 40.7 percent from 3-point range and finished third in the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year voting. Brown played in all 82 games.
And Watson emerged as a rising talent, potentially poised for stardom. The 6-foot-8 wing increased his scoring from 8.1 points to 14.6 while hitting 41 percent from 3. Even more important: on a team that finished 21st in defensive rating, Watson became a lockdown defender on the perimeter.
But disaster struck in a first-round matchup against the sixth-seeded Timberwolves, a team Jokić noted in 2024 was built to beat the Nuggets. Rudy Gobert’s length neutralized Jokić into a series where he had poor shooting and decision-making. Jaden McDaniels’ tenacity smothered Murray, limiting him to inefficient play. Gordon was severely hampered by a calf injury, which caused him to miss Game 3 and Game 5, and parts of Games 4. And Watson never played, unable to return from an April hamstring injury, his second of the season.
Meanwhile, the newcomers brought in to push the Nuggets over the top largely faded in the postseason. Even with a big Game 6, Johnson shot 31.4 percent from 3. Hardaway missed all seven of his 3s in Game 4. Brown had moments while averaging 6.3 points but disappeared Thursday, and Valančiūnas played just 25 minutes all series.
The Nuggets aren’t stuck — a team with Jokić and Murray will always be competitive — but they don’t have a lot of room to operate. Up ahead are some uncomfortable decisions.
The Nuggets didn’t just lose to the Timberwolves — they were bullied, physically and mentally. McDaniels mocked their defensive abilities and taunted them on the court. From top to bottom, the Timberwolves roster held a competitive edge. They played harder, were more physical, more aggressive. They simply looked like they wanted it more.
Those eye-opening inefficiencies highlighted in the Minnesota series raise more questions. The Nuggets already know they need more, and better defenders, but do they also need more heart? More physicality? More grit?
Those topics have certainly been on the table for much of this season.
“Coach (David) Adelman has been saying it from the beginning of the year: ‘We are known as being the finesse guys, the good guys. We have to make teams feel us,’” Wallace, the team’s co-general manager, told The Athletic. “He would say, ‘Don’t be afraid to be a little more aggressive, a little more demonstrative defensively. That’s another level we have to go to, especially in the playoffs when it becomes a halfcourt game.’”
The problem is the Nuggets will likely once again find themselves in the bargain bin in the free-agent market, which limits their options. Hardaway and Brown were signed for the veteran’s minimum last summer, and both may be asked back, but their returns do not solve the team’s questions about defense and physicality.
So, how can the Nuggets create some room to pursue players outside of the bargain bin? That’s where it gets tricky, because the Nuggets’ tradeable assets are undesirable.
The two most likely, but uncomfortable, options are trading either Johnson and/or Gordon.
Outside of Johnson’s expiring $23 million deal, Denver has unappealing options for other teams. Braun will be entering the first season of a five-year, $125 million deal that, if Denver is honest, likely carries some buyer’s remorse. Braun hasn’t been the same since a November sprain to his left ankle, and right now, it’s not hard to imagine the Nuggets’ brass kicking themselves for offering an extension to Braun, and not Watson, last summer.
The Nuggets will have the right to match any free-agent offer to Watson, but will the Nuggets be able to smartly match an offer in the $20 million to $25 million range, considering how deeply it will put them into the tax and potentially push them above the second apron? Other teams will know this and will likely make offers that cause Denver to sweat. Besides Watson’s free agency, the Nuggets will have to come up with money to sign Jones, the former two-way player who made their playoff rotation.
Some relief can be created by offloading forward Zeke Nnaji, but the demand is low to non-existent for a guy who made $8 million while playing 12 minutes a game this season.
That leads to the uncomfortable conversation of trading the beloved Gordon, who is nicknamed Mr. Nugget. Gordon has three years and $103 million left on his deal, and while it’s hard to imagine Gordon playing anywhere else, it’s getting harder to justify keeping him on the roster if he is continually unable to perform when it matters most.
Trade Aaron Gordon? He is a beloved teammate and fan favorite, but played in just 36 games this year after only 51 last season. (Photo by Francois Nel/Getty Images)
And then there’s the contractual matter concerning the man in the middle of it all — Jokić.
While team sources say there is no indication that the three-time league MVP has a wandering eye, and he said as much both on media day in late September and (in Serbian) during an interview in early March, the fact remains that he chose not to sign an extension last summer and, thus, can be a free agent in the summer of 2027 (he has a player option worth $62.8 million for the 2027-28 season). If, that is, he doesn’t sign an extension again during this offseason.
Jokić’s choice to not extend last summer made complete financial sense. The max he could have earned was a three-year, $212 million deal that paled in comparison to the four-year, $293 million deal he could sign this summer. But the dramatic nature of the Nuggets’ fall, coupled with the reality that every team in the league would line up for the chance to trade for (or sign) Jokić, means the entire league will be watching to see if he signs the extension.
If he does, it’s only natural to wonder whether the Nuggets might have some internal discussion about the second-highest-paid player on the roster: Murray. In contrast to Gordon, whose health struggles might make possible suitors wary if he were made available, the 29-year-old Murray is coming off the best regular season of his career. He is handsomely paid — three years and a combined $161 million left on his deal — and there is always robust market for elite scorers and playmakers. The danger is breaking up the Jokić-Murray two-man game that is widely considered the best in all the NBA.
The day before the playoffs started, Wallace and Tenzer took Strawther, their 24-year-old shooting guard, to lunch at Hillstone restaurant in Cherry Creek.
It was a keep-your-head-up meeting, a vote of confidence for the 2023 first-round pick out of Gonzaga. Like in his second season, when he came off the bench to score 15 points in Game 6 against Oklahoma City, they told Strawther to be prepared to come in and win one playoff game per series for the Nuggets.
Strawther ended up playing only 18 minutes in the series — but the message was clear: The front office believes in Strawther and knows his time is coming.
Strawther, a silky 3-point shooter with a deadly floater, is an example of the delicate task front offices face in threading the needle with up-and-coming players. In championship windows, veteran leadership and experience is needed, but development of youth can’t be ignored.
Denver this season tried to play hopscotch and hit both the experience and developmental boxes.
“We’re mature, but we are not old,” Wallace told The Athletic before the playoffs started. “You look at OKC and the San Antonios and yes, they are here, they have arrived, and they have a lot of good, young talent. But I think we have a good mixture of both maturity and some youth. Guys like Julian stepping in and playing spot minutes .. how Cam has come along this year.
“It’s why I’ve said over and over again: Player development is such a huge key in our game now.”
Last summer, while they were unsuccessfully negotiating a contract extension for Watson, the Nuggets told Watson to come to Denver and train with their staff.
“Peyton didn’t fight us, and he came,” Wallace said. “And look at his development. I’m extremely proud of him.”
If the Nuggets are able to create some room to sign Watson, and they see Strawther as the replacement for either Brown or Hardaway, a new youthful iteration of the Nuggets could be on the way. Or maybe Strawther is used as bait to help entice a team to take on one of the undesirable contracts, allowing the Nuggets to continue to prop open their championship window.
Those answers will be revealed in the coming months. Until then, the resounding thud of a lost season echoes.
